Rabbi Irwin Kula of the National Center for Jewish Learning and Leadership says Yom Kippur and the High Holidays are about life, not death. The paradox, he says, is that "one of the great ways to focus ourselves on life is to think about death."

"On Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur thousands of people gather together and go through many, many prayers in which we ask ourselves, how have I done?"

"Judaism is packed with symbols. The shofar is one of the main symbols that people identify with, you know, in terms of the High Holidays" says Rabbi Chaim Hershkowitz of Chabad's Jewish Children's Museum.