Shavout, Friday, May 29, 2009
Shavout means ‘weeks’ and is celebrated on the 6th of Sivan, seven weeks after Pesach, and originally perhaps had no greater purpose than ‘concluding’ Pesach . In the agricultural year, Pesach was the time of the barley harvest, and Shavuot the wheat harvest, and it is said that the correct time to cut wheat is 50 days after the barley is ripe. As time went on, it, like the other pilgrim festivals of the Jewish year, was given an historical meaning, and Shavuot became z’man matan toratenu, the season of the giving of the (our) Torah.
Pesach commemorated the Exodus from Egypt, the next seven weeks, the period known as the Omer, was also a time of a spiritual journey, to Shavuot and the re-enactment each year of the giving/receiving of Torah at Mount Sinai. While its origins were agricultural, it is interesting that, theologically, for Jews, the 50th day from Pesach is Shavuot, while Christians celebrate Pentecost, literally the 50th day, after Easter, and often the two coincide.
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