The Calendar of Time

The Calendar of Time

There are all sorts of idioms in the English language concerning time. Time flies when you’re having fun, time is fleeting, just in time; too many more to list. It seems that time does go by faster each year and as we grow older. I am on my way to the airport now to pick up my son at the completion of his first year of college. I’m sure we just moved him in when I blinked, and now the year is over.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel observed that “Judaism is a religion of time aiming at the sanctification of time.” Parashat Emor gives details of the calendar of sacred celebrations by which Jews have sanctified time. We do so because the Torah commands us to set aside days for enjoying and sharing the sanctity of these holy days together, without work to distract us. These days include weekly Shabbat celebrations of course, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and the Shalosh Regalim festivals; Pesach, Shavuot and Sukkot. Additionally, there is discussion of the period of time in which we are now; the counting of the Omer from Pesach to Shavuot. G-d tells Moses to present the people with the moadei Adonai, the sacred times or occasions from G-d that they are to observe. 

We currently find our Jewish calendar in the middle of the counting of the Omer. This occurs daily for 7 weeks between the first day of Pesach and Shavuot. Why this time period? There are several possible answers to this. Since the Jewish people were farmers and shepherds, one suggestion is that 7 weeks would be the period of time it takes for the barley crop to grow ready to be harvested. With this thought, G-d orders Moses to tell the people that as they harvest their fields, they are to leave the edges and the fallen gleanings in the fields for the widow, the poor and the stranger. In this way, everyone may keep their dignity in the harvest, by being able to care for themselves from the bounty of the community. 

The 7-week period culminates with the festival of Shavuot. It is a festival celebrating the successful harvest, and also the giving of the Torah to the people Israel. Shavuot is also called Chag ha-Bikkurim and Zeman Matan Toratanu. The people brought their first crops and cattle to the Temple for sacrifice. Again, these days have been declared holy days by G-d, where there is to be no work. So how did Shavuot shift from a holiday of celebration of the harvest to a holiday where we celebrate the people of Israel receiving the Torah? Here is one theory from the rabbis from the Talmud: The rabbis point out that Israelites arrived at Mount Sinai “on the third new moon” after their Exodus from Egypt. They camped there for three days, and spent another three days creating boundaries around the mountain. This brought the date to the sixth of Sivan, which coincides with fifty days after the beginning of Pesach. To the rabbis of the Talmud, this proves that Shavuot is also the day that the Israelites received the Torah at Mount Sinai. (Shabbat 86a)

If we think of Shavuot as Zeman Matan Toratenu, it celebrates the sacred moments at Mount Sinai when the Jewish people received and committed themselves and all future generations to the Torah. We consider the Torah a “tree of life”; the people responded with the words of Proverbs 3:18, Etz Chayim Hei. This was a revelation, and G-d declared Shavuot another holy day where there is to be no work, another example of sacred time.

Our people have many days in our calendar of sacred time. These days become a time where we can leave the secular world for a brief period, and devote ourselves to our family, ourselves and most importantly, to our G-d. They are a time for prayer and introspection, for celebrating the gifts that G-d has given our people, to remember our history and to celebrate the future of the Jewish people.

Shabbat Shalom.
Cantor Toby Schwartz