Shortly after sunset on the 29th of Adar in the year 1313 BCE, God commanded Moses regarding the mitzvah of sanctifying the new moon and establishing a lunar calendar. This is the first mitzvah that the Jewish people were commanded to observe as a nation.
Moshe had difficulty discerning the exact moment of the new moon's birth. Then God showed him the crescent moon of the month of Nisan, indicating the exact size it should be to consecrate the new month.
For the generations that followed, each new month was sanctified and began when two witnesses testified before the Sanhedrin (supreme rabbinical court) that they saw the molad, the new moon.
In the 4th century CE, the sage Hillel II saw that the Jewish people would no longer be able to have a calendar based on the Sanhedrin, so he, along with a rabbinical court, designed and established the calendar we use today, until the coming of the Messiah who, among other things, will reestablish the Sanhedrin.
Today, once a month, when the soft light of the moon grows in the sky, the special blessing called Kiddush Levanah (Sanctification of the Moon) is recited.
This prayer can only be recited three days after the new moon, called molad in Hebrew. However, the custom, according to Kabbalah, is to wait a week. Once fifteen days have passed since the new moon, the blessing can no longer be recited. The best time to do so is immediately after Shabbat, when the person is dressed in Shabbat clothes.
This is not a praise of the moon, but of its Creator, for the fantastic work we call astronomy. The moon has the clearest and most obvious monthly cycle, so we take advantage of its rebirth to thank God for the entire star system. Blessing the moon is like receiving the light of the Divine Presence.
Furthermore, the Jewish people are compared to the moon, which waxes and wanes, just like the history of the Jewish people. Blessing the moon at its renewal is a way of renewing our faith that God's light will soon fill the earth and the Jewish people will be redeemed from exile.
Hello, good morning. I would like to request the New Moon prayer in Spanish and Hebrew phonetics. Please send it to me as soon as possible. Thank you.
My daughter, for a religion project, has chosen Judaism from among several religions and is particularly interested in the moon prayer.
Since we couldn't find it anywhere, we would be deeply grateful if you could send us the prayer in Spanish.
They have very little time to present it.
Thank you very much.תודה רבה
Hello, this site has a Sephardic version:
http://www.shalomhaverim.org/bircat_halevana.htm
Greetings!
Look for the siddur birkat shelomo
Thank you very much. Shalom aleichem.
Good morning and Shavua Tov, Rabbi... Jewish women are forbidden to look at the moon and...
To the moon?