Jewish Holiday of Shavuot: June 3rd to June 5th

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                    

Charles Heston in the role of Moses in the Ten Commandments 1956
Shavuot=weeks  Here we go again with an important holiday to observe and with our delicious foods, it's something we do look forward to in that we get to eat cheese blinzes and other special goodies according to our customs!  We start our celebration the evening of June 3rd and it's over on June 5th this year which in the Hebrew calendar is the 5th of Sivan to the 7th of Sivon.  .

This is Shavuot/Shavuos, when we were given the Torah by Moses.  Imagine yourself sitting around amongst 600,000 of your family and friends and having left Egypt, marching and resting towards the Promised Land, and Moses has all sit down and listen to him in the mountains of Mt. Sinai, where hopefully the sound will carry to all. He probably had some men blow the Shofar (ram's horn) to get everyone's attention and quiet.

The number 7 is very special as there are 7 days in a week, and the Israelites had to work every single day when slaves in Egypt; no weekend for them.  Exactly 7 weeks after they left Egypt and while camping here at the foot of Mt. Sinai somewhere in the Sinai Peninsula, the awesome event was witnessed by all of our ancestors.

Moses came down the mountain and gave these 600,000 the 10 Commandments.  This was the Revelation, when G-d's will was revealed for all forever after.  This of course if not the whole Torah, which consists sof 613 commandments, but they were its foundation and became the moral bedrock for much of Western civilization.

So we celebrate this season of GIVING of our Torah.  We ask why this festival is not called the season of the receiving of our Torah?  The answer is that while the giving may have taken place at one time which we are commemorating, the receiving of the Torah must continue to take place every day and everywhere.

The Jews who were witnesses to this great event accepted this Covenant with G-d by declaring,
"We will do and we will listen."  (naaseh v'nishma).

The Torah makes it plain that "Neither with you only do I make this Covenant, but with him that standeth here with us, and also with him that is not here with us this day, meaning that future generations and those who would later accept this law.

Shavuot emphasizes the spiritually important lesson that the release from bondage like the Israelites were from slavery and the winning of political freedom doesn't give anyone complete freedom unless it includes the  spiritual restraints, disciplines and duties in this Revelation and in Israel's acceptance of the Torah.

That means it wasn't the end all to be freed after 400 years of slavery and that's it.  .  We had to be re-educated with a new way of living and thinking.

We have counted 7 full weeks from the 2nd day of the Passover.  Therefore, it is tied to Passover and ends the festival of Passover which led to leaving Egypt.

After getting to Israel, it is thought of also as an agricultural festival in the land of Israel, also remembering that this is the time of the harvest for wheat, and is remembered as the Day of the First Fruits, because it marks the beginning of the fruit harvest and was the occasion for the  bringing of the first ripe fruits to the Temple as an offering of Thanksgiving.
                                                                         

Now, get out the cottage cheese for those cheese blintzes.  We eat such a delightful food since it is the custom to eat at least one dairy meal during the holiday and emphasizes "a land flowing with milk and honey."  This is another way of remembering that we were given the Torah at this time, and recognizing that we have the Written and the Oral Torah.  We have read verses saying, "the choicest first fruits of the land unto the house of the Lord your G-d" in celebration of Shavuot also stress that "you must not boil a kid in its mother's milk."   The Oral Torah based its prohibition of eating meat and milk together at the same meal, so a separate dairy meal is deliberately eaten to emphasize the total unity of the verse and the authenticity of the Oral Torah as well.  For the Orthodox, they wait at least 6 hours before eating meat after eating a dairy product.  This means that a hamburger and milkshake is not a meal for us.  Think of how the mother cow or goat would feel if she realized you would eat her child when she just gave you her milk.  In this way we are taught that animals have feelings and we are to include them in our actions.

Makes at least 2 dozen Jewish Cheese Blintzes

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:

• Blintzes:
• 4 large beaten eggs
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• Filling:
• 1 pound dry curd or farmers cheese or ricotta
• 1 tablespoon melted butter
• 1 large egg yolk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1/4 cup sugar or more to taste

We're not just a group of people celebrating and eating all the time.  We were asked to accept this covenant and did so which has led to being singled out and hated by much of mankind.  and yet, here we are,  about 14 million stubborn people following a promise made over 3,200 years ago to Moses and to G-d.  This group of Israelites and their descendants and those others following with them were to be the holy candle shining out for others as an example; a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, so they all had to be sanctified.  Holiness must be in all our religious law and encompasses every aspect of human concern and experience.  The person, the time and the place must remain holy.  All laws deal with one of these 3 aspects.  

Our definition of a holy person is different from other religions.  It is not to be the ascetic, saintly withdrawal from life or denying oneself in all human pleasures or repression of all human drives.  Our holy person is to participate in the human life sharing joy and sorrowful experiences of life, enjoying pleasures but choosing the right from the wrong, the true from the false, the good from the bad, the sacred from the profane, the pure from the impure, the clean from the unclean.  The holy person can make  the ethical-moral-religious discrimination of what life has to offer. 

 Rashi said that you shall be holy,  meaning you shall separate yourselves...but from idolatry, secularism, the vulgar and the profane.  We are to live a life of sanctity,  and help create a more sanctified society.  In other words, we are not to be sheep and follow the crowd, but to be the leaders, the shepherds and to set the correct examples.  

Resource: To Be a Jew: a guide to Jewish observance in contemporary Life by Rabbi Hayim Halevy Donin, p. 30-37 and more.
 http://easteuropeanfood.about.com/od/crossculturalnoodles/r/cheeseblintzes.htm
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049833/

Shavuot, the Dairy Holiday This Year in Portland

Nadene Goldfoot
What a special week-end this is to be!  Sunday is the first day of Shavuot which is a special Jewish holiday commemorating the giving of the Ten Commandments, G-d's revelation to Israel which turned out to be a list  of 613, and Israel's acceptance of the Torah (5 books of Moses).   One thing about our religion, you can't hardly turn around without preparing for the next holiday.  These holidays are all centered around teachable historic events that we are not to forget, and this is emphatically etched into our minds with food.  For Shavuot there are the favorite  dairy products, like cheese blintzes.

The whole theme of this holiday is centered around the fact that the release from physical bondage-which went on in Egypt for 400 years-and the political freedom that is represented by our holiday of Pesach "Passover", does not constitute complete freedom unless it culminates in the spiritual restraints, disciplines and duties represented by Shavuot.  I take it then that we just shouldn't go off the deep end with our basic carnal values but keep the restraints at least of 10 commandments, which is hard enough in our lives. Even those who only expect to keep 7 of them are doing well.  

We are to eat at least one dairy meal during these 2 days.  This may come from remembering that Israel is "a land flowing with milk and honey."  I like the commandment of  "You must not boil a kid in its mother's milk", which is the prohibition of eating meat and milk together in the laws of kashrut (kosher).  Of course a kid was a goat, not your child, heaven forbid!  Here, the meaning is very deep.  It has to do with the unity of the verse and the authenticity of our Oral law as well.  It is also something that gives us pause to reflect the very feelings of a cow for her calf, and that this cow has given us milk for our dairy products and we are not to hurt her feelings by eating her child in that very milk she herself had produced.  It is to give us feeling for all of humanity, not just for animals, but people, too.  As a result, Jews are not big on hunting.  We'll buy  meat preferably from a kosher butcher where animals allowed to us were killed as humanely as possible.  We don't dine on all animals, however.

In the states we also have Memorial Day to celebrate on the very next day, Monday the 28th which of course is the 2nd day of Shavuot.  Already many people here in Portland are driving to the coast to spend a 3 day weekend, prodded by the sun that actually shone this morning without rain clogging up the streets.  . It's a celebration of barbecuing and potlucks.  This commemorates what we used to call "Declaration Day", which was remembrance after the Civil War of the Union soldiers.  It's extended now to all fallen military men and women  in service to our country.  What with the thought of a vacation,  I wonder if people remember or honor the original meaning of this time off from work. There always are organized groups whose duty it is to do such things, however.   .  

Resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorial_Day
Book:  To Be a Jew by Donin

Lag B'Omer Holiday Tomorrow

Nadene Goldfoot
Long ago in the 2nd Century CE, there was a horrible plague that hit the pupils of Rabbi Akiva, who lived from 50 CE to 135 CE, a mystical rabbi. It is said that no rabbi of the talmudic period made a more profound impression on Jewish history and on the imagination of the Jewish people than this rabbi.

  It finally ended on the 18th of the month of Iyyar, which is tomorrow.  This also is in the period of "counting the Omer" and happens to be the 33rd day of counting this, which goes on for 49 days.   On the 50th day we will celebrate another holiday, Shavuot.  One nice thing about being Jewish is that we always have an abundance of holidays to celebrate, which for a woman means to get out the recipes for that holiday's special treats.  Lag B'Omer is considered the "scholars" feast.

During the 49 days of the Omer period, we are considered to be in mourning so there have been prohibitions of marriage, listening to music, shaving  and even cutting your hair.  On Lag B'Omer this is suspended.  Children get a holiday from school.  In Israel, the custom is to have bonfires and visiting the tomb of Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai in Mt. Meron, who died on this day.

An "Omer" was a measure of grain in bible days.  An omer of the new barley was brought to the Temple on the 1st day of Passover, and from that day on,  new grain was permissible to eat.  Our forefathers were told to count verbally 49 days or 7 full weeks, from the night following the barley offering (Leviticus 23).  The offering was brought to the Temple in the form of 2 loaves of bread.  The counting is a reminder of Israelites going from slavery in Egypt to Mt. Sinai to receive the Torah on Shavuot.  The meaning relates to barley, used mainly for feeding cattle, to wheat, used for us.

Today in the states everyone is so environmentally conscious that there won't be any bonfires, unless they're at the beach.  Even around Mt. Meron in Israel there may be an end to this custom as people are afraid to set off forest fires from bonfire sparks.  Parades will be held in Jewish communities around the world, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson said in encouragement.  I don't think so.  In Portland, this would be very difficult.  There is concern over terrorism, getting the police to go along with it, permits, etc.  We'd be lucky to be able to have a parade around our community centers or synagogues to show Jewish unity, which we also need badly.

The important thing, said Rabbi Amrousi to Arutz Sheva  is to love your fellow man as you would between people and between man and G-d.

Resource: Arutz Sheva news2@israelnationalnews.com  A call for ecological and spiritual Lag B'Omer by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
New Jewish Encyclopedia

Why Shavuot in Jerusalem 1967 is So Important to Jews

Nadene Goldfoot
In 1967 Israel was able to retrieve all of Jerusalem just before Shavuot, one of the three holiest days in Judaism.  It celebrates the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai to Moses.  Three million Jews were there witnessing this divine revelation.  The Torah brought monotheism, justice and responsibility to the Jews.  This in turn has been shared with the whole world.  Perhaps the whole world has been changed because of it. 

 The Western Wall, or Wailing Wall is in East Jerusalem.  This was the first time that Shavuot could be commemorated at the Wall since 1948.  It was opened for visitors on this holiday.  Since buses and cars are not used on holidays in Jerusalem, people walked to the wall.  This has been the custom ever since. 

The Wall is usually the first place that Jewish tourists go to when they visit Israel.  The custom is to put a prayer on a piece of paper and put it in the cracks of the wall.  For 19 years Israelis had to wait to have free access to this part of their most important city in all of their history.  They're not about to lose it again.  In their hands Jerusalem has come to life.  Remembering our history is to know how we were made.  The Wall's history goes back to the Temple built by Herod in 19 BCE.  This very wall is the remnant of the wall surrounding the courtyard of that Temple.  It was called the Wailing Wall because people would remember the day the Temple fell to the Romans in 70 AD.  This 2nd Temple brings to our mind Solomon's Temple built in the 10th century BCE.  It was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE.  The Babylonians came from what is today called Iraq. 

Under Jordan from 1948-June 1967, no Jew could enter East Jerusalem under any condition.  The cemeteries were violated in every way.  The condition of the area was terrible.  Under Israeli rule the area has blossomed for all: Jews, Christians and Muslims.  In 1980 Israel declared Jerusalem complete, united and Israel's capital.  As the mayor of Jerusalem, Nir Barkat,  has stated, Jerusalem must not be divided. 

Resource: http://www.aish.com/h/sh/t/48959111.html?utm_source=mimi_aish_com&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Aish_com%3A+Get+Ready+for+Shavuot+-+June+6%2C+2011+&utm_campaign=Aish_com%3A+Get+Ready+for+Shavuot+-+June+6%2C+2011&utm_term=ABCs+of+Shavuot
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Wall
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nir_Barkat
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Jerusalem

My Shavuot in Israel 1982

Nadene Goldfoot
Shavuot this year starts on June 7, on Tuesday (Sivan5)  at sundown, and brings memories of a wonderful experience in Israel.  It happens to be one of the three pilgrim festivals in Judaism and there I was, living right in Safed, Israel.  I didn't have to drive to the synagogue.  We walked as a quaint one was about 15 minutes away.  There I saw costumed men who wore clothes  most all the time of knee britches, long socks, and shtreimels (big black broad-brimmed hats trimmed with velvet or edged in fur) on their heads.

This is a time when the Passover period ends.  People have been counting the Omer for  fifty days.  This commemorates the time when the law was given to Moses on Mt. Sinai.  Kaabbalists and others have observed the eve of Shavuot in study.  The book of Ruth is read in the synagogue and the Ten Commandments.  It mentions the barley and wheat harvests and this is the time of wheat harvesting.  People will have flowers and boughs in their home and synagogue for decoration.  Dairy products are served. 

May 29, 1982 from my book, Letters From Israel. 

Thursday was Shavuot, and Don and Maureen had been invited over for dinner.  I served borsht with sour cream, some delicious cold smoked fish that is better than kippered salmon, salad, cheese blintzes with sour cream and cherry preserves, and for dessert we had cheesecake with cherry topping.  Don was in seventh heaven.  I have to brag that everything tasted so good.  The blintzes came from your cookbook that you had given me.  (This was a letter to my mother, of course.)

The next night we went to their house for Shabbat dinner.  That helps when you have two celebrations back to back to cook for.  The only problem is walking there and back, but the exercise was good for us. 

Thursday night you are supposed to stay up all night and study the Torah.  Don and Maureen conked out and went home, but this 11 year old Moishe came over and studied with us until about 2am.  At midnight we all went outside and said a special prayer, because at midnight the heavens were to open up and your prayer was to go directly up to HaShem (G-d).  Moishe thought the heavens really would open up and was afraid to go out at first.  His father was at the synagogue and really stayed up until 7am.  Anyway, we had lots of fun with Moishe, as he would say, "Stop, I don't understand that," and we would go over some passage.  I think the kid is going to grow up to be a Tzaddick.  He's so smart.  Well, I've had a nice respite from my students, and tomorrow I must be back in the saddle.

Resource: http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/2144/jewish/Shavuot-Calendar-2011.htm
Letters From Israel by Nadene Goldfoot
The Standard Jewish Encyclopedia