Omer 2024 Day 23

Day 22 | Day 24

Day 23: Gevurah in Netzach, Strength in Endurance

This week's Torah portion is Emor, where we read about counting the omer. This particular section tells us each of the holidays and the dates on which they fall. We're given a calendar date for each of them...except for Shavuot.

These are the set times of God, the sacred occasions, which you shall celebrate each at its appointed time: In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, at twilight, there shall be a passover offering to God, and on the fifteenth day of that month יהוה’s Feast of Unleavened Bread. You shall eat unleavened bread for seven days. (Lev. 23:4-6)

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And from the day on which you bring the sheaf of elevation offering—the day after the sabbath—you shall count off seven weeks. They must be complete: you must count until the day after the seventh week—fifty days; then you shall bring an offering of new grain to God. (Lev. 23:15-16)

We could easily calculate 50 days from the second day of Passover and know that Shavuot falls on the 6th of Sivan, but God doesn't give us that date as God does with all the other holidays. Instead, Shavuot is deliberately tied to Passover by the process of counting the seven weeks of the omer. We count the omer from Passover to Shavuot in order to mirror our leaving Egypt/slavery and reaching Sinai/receiving the Torah. It reflects our movement from slavery to freedom, from the narrow place (Mitzrayim) to God.

Those seven weeks give us time to have the narrow Egyptian/slavery mindset stamped out of us as a people. God recognizes that 400 years of life in Egypt made an impression on our collective mindset, and that it will take time to change ourselves and our thinking. By forcing us year-after-year to count the days from Passover to Shavuot, instead of just putting a date on the calendar, God forces us to be conscious of the connection between the two holidays. Receiving the Torah is all the more meaningful because of what God did for us in Egypt and because of our journey through the wilderness to reach God. It is a reminder that our people endured 400 years of slavery and 49 days in the wilderness before coming into the strength of our relationship with God.

Omer 2024 Day 21

Day 20 | Day 22

Day 21: Malchut in Tiferet, Leadership in Balance

This week's Torah portion is Emor, which begins with the laws regarding the proper behavior of the kohanim. Kohanim are not allowed to touch a dead body (with exceptions for certain relatives). There are limits to the ways they can cut their hair and beards and the people they can marry. Kohanim with disabilities (blindness, physical birth defects, or broken limbs) are not allowed to offer sacrifices.

When God speaks to Moses, it says "God said to Moses: Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron, and say to them... (Lev. 21:1)

But when Moses repeats the laws, it says, "Thus Moses spoke to Aaron and his sons and to all the Israelites." (Lev. 21:24)

Why tell all the people the laws that only pertain to the kohanim? Most of the commentaries (including Rashi, Steinsaltz, and Chizkuni), offer some variation on the theme of oversight. That the reason the people are told these laws is so that they can ensure that the kohanim observe them and keep themselves from bringing a sacrifice to a kohein with a broken leg.

Leadership needs to be balanced. Leaders need to have checks on their power, and also others who know their responsibilities of leadership to ensure those responsibilities are being fulfilled.