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5月27日 ShavuotThe festival of Shavuot (Pentecost) starts tomorrow evening. Unlike all the other festivals mentioned in the Torah, the date of Shavuot is not specified. Instead, the Children of Israel were commanded to count a period of seven weeks from the day following the Pessach (Passover) festival (hence the name Shavuot,meaning "weeks"). Like Pessach, Shavuot is a harvest festival. Thus, it is also known as Chag Hakatzir ("The Festival of the Harvest") and as Yom Habikkurim ("The Day of the First Ripe Fruits"), when it was customary to bring a thanksgiving offering to G-d for His bounty. But most importantly, Shavuot is Zman Matan Torateinu ("The Season of the Giving of our Torah").
Pessach is a spring festival, marked by the blossoming of flowers, but while the flowers are beautiful, it is only when the fruits ripen that they have a use and a purpose beyond mere beauty. In the same way, the Exodus from Egypt brought freedom to the Children of Israel, but it was a freedom without use or purpose - anarchy, in fact. Only when the Children of Israel accepted the Torah, and adopted a set of rules and a morality by which to live, did the flowers of freedom ripen into the fruits of nationhood.
You might ask yourself, why is Shavuot called "The Season of the Giving of our Torah" rather than "The Season of the Receiving of our Torah". The reason for this is that whereas we make the decision, daily, to accept the Torah and live by it (or not, as is, unfortunately, too often the case) the Torah was given by G-d once, and once only, on Mount Sinai, on the 6th day of the month of Sivan - a specific time and place.
In the Book of Exodus, Chapter 19, we read how the Children of Israel prepared to receive the Torah by purifying themselves for three days. Since then, it is the custom to spend the eve of Shavuot in all-night prayer and study - Tikkun Leil Shavuot. In modern Israel, outside ultra-orthodox circles, this often takes the form of lectures and symposia on the application of Torah and Halakha (Jewish Law) to topical questions arising from the problems presented by modern lifestyles and technology. For example, I noticed that tomorrow night, Jerusalem's Yeshurun Synagogue will host a number of lectures on subjects ranging from how to determine the moment of death according to Halakha (vitally important in an age when organ transplants are an accepted fact of life) to the Halakhic aspects of Operation Cast Lead.
Shavuot is when we read the Book of Ruth, the story of the most famous convert to Judaism in history. Her story takes place round about the time of the wheat harvest. We read about her gathering corn in the field of Boaz - for in Jewish law, the corners of the field, the fallen and forgotten sheaves, the gleanings, were to be left for the poor. Ruth, as we know, was the great-grandmother of King David. Thus, a foreign woman, a convert, was the ancestress of the most famous of the kings of Israel, the mother of the line from whom the Messiah will one day come. Furthermore, Shavuot, according to Jewish tradition, is the birthday of King David. It is also the day of his death.
One of the most beautiful of Shavuot customs is that of decorating the synagogue with flowers. In our synagogue in London, if my memory doesn't deceive me, they were always white flowers - lilies and so on. Here in Israel, I have seen this custom extended even to the extent that the supermarket was decorated with flowers and ears of wheat!
As with any Jewish festival worthy of the name
 , Shavuot too has its special foods. There doesn't seem to be any single authorised reason for the tradition of eating dairy foods on Shavuot but just as Purim wouldn't be Purim without Hamantaschen, Shavuot wouldn't be the same without cheesecake. Some claim that it is because light, dairy foods are more suited to the hot weather usual at the time of this early summer festival. Another explanation is that until the Torah was given, the Children of Israel did not have to abide by any special dietary laws. They did not, in short, have to "keep kosher" and so they ate meat even of animals which were later deemed "unclean". In consequence, their meat dishes were unfit, not kosher. Therefore, from the moment the Torah was given, they could no longer use those utensils until they had been ritually purified. But this they could not do on Shabbat or on a festival, so they had to make do with eating only dairy products until the festival ended. Whatever the reason - I just love cheesecake .When I was a child, I was entranced by an ancient Jewish legend, according to which, at midnight on the eve of Shavuot, the heavens split wide open and one may see the Almighty and all the heavenly host. At that moment, any wish one makes will be granted. Year after year, I struggled to keep awake, in vain. When I grew older, staying awake was no longer a problem, but I still never saw anything but a black night sky. In cloudy, rainy England, I couldn't even see stars. I realised then that to see this miracle, one had to be in Israel. But alas, when I came to Israel, I was again disappointed. Each year at Shavuot, midnight came and went - and still, nothing. I understood then that this vision was only given to those who spent the night studying and praying. Year after year, I have tried to approach midnight on Shavuot able to say, honestly, that I have been studying Torah, even if it's just a few verses.
I still haven't seen the heavens split open.
I don't despair.
Maybe this year... 4月7日 SunriseTomorrow will witness an event which, according to Jewish tradition, occurs only once every 28 years. At sunrise, the earth, the sun and the moon will be aligned in exactly the same places they were on the day they came into being, on the fourth day of Creation. Please note: tomorrow is Wednesday - the fourth day of the week. Hundreds of thousands of worshippers are expected to rise before dawn, to witness the sunrise and say special prayers, for tomorrow marks Birkat Ha'Hama - "The Blessing of the Sun" - marking the end of a 28 year solar cycle and the start of a new cycle. Even rarer, the event will take place on the eve of Pessach, in the middle of the lunar month, when the rising sun and the setting moon are both clearly and completely visible in the morning sky. In a way - and this is the way it has been explained to Jewish children for countless generations - one could say that tomorrow is the sun's birthday.
So I'd better go and get a good night's sleep now - I need to be up early tomorrow  .10月8日 No man is an islandTonight marks the start of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. In my last blog entry, I wrote that the Ten Days of Penitence, between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, are a time for soul-searching, and for repentance - not just for our own sins, but for those of the community as a whole. We are all responsible for each other, the Torah teaches us. "No man is an island. entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee." Thus wrote the poet John Donne.
True, each one of us makes his or her own choices. But how can we know in what way something we ourselves said or did, influenced the choices or the actions of another? How can we know if a careless word did not wound or cause harm in ways we never imagined? Rabbi Yisrael Meir Hacohen Kagan (known as the "Chafetz Chaim") wrote a whole book (by which name he is known) on the importance of guarding one's tongue. "Who is the man, desirous of life, who loveth many days that he may see Good? Guard thy tongue from Evil and thy lips from speaking guile. Stay away from Evil, do Good, seek Peace and pursue it." (Psalm 34).
We have all fallen into the trap of speaking evil at one time or another, whether it is the newspaper reporters who are quick to accuse, to spread rumours, to put people on trial in the Press before all the facts are known, or whether it is the private citizen, people like you and like me, who are quick to spread gossip, to apportion blame or to utter a harsh word without thinking how the seed may take root. We need to remember - just as a word of encouragement at the right moment can save a life, so the wrong word can push a fellow human being over the edge.
I have done my soul-searching and I think I know what is my besetting sin. I know what I need to correct in the coming year.
We are taught that Yom Kippur does not bring forgiveness from God, until we obtain the forgiveness of those whom we have hurt. So I would like to take this opportunity to send a message to all those I may have wounded or offended, whether intentionally or unwittingly, to say I am sorry and to ask for forgiveness.
גמר חתימה טובה לכל בית ישראל
4月16日 Birth of a NationIn three days, Pesach (Passover, for my non-Jewish readers) will be upon us. When we sit down at the Seder table on Saturday night, we will be part of a tradition that stretches back more than three thousand years. When we sit down at the Seder table, I am always conscious of the incredible fact that all around the world, at this very moment, millions of Jews are doing exactly the same thing, reading from the same book, the Haggadah, eating the same symbolic foods - the parsley, the charoset, the bitter herbs, the matza (unleavened bread) and it gives me a wonderful feeling of oneness, of identity with my people. The Chosen People.
And with good reason. Pesach marks the birth of the Jewish People as a nation. The Israelite tribes were driven to Egypt 400 years earlier by famine. In Egypt, they were forced into slavery. They left Egypt an unruly rabble of freed slaves but at Mount Sinai, they accepted a way of life and a destiny. It took forty years of wandering in the wilderness to meld them, but they entered the Promised Land a nation.
Our enemies do not recognise our nationhood. They claim that to be Jewish is to be part of a religion, not a People. But what is a People? Surely the essence of a People is a common history, language, culture. The Palestinians claim to be a People, even though, until the State of Israel was born, the notion of a Palestinian People did not exist and they considered themselves part of the Arab Nation. That was just 60 years ago. We Jews have considered ourselves to be a People since the Exodus from Egypt. We are a People, because we share a three thousand year old history. We are a People, because we share a three thousand year old culture. We are a People because we share a three thousand year old Law. We are a People, because we share a three thousand year old way of life. Because Judaism is not just a set of religious laws, it is a way of life, a legal, moral, cultural and social framework encompassing all facets of life.
We are a People, because we share a common memory, a memory that is older even than the Exodus, that stretches back at least five hundred years before that, to Abraham, who left his home in Chaldaea and travelled to a narrow strip of mostly arid land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea because G-d so commanded. To Isaac, Abraham's son, and to his son, Jacob and his descendants, who remained faithful to the One True G-d whilst the descendants of Ishmael, Abraham's other son, whom the Arabs claim as their forefather, turned to idolatry, until Mohammed, inspired byJudaism, brought them his own version, Islam - and enforced it by the sword.
The Palestinians claim the right of self-determination, and the world supports them. We Jews defined ourselves as a people over three thousand years ago. As we sit down to the Seder, we remember that defining moment. And as long as we continue to celebrate the Seder, as long as we keep that memory alive in our hearts, no-one can take away from us the fact that we are a People. That we are a nation. That we are.
Chag Sameach
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