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How Do You Count an Omer?

May 5, 2016

       How do you count an Omer?  At the end of the second seder we begin one of the most arcane rituals in Jewish religious practice.  It is also one of the easiest mitzvoth  to observe.  I have a soft spot for arcane rituals.  In most cases they are the most ancient rituals.  They appear arcane precisely because they are connected to practices involving the Temple in Jerusalem, thus their cultural context is entirely absent.

        Yet, certain ideas are clearly articulated by this ritual and not only continuing to observe it, but enhancing it, has the potential of enhancing our contemporary spiritual quest.

        A spiritual journey is, in fact, what the ritual implies.  The fact that this journey begins at the seder or more properly on the day after the Exodus (the second seder being a consequence of late diaspora practice) demonstrates that the journey begun on the night of the Exodus will not culminate until seven weeks have passed.  It would be nice to justify this journey, as tradition overwhelmingly has, as culminating with the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai at Shavuot.  Unfortunately the biblical text makes no such connection. Shavuot is not identified with the Sinai revelation until later Rabbinic interpretation endeavored to bestow some raison d’etre for Shavuot that the Torah apparently failed to provide.  Or so it would seem.

        Obviously, the raison d’etre for Shavuot was clear to the biblical audience and needed no bolstering by recourse to either history or theology.  It is that original raison d’etre that I’d like to suggest with the thought that in the end it remains more compelling than those later imposed on it.

        The offering of an omer of barley at the beginning of Pesach is, first of all, connected to the essential agricultural cycle by which Israel lived.  The barley harvest ended just before Pesach.  However, eating or otherwise making use of the bounty of the harvest was postponed until Shavuot – seven weeks later – just at the time that the wheat harvest had come in.  Then and only then would the Israelite farmer recount the sacred history beginning with Jacob’s descent into Egypt (my father was a wandering Aramean…) and acknowledging the redemption from slavery that is only a full redemption when Israel has possessed its land and turned to the peaceful pursuit of planting, harvesting and worshiping in gratitude.  For the biblical writer the culmination of the Exodus is not revelation, but habitation.  

        There is much we can still learn from this original context, some of which may resonate with our contemporary predicament more than even the idea of the revelation of Torah –  an event that, after all, the Torah itself does not designate as reasons for a sacred occasion.

        First, that the inhabitation of the land of Israel is the goal of the miracle of Israel’s redemption.  However, messy that habitation was in years past or at present, learning to live as a holy people on a land made holy by that people remains at the top of the Jewish agenda.

        Second, the process of habitation takes time.  Even as the land begins to give up to bounty, the Jew is cautioned to refrain from considering it available for his or her disposal.  Patience and forbearance must replace the gluttony of the slave mentality.  Truly redeemed people can postpone satisfying their appetite.

        Third, the ability of human beings to live in the rhythms of nature is the key to ultimate freedom.

        Each of these implications drawn from the biblical Shavuot and the counting of the Omer can give rise to new customs to be associated with the commandment to count off each day during this period.  We might spend a moment each night as we count evaluating what we are doing to enhance the habitation of the land, defending our right to it even as we critique the ways in which we have been complicit in its failures in vision.  We might reflect on the patience, forbearance and gratitude that are needed in raising the cultural discourse both in Israel and the United States.  Each night we might commit to a specific act by which we might contribute to this process rather than exercising our appetite to eat the bounty that both lands have made possible.

        Finally, we might use a few minutes each day to rediscover nature in time, speech and space by putting aside the ubiquitous devices that separate us from that natural rhythm.  Could we count the Omer by turning off our screens each day for ten minutes?  Surely a revelation will follow.

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