My Weekly Drash -- Shabbat Shavuot

Gut yontiff! Shavuot begins Thursday night and lasts through sundown
Saturday, overlapping with Shabbat. Our reading on Saturday morning is out
of the regular cycle, as we jump ahead to read a few chapters of Parshah
Re'eh in Deuteronomy. At 16:9-12, a description is offered of Shavuot, the
Feast of Weeks, and what sounds like a Thanksgiving festival commencing
seven weeks after the beginning of the grain harvest. We have been counting
off those weeks since the second night of Pesach. A "freewill contribution"
is to be offered for sacrifice, thanking God for the harvest's bounty.
Shavuot gained additional meaning during the Second Temple period when it
was calculated that 50 days after the Exodus from Egypt - which is to say,
the first day of Shavuot - Moses and the Israelites received
the Torah at Sinai. Thus as Pesach is a commemoration and celebration of our
redemption, Shavuot gained the additional emphasis of focusing on the moment
of revelation. The rabbis thus invented multitasking, making the observance
of the festival stand for several things at once.


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