Before the calendar was set as we have it today, the first day of the month, Rosh Hodesh, was set by the court in Jerusalem based upon witness testimony. Two witnesses had to come forth and testify that they had seen the new moon. According to rabbinic tradition this halakha went all the way back to Moses upon Mount Sinai. Although in the diaspora we celebrate two days of the festival and two days of Rosh Hashanah (in Israel two days of Rosh Hashana are also observed), the underpinnings reasons are different.
When it comes to the festival, the court knew exactly when Rosh Hodesh was and could conclusively decide when the festival should be observed. That was all well and good for the communities in Israel who could receive this information in a timely fashion. However at one point in our history, the communities in Babylonia suffered a breakdown of communication leaving them in a quandary when to observe the holiday.
"Abaye said: On the contrary, It is reasonable to say in accordance with the opinion of Rav that the second day is observed as a Festival due to uncertainty, as we learned in a mishna (Rosh HaShana 22b): Initially, after the court sanctified the new month, they would light torches on the mountain tops, from one peak to another, to signal that the New Moon had been sanctified. After the Samaritans [Kutim] disrupted this method by lighting torches at the wrong times, the Sages instituted that messengers should depart to inform the people of the start of the month. Since the messengers could not reach all Diaspora communities before the beginning of the Festival, the Sages instituted that an additional Festival day should be observed there, due to the resultant uncertainty with regard to which day was the actual Festival day." (TB Beitza 4, Sefaria.org translation)
\Because of the doubt which day was actually the first festival day, the Babylonian Jewish community added the second day of the festival. If the first day was the holiday, then they didn't lose anything observing the second day as a holiday as well. If the second day of the festival was in actuality the holiday, then they observed the holiday and didn't lose anything by observing the day before.
The Gemara has an excellent question. Now that we have a fixed calendar there is no longer any doubt which day is the holiday. Why do traditionally observing communities still observe today's? "The Gemara asks: And now that we know the determination of the first day of the new month, what is the reason that we observe two Festival days in the Diaspora? Because they sent a warning from there, from Eretz Yisrael: Although now there is a fixed calendar and there is no uncertainty, be careful to observe the custom of your fathers that you received, because at times the monarchy will issue decrees of persecution restricting Torah study and the fixed calendar may be forgotten. And the people will come to have their proper observance of the Festivals be disrupted again. However, the fundamental halakha is that the observance of two Festival days is based on uncertainty." (Sefaria.org translation) The two days of the festival were considered two different sanctites and not one snctity consisting of a long day consisting of 48 hours.
TB Beitza 4b-5 discussion Rosh Hashanah is admittedly difficult and complex. Because the court set the calendar based on eyewitnesses, they knew exactly when the first of Tishri, Rosh Hashanah was. A different problem arose. What happened when witnesses carried and came very late in the day?
"As we learned in a mishna (Rosh HaShana 30b): Initially, the court would accept testimony of witnesses who saw the new moon to establish the first day of the new month. This system would also be used for the first of Tishrei, which is Rosh HaShana, and the court would accept this testimony on the entire thirtieth day of the month of Elul. Once, the witnesses tarried and managed to arrive only when the hour was late, and the Levites erred in the song. They were unsure whether to sing the weekday song or that of Rosh HaShana during the sacrifice of the afternoon daily offering, as it was unclear whether or not witnesses would arrive that day. From that point on, the court instituted that they would accept witnesses who came to testify that that day was Rosh HaShana only up to minḥa time, i.e., when the daily afternoon offering was sacrificed. If witnesses had not arrived by then, they would declare Elul a thirty-day month and calculate the dates of the Festivals accordingly.
"And if witnesses came from minḥa time onward, although the calculations for the dates of the Festivals began only from the following day, the people would nevertheless observe that day on which the witnesses arrived as sacred, and they would also observe the following day as sacred. On the second day, they observed Rosh HaShana in full, both by sacrificing its offerings as well as calculating the upcoming Festivals from that date. It is evident that the observance of two days of Rosh HaShana did not stem from uncertainty in the Diaspora as to when the Festival began. Rather, the Sages instituted that the two days of Rosh HaShana are one unit due to the inherent difficulty in determining the date of a Festival that is celebrated on the first of the month. " (Sefaria.org translation) In other words they observed the 30th day of Elul as Rosh Hashanah by folding it into the first day of Tishrei making it one long day or one sanctity.\
Even when Rabban Yoḥanan ben Zakkai enacted the receiving of witnesses all day long because the Temple no longer stood and the worship service there could not be impacted, he did not change the sanctity status of Rosh Hashanah as one long continuous day of 48 hours. "Even from the time of the ordinance of Rabban Yoḥanan ben Zakkai and onward, an egg remains prohibited (Proving that the two days Rosh Hashanah is really one sanctity-gg). What is the reason? May the Temple speedily be built, and the ordinance that testimony is accepted only until minḥa time will be restored, and people will say: Last year, didn’t we eat an egg laid on the first day of Rosh HaShana on the following day, the second Festival day of Rosh HaShana? Now, too, we will eat it, like last year. And they will not know the significant difference in halakha between the two cases, as last year the two days of Rosh HaShana were two sanctities, and now they are one long sanctity." (Sefaria.org translation)
The Reform movement only observes one day of the festival including only one day of Rosh Hashana. I assume they reject the Gemara's reasoning why two days are observed in the diaspora since the calendar is fixed and we know exactly when the holiday begins. Some Conservative synagogues only celebrate one day of the festival for the same reason as the Reform movement although they still observed two days of Rosh Hashanah. Some Conservative synagogues only celebrate one day of the festival because people voted with their feet. They could not gather a minyan on the second day of Yom Tov. Still other Conservative synagogues along with Orthodox synagogues observe two days of Yom Tov.
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