Rosh Hashanah LaBehemot: The New Year for Animals and Hashem’s Care for His Creatures

The Mishnah’s four new years

The first mishnah of tractate Rosh Hashanah lays out the calendar:

There are four new years. On the first of Nisan is the new year for kings and for festivals. On the first of Elul is the new year for the tithe of cattle; Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Shimon say, on the first of Tishrei. On the first of Tishrei is the new year for years, for the sabbatical years and jubilees, for planting and for vegetables. On the first of Shevat is the new year for trees, according to Beit Shammai; Beit Hillel say, on the fifteenth of it.

The unattributed opinion that sets the animals’ new year on 1 Elul is understood by the Talmud as that of Rabbi Meir.¹ Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Shimon disagree and place it on 1 Tishrei, with the new year for years.

Why a new year for animals?

A “new year” in this sense is a cut-off date. The Torah commands that tithes be given “year by year” (Deuteronomy 14:22), and the sages understood that produce of one year may not be tithed on behalf of another. The same rule applies to the tithe of cattle: animals born in one tithing year are counted together and may not be combined with animals born in the next. So someone had to decide when the year begins.²

The Gemara’s reasoning

The Babylonian Talmud explains the dispute from a verse in the Psalms:

The pastures are clothed with flocks; the valleys also are covered over with corn; they shout for joy, they also sing.

According to Rabbi Yochanan, both sides read this verse as describing the breeding season of the flocks, but they connect it to different months. Rabbi Meir holds that the sheep mostly conceive in Adar, when the valleys are covered with grain, and give birth in Av, five months later; therefore the new year for their tithe should come immediately after, on 1 Elul. Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Shimon hold that they conceive in Nisan and give birth in Elul, so the new year should be 1 Tishrei. Rava adds that the real dispute is how closely to compare the tithe of cattle with the tithe of grain, which Deuteronomy 14:22–23 mentions together.³

The halacha was not finally settled by the Mishnah’s order. Rambam rules like Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Shimon, that the year for the tithe of cattle begins on 1 Tishrei; other medieval authorities, such as the Meiri, followed Rabbi Meir.⁴ The Mishnah also records Ben Azzai’s solution to the uncertainty: animals born in Elul are tithed by themselves.⁵ Calendars list 1 Elul, the Mishnah’s first opinion.

The tithe of cattle in the Torah

The commandment itself is brief:

And concerning the tithe of the herd, or of the flock, even of whatsoever passes under the rod, the tenth shall be holy unto Hashem. He shall not search whether it be good or bad, neither shall he change it.

The tithe of cattle, ma’aser behemah (מעשר בהמה), was different from the other tithes. It was not given to the Levites or the poor. The tenth animal became holy and was brought to Jerusalem as an offering of lesser holiness: its blood and fats were placed on the altar, and the owners ate its meat in the holy city with their families.⁶ It could not be redeemed or exchanged. The Tanakh mentions it again in the days of King Hezekiah, when the people “brought in the tithe of oxen and sheep” (2 Chronicles 31:6).

The Mishnah describes the counting. The young animals were gathered into a pen with a narrow opening, so that they had to come out one by one, while their mothers stood outside calling to them. As each passed under the shepherd’s rod, he counted, and the tenth was marked with red ochre and declared holy.⁷ The tithe was taken before each pilgrimage festival.⁸

The image of the flock passing under the rod became a picture of Hashem’s own care and judgment. Ezekiel prophesies, “I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant” (Ezekiel 20:37). Jeremiah promises that in the restored land “shall the flocks pass again under the hands of him that tells them” (Jeremiah 33:13). And on Rosh Hashanah the Mishnah teaches that all who come into the world pass before Hashem kivnei maron, a difficult phrase that the Talmud explains as “like sheep”; Rashi says, like the sheep counted one by one for the tithe.⁹ The great High Holiday poem Unetaneh Tokef takes up the image: “As a shepherd examines his flock, making his sheep pass under his staff, so do You cause to pass, count, and number every living soul.” (Some scholars think maron originally meant a troop of soldiers, but the sheep reading is ancient.) So the forgotten new year of the flocks lives on in the Days of Awe.

Why the tithe of cattle lapsed

After the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, the sages ruled that the tithe of cattle should no longer be separated. A tithed animal was holy and could only be offered on the altar; without the altar, there was a danger that people would slaughter it outside the Temple, shear it, or work it, all of which are forbidden. It was better not to consecrate it at all.¹⁰

The modern revival

In the early twenty-first century, Jewish educators and animal-welfare advocates began to revive the date in a new way. Informal celebrations began around 2009 at a Jewish farm in the United States, with blessings of animals and a shofar blast for Rosh Chodesh Elul; from 2012 a coalition led by Jewish vegetarian and animal-protection groups proposed keeping 1 Elul as a day to reflect on the treatment of animals, and rabbis from across the Jewish movements, Orthodox and others, expressed support.¹¹

This is a reinterpretation, and it should be presented as one. The ancient day was a date for counting animals that would be offered and eaten; it was not a festival of animals, and the Mishnah does not attach any celebration to it. But the reinterpretation draws on something deeply biblical. The Torah that commanded the tithe of cattle also commanded Israel to care for its animals, and the beginning of Elul, the month of self-examination before the Days of Awe (see Selichot and the month of Elul), is a fitting time to ask how we treat the creatures in our care.

Tza’ar ba’alei chayim: the Torah’s compassion for animals

The sages gathered the Torah’s commandments about animals under the principle of tza’ar ba’alei chayim (צער בעלי חיים), “the suffering of living creatures”, which a person must not cause and should relieve.

Help the fallen animal. “You shall not see your brother’s ass or his ox fall down by the way, and hide yourself from them: you shall surely help him to lift them up again” (Deuteronomy 22:4). Even an enemy’s donkey collapsing under its burden must be helped (Exodus 23:5). The Talmud debates whether the duty to relieve animal suffering is from the Torah itself or a rabbinic enactment, and concludes that it is from the Torah.¹²

Let the working animal eat. “You shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the corn” (Deuteronomy 25:4). An animal that works beside the harvest may eat from it.

Let the animals rest. The Sabbath is for them too: “on the seventh day you shall rest: that your ox and your ass may rest” (Exodus 23:12; compare Deuteronomy 5:14).

The righteous know their animals.

A righteous man regards the life of his beast: but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.

The sages drew practical lessons. The Talmud teaches that a person may not eat before feeding his animals, since Deuteronomy 11:15 mentions the grass “for your cattle” before “that you may eat”.¹³ It also tells that Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi suffered for years after he sent away a frightened calf that had fled to him on its way to slaughter, saying, “Go, for this you were created”, and that his suffering ended only when he showed mercy to a family of weasels, quoting “his tender mercies are over all his works” (Psalm 145:9).¹⁴ Rambam explains the commandments not to slaughter a mother and its young on the same day (Leviticus 22:28) and to send away the mother bird before taking the young (Deuteronomy 22:6–7) as teaching compassion, since animals feel the grief of their young.¹⁵

Moshe and David were shepherds before they led Israel (Exodus 3:1; 1 Samuel 17:34–35), and Rivkah was chosen for Yitzchak because she watered a stranger’s camels (Genesis 24:19). And the book of Jonah, read on Yom Kippur, ends with Hashem’s question: “should not I spare Nineveh… and also much cattle?” (Jonah 4:11).

Messianic reflection: the Father who sees the sparrow

Yeshua taught within this Torah of compassion. To reassure his disciples, he pointed to the smallest creatures:

Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear you not therefore, you are of more value than many sparrows.

Luke adds, “not one of them is forgotten before God” (Luke 12:6). The argument is a kal vachomer, from light to weighty: if the Father cares for each sparrow, how much more for you. It does not make the sparrow unimportant.

On the Sabbath, Yeshua asked, “Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath day?” (Luke 14:5; compare Matthew 12:11). Here he stands within a live Jewish debate. The Dead Sea community forbade lifting an animal out of a pit on the Sabbath, while the Talmud later permits bringing cushions and bedding to help it, on account of the animal’s suffering.¹⁶ Yeshua assumes his hearers would relieve the animal, and reasons from it to healing people.

In John 10, Yeshua describes himself in the language of the shepherds of Israel. The good shepherd “calls his own sheep by name, and leads them out” (John 10:3); he “gives his life for the sheep” (10:11). The picture comes from Ezekiel 34, where Hashem promises to seek His scattered flock and to set over them “one shepherd… even my servant David” (Ezekiel 34:23). Yeshua is that shepherd, sent by the Father and serving the Father: “My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all” (John 10:29). Like the shepherd counting under the rod, he knows each sheep; but he lays down his life for them.

Paul and the muzzled ox

Paul quotes Deuteronomy 25:4 to argue that those who teach the good news may be supported by those they serve:

For it is written in the Torah of Moshe, You shall not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treads out the corn. Does God take care for oxen? Or says he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written.

Read on its own, Paul’s question can sound as if he denies that the commandment is about oxen. Honestly, his application is not the plain meaning of Deuteronomy. But Paul is arguing as the sages often did, from the lesser to the greater: if the Torah protects a working ox, how much more a working person. He cites the same verse again, beside the saying “the labourer is worthy of his reward” (1 Timothy 5:18), with the same lesser-to-greater logic, and nowhere does he set aside the commandment for animals. The Torah’s plain meaning stands, and Paul’s application builds on it.

Prophetic hope: creation set free

The prophets see a future in which the conflict between creatures, and between humans and animals, is healed.

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them… They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Hashem, as the waters cover the sea.

This peace comes with the shoot from the stem of Yishai (Jesse), the Messiah son of David (11:1–5). Hosea adds that Hashem will make “a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground”, and will break the bow and the sword (Hosea 2:18). Commentators have read these passages literally and as images of peace among nations; Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook saw in them a future in which humanity no longer kills animals.¹⁷

Paul shares this hope. Creation, he writes, waits “for the manifestation of the sons of God”, because “the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now” (Romans 8:19, 21–22). The hope of the Brit Hadashah (the New Testament) is not escape from creation but its redemption, together with the resurrection of the dead and the restoration of Israel.

Remembering the day

• Mark Rosh Chodesh Elul with its prayers, and, if your custom is Ashkenazi, with the shofar that begins to sound each morning of Elul.
• Learn Mishnah Rosh Hashanah 1:1 and Leviticus 27:32–33, and the Torah’s laws of compassion: Exodus 23:5, 12; Deuteronomy 22:4–7; 25:4.
• Care for the animals in your keeping: feed them before you eat, and see to their health and rest.
• Support those who care for suffering animals, think about how the animals that feed and clothe us are treated, and teach children kindness to creatures.
• Pray Psalm 104 and Psalm 145, and begin the self-examination of Elul with gratitude to the Creator, whose “tender mercies are over all his works”.

See our calendar for this year’s date.