In its accounting of the different holidays, the Torah commands:
And you shall count for yourselves, from the morrow of the rest day from the day you bring the omer as a wave offering seven weeks; they shall be complete (Vayikra 23:15)
While we know that all if the holidays that make up the Jewish calendar and the events we commemorate are related to each other, there is no clearer connection between two holidays as the link between Pesach and Shavuout. So connected are these two moments in the year that the name of the second holiday is literally called Shavuout (weeks) to indicate that it is a celebration that comes only after the completion of the seven-week count from Pesach.
In this light, Chazal tell us that just as Shemini Atzeret is the final stage of Sukkos, Shavuout is the final moment of Pesach. If the two are really like one extended holiday, then the entire period of Sefirat HaOmer (the count between the two holidays) is a chol hamoed of sorts – a time that should be filled with rejoicing as we transition from one celebration of freedom to the most monumental celebration of the year.
And yet, amidst this celebratory and anticipatory time we commemorate a great tragedy of our history when the students of the great Rabbi Akiva were punished for the lack of respect they showed one another. As we read through this parsha that so highlights for us the power of time and the importance of embracing the moment during these appointed times, how do we understand this overlap. How do we psychologically and practically respond to this paradoxical experience of time – what should we feel, and what should we do?
The question becomes deeper when we are reminded of the Jewish law that prohibits an individual from sitting shiva on Shabbat or Yom Tov – reminding us that one is not permitted to be mournful on a day that we are supposed to be inherently happy. So how can we simultaneously be celebrating?
It can be no coincidence that the greatest Torah scholars of a generation were killed during the moments preceding Matan Torah at the same time as we mourn a great tragedy – but what is it that we learn from this?
Rabbi Yaakov Thaler offers a profound answer to this question. He suggests that the reason these Torah scholars were punished specifically at this time is not necessarily because their behavior worsened in the weeks between Pesach and Shavuos to warrant their sudden punishment, but because it was during this time that they should have been working on bettering themselves and preparing themselves for the Shavuos experience. In other words, it was not they who changed, but the times – it was their failure to change with the times that brought about their punishment.
In this light we can better understand the nature of the unique time period we find ourselves in. We are anticipating the rejoicing, but we cannot yet celebrate in full because we must earn the Shavuot experience, we must first ready ourselves to accept the Torah. This is why the holiday has the unique name of Shavuout – to teach us that the day itself is not meaningful and uplifting unless we have utilized the weeks leading up to it to propel ourselves forward in order to be in the proper condition to re-accept the Torah as we do each year.
Rabbi Liebowitz explains that with this approach to the holiday of Shavuot and the Sefira period leading up to it, we can also understand why we don’t follow the traditional way of counting down towards this most exciting and most significant day in the Jewish calendar, but instead we count up. We do not passively count the days as they pass before us, but instead we must actively be involved in the process. Each day we count, we are accounting for what we accomplished in that day. And so, the counting of Sefira serves as a constant reminder of the importance, the value, and the potential of time.
For the students of Rabbi Akiva, it was their kavod for one another that they had to be working on, for each of us it is something different that we must work on to refine ourselves to become vessels that can uphold the holiness of the Torah. Of course there is a deep lesson to be learned from the fact that we have not seven days, but seven weeks for this process – reminding us that indeed changes we hope to make in ourselves takes constant effort, it takes time.
And so we can understand the qualification at the end of the verse: And you shall count for yourselves…and they shall be complete. It is not as much a concern of time as it is how we make use of that time – it is about maximizing these weeks to prepare ourselves for a re-acceptance of the Torah with all its commands to be kept and lessons to be learned. Did we spend these weeks internalizing one of the most fundamental truths and realities about living a torah life –that it takes effort and time to learn the lessons and even longer to live those lessons.
And perhaps that is what is most fundamental to internalize and to accept as we ready ourselves to re-accept the Torah. After all, it is in this parsha that Hashem commands us to sanctify the times - Hashem appoints the times for the chaggim but that is upon us to sanctify the time- in order to do this we must know the importance of time and to consider how we commemorate it, how we spend it, and how we sanctify it. What better way to internalize this lesson than to be reminded with the count of the Omer each night – whether we are still in the count or not may we all consider these lessons so that we can make the most of this unique and opportune time in the Jewish calendar! Shabbat Shalom, Taly
