Shortly before sundown on the 29th of Adar, G-d commanded Moses regarding the mitzvah of sanctifying the crescent new moon and establishing a lunar calendar. This is the first mitzvah the Jews were given as a nation.
Moses had difficulty envisaging the moon's appearance at the exact moment of its monthly rebirth. After the sun set, G-d showed Moses the crescent new moon of the new month of Nissan, showing him the precise dimensions of the moon at the moment the new month is to be consecrated.
For the generations that followed, each new month was ushered in when two witnesses testified before the Sanhedrin (rabbinic supreme court) that they had seen the molad, the new moon. In the 4th century CE, Hillel II foresaw that the Jews would no longer be able to follow a Sanhedrin-based calendar. So Hillel and his rabbinical court established the perpetual calendar which is followed today -- until Moshiach will come and reestablish the Sanhedrin.
Links::
Lunar Time
Rosh Chodesh
The Molad
A few months after its creation, Napoleon's "Sanhedrin" (rabbinical supreme court) was dissolved. The Sanhedrin was created to approve certain religious regulations requested by the French "Assembly of Notables." The regulations were designed to blur the distinction between Jews and non-Jews.
The rulings of this pseudo-Sanhedrin were never adopted by Jewish communities.
Link:: Napoleon Bonoparte
Creativity is an exercise in paradox.
On the one hand, creativity is the artist’s expression of self.
Yet, on the other hand, the artist must remove himself from his art, with discipline and with skill, so that his creation will appear real, as though it has a life of its own.
Creation of a universe from the void is the absolute paradoxical act.
It is the absolute expression of absolute existence, as existence emerges without bounds.
And it is the absolute of restraint, as the Creator conceals His presence so that this creation will perceive itself as its own being, and not simply a fantasy of its Creator.
In the very existence of this universe is manifest the ultimate oneness: That light and darkness, being and not-being converge at a point where all is one.
So that even when there is a heaven and an earth, there is nothing else but that elusive point we know as G‑d.