There was a time, before “business casual” became the norm for office dress, when I would walk into shul on Rosh Hashana dressed as though I was heading into a formal negotiation. As a practicing attorney, I understood the importance of preparation, presentation, and persuasion. Likewise, each year, I came to shul in my best corporate suit prepared to do business—to advocate and make my case before God.

Perhaps my Rosh Hashana mindset was somewhat irreverent. But in retrospect, it may not have been entirely misguided. After all, Chana, whom we read about each year on Rosh Hashana, is a woman who appears before God to do precisely as I intended: make her case and come away with a “win.”

Chana comes to the Mishkan with something deeply personal and unresolved. She is not described as bringing an offering or expressing praise. She has a specific request: a child. She presents it with intensity and vulnerability, and ultimately, her prayer is answered: “And the Lord remembered her… and Chana conceived and she bore a son” (Shmuel I 1:19–20).

• Why Chana on Rosh Hashana?

Chana’s story, which we read as the haftarah on the first day of Rosh Hashana, reflects several central themes of the day. Both Chana and the day of Rosh Hashana are defined by tefillah. In fact, Chazal deem Chana to be the prototype for effective prayer. The Gemara (Berachot 31a) derives core elements of the Amidah from her behavior: she “spoke upon her heart,” establishing the requirement of internal sincerity; “only her lips moved,” teaching that the Amidah is recited silently; and her focused, almost total absorption models the level of concentration expected in prayer. Chana did not perform tefillah—she created it.

Rosh Hashana is also called Yom HaZikaron, the Day of Remembrance, and Chana’s story echoes this theme when the text explicitly states: “And the Lord remembered her.” The Gemara (Rosh Hashana 11a) expands this idea, teaching that several barren women—Sarah, Rachel, and Chana—were remembered by God on Rosh Hashana. The day is not only about proclaiming God’s kingship; it is about Divine remembrance of individuals and their hopes and dreams.

While it is clear that Chana and her answered prayers are a thematic fit for the day, it also reflects something counterintuitive about how one approaches God on Rosh Hashana. Rosh Hashana is the day in which we annually commemorate God’s coronation as our King and His sovereignty over the world as its Creator. The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, observes that Rosh Hashana is associated with the theme of Malchuyot, or Kingship, because it is the day we coronate God as King. Chana, however, approaches Him not with grandeur and formality, but with vulnerability and direct communication (Likkutei Sichot, Rosh Hashana/Shabbat Teshuvah 5725). She offers no sacrifice, and no mandatory ritual. Instead, she brings only a deeply personal plea. And it is precisely that form of prayer that is answered and ultimately changes Jewish history with the birth of Shmuel.

• Chana and Eli: A Debate About the Nature of Prayer

If Chana represents the model for prayer, then her interaction with Eli HaKohen provides the framework for understanding the boundaries of that model. The text describes Eli observing Chana as she prays silently, her lips moving without sound, and he berates her by exclaiming, “How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Sober up!” (Shmuel I 1:14). This reaction raises an obvious question: If Eli genuinely believed that Chana was intoxicated in the Mishkan, why did he wait until she had completed her entire prayer before confronting her? A drunken presence in the Mishkan would surely require immediate intervention. 

Eli’s lack of immediate action suggests that Eli’s critique may not have been literal. Rather than accusing Chana of intoxication, Eli may have been responding to the form of her prayer—its intensity, its emotionality, its deeply personal focus. Such a display may have appeared inappropriate within the sanctity of the Mishkan. The Mishkan is a makom kadosh, a holy place, designated for avodah—structured service, reverence, and the acknowledgment of God’s greatness. It was not perceived to be the forum for subjective, emotionally driven, personal requests.

Chana’s response is not defensive; it is instructional and enlightening for Eli. She explains, “Oh no, my lord…I have drunk no wine or other strong drink, but I have poured out my soul before the Lord” (Shmuel 1:15). Her prayer, she insists, is not a lapse in decorum but an authentic act of recognizing God’s sovereignty. Indeed, the Lubavitcher Rebbe frames this exchange as a fundamental disagreement about tefillah. Eli views personal petition as inappropriate in the presence of God’s holiness. Chana demonstrates that when properly framed, such a petition is not only appropriate—it is an essential component of avodat Hashem, service to God. 

• The Tension Within Rosh Hashana

The disagreement between Eli and Chana mirrors a broader tension within Rosh Hashana itself. On the one hand, the day is defined by Malkhuyot—the coronation of God as King. The liturgy minimizes personal requests and instead emphasizes God’s sovereignty, transcendence, and authority. On the other hand, Rosh Hashana is also a day of judgment for each and every living being. Individuals stand before God with very real needs—life, health, livelihood, and peace. The instinct to ask is both natural and unavoidable. The question, then, is not whether we may ask, but whether asking is compatible with coronation, the theme of the day.

In our daily prayers, this tension is present but less pronounced. When we say the amidah, we begin with praise to God and then proceed to a structured series of requests. But Rosh Hashana is God’s special day of coronation. The day seems to demand a singular focus: the recognition of God as King. Eli’s position reflects that conventional thinking—the Mishkan is God’s special place where it is all about Him. Chana’s response challenges it.

• Request as Recognition of Sovereignty

Perhaps the resolution lies not in choosing between coronation and request, but in understanding the relationship between them. Additionally, our understanding of coronation is limited by the fact that we no longer experience true kingship and the power that it wields. Therefore, allow me to offer a modern day analogy—for illustrative purposes only. The dynamic of supplicant and sovereign is captured vividly in the opening scene of The Godfather. On the day of his daughter’s wedding, Don Corleone receives a series of petitioners. By custom, precisely because it is “his special day,” he cannot refuse their requests. Each petitioner approaches him with deference, carefully acknowledging his supremacy before presenting a deeply personal need. The requests do not detract from his power; they affirm it. The act of asking, in itself, is an expression of his authority. So too, on Rosh Hashana, it is specifically because we are coronating God as King that we bring our requests before Him.

Chana’s own tefillah reflects this orientation. She does not simply ask for a child; she situates her request within a larger framework of Divinity. She implores God, “If You will grant Your maidservant offspring… I will dedicate it to the Lord all the days of its life” (1:11). Her request is not an endpoint; it is a vehicle for avodat Hashem, her service to God. In this sense, Chana is not interrupting the coronation; she is participating in it. She is not just asking for something; she is aligning her needs and desires with God’s kingship and the Almighty’s very creation of those needs and desires.

• The “Business” of Rosh Hashana

Perhaps, then, my instinct, years ago, to come to shul “dressed for business” was not entirely misplaced. Rosh Hashana is, in a sense, a day of negotiation—but not in the adversarial way I once imagined. It is not about facing God as adversaries. It is about positioning ourselves correctly before Him and framing our requests in terms of His great capacity to fulfill them and our intention to dedicate the blessings bestowed upon us to the service of God.

We are not negotiating with God in the conventional sense. We are not persuading God to act against God’s will. Rather, we are aligning ourselves with it. We begin with coronation—with the recognition that God is the source of all existence. In fact, our need for sustenance as well as inherent longings, like Chana’s unfulfilled maternal instinct, were placed within us by our Creator. Our very needs were created by God and our prayers and requests are merely recognition that God is the one who fulfills them. 

With this construct, we come to crown the King. To declare, with humility, that God is the source of all life, all judgment, all possibility. And within that framework, we ask not as entitled claimants, but as subjects. Not as independent agents, but as God’s creations, intentionally made by God with individual needs and aspirations. Not in spite of God’s Day of Coronation, but because of it. 

Chana’s story therefore, reminds us that the deepest form of prayer is not choosing between coronation and request—but weaving them together. Perhaps that is what it means to truly be remembered. It is not merely a Day of Remembrance for God. God recalls us—but we too, remember who we are, standing before Him. Ready, once again, to do the most important “business” of all.