Shofar Iyar/Sivan 5772
Jewish Family Congregation www.jewishfamilycongregation.org
May 2012
From the Rabbi’s Desk If you check the Torah, you will find that the festivals listed for observance on the nascent Jewish calendar are Shabbat, Pesakh, Shavuot, Sukkot, Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur (Leviticus 23). The minor holidays that have been added to the calendar since the Torah was completed include Chanukah, Purim, Tu B’Shvat, Yom Ha-azma -ut (Israel Independence Day) and several somber days that commemorate historical events of great sorrow, like Tisha b’Av (which marks the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, twice on the same date), and Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Memorial Day).
or even cities, and the agricultural aspect of the Pilgrimage Festivals receded, so that, by the time of the rabbis (from about 30 CE onward), each of the festivals acquired a distinct connection to the story of the exodus which has come to dominate its significance ever since. This process was speeded up by the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, because, without the location for the sacrificial offerings, the festivals would have fallen into disuse, were it not for the other significance already attached to them.
The three harvest festivals were pilgrimage events, since the Torah required that all adult male Jews were to come to the Temple in Jerusalem to bring a special sacrifice for the occasion. Obviously, Shabbat is observed at home, and Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur were observed in one’s home community as well.
very tenuous dietary component as well (see below) so it is largely unobserved outside Orthodox circles.
The rabbis calculated that the Israelites arrived at the foot of Mt Sinai just before the sixth day of Sivan (based on the In antiquity, the major festivals were Pesakh, Shavuot and itinerary of their travels given in Numbers 33), seven Sukkot, all harvest festivals celebrated by the Canaanites weeks after their departure from Egypt. And so the agriwhen the Israelites arrived there, and ultimately turned cultural festival of the wheat harvest became the celebrainto occasions related to the Israelite escape from slavery tion of the giving of the Torah at Sinai. Today, since most in Egypt (it is worth noting that what we call “the High Jews have very little direct connection to the agricultural Holy Days” did not acquire that stature until much later). cycle, it is a lot easier for us to find meaning in celebrating But the harvest aspect of the festivals remained central to the giving of the Torah than in the harvest. the occasions because of the agrarian nature of the soci- So it is indeed odd that Shavuot has itself lost prominence ety that celebrated them. So, Passover was the celebra- in the awareness of non-Orthodox Jews, to the point that tion of the early barley harvest, Shavuot the early wheat we really have to work to explain its significance. There harvest, and Sukkot the general produce harvest. are very few songs associated with this holiday, and only a
The Reform Movement addressed this issue by adding to the festival of Shavuot the occasion of Confirmation. It makes good sense, for if we celebrate the giving of the Torah on Shavuot, we are really marking the beginning of
As the Israelites became sedentary following the settlement of the Promised Land, many of them lived in towns From the Rabbi’s Desk What’s Happening/May Service Schedule May Oneg Hosts President’s Message Early Childhood Center The Religious School Kids Ask the Rabbi
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