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MAY 2016 BLUFFTON SUN RABBI DR ARTHUR SEGAL
Shalom and greetings:
In our tour through the Jewish calendar this year, we arrive at May 26, Lag B'Omer, the 33rd day of the counting of the Omer, which is a Torah commandment to perform from the second day of Passover to the late spring barley harvest festival of Shavuot, 7 weeks later. An omer is 3.64 liters of grain or a sheaf of barley. Rabbinic Talmudic Judaism turned this harvest festival of Shavuot, into the day Moses went up Mt Sinai to receive the Torah from God, and the seven weeks of the Omer are special days set aside for study and Jewish Spiritual Renewal, to prepare ourselves for this reliving of the Revelation.
Talmud Yevamot 62b states that during the time of Rabbi Akiva, circa 135 CE, 24,000 of his Rabbinic followers died from a plague and during Lag B'Omer, the deaths stopped. Plague occurred because '' they did not show proper respect to one another.'' Each would say their education and ordination (semicha) was better than the others. This day reminds us that today's rabbis need to respect one another regardless of which schools, or which rabbi ordained them.
One of Rabbi Akiva's students was Shimon bar Yochai. According to Talmud Sanhedrin 14a, Rabbi Yehudah ben Bava, granted private semicha upon Rabbi Shimon. R'Shimon became the greatest teacher of his generation, authoring the Kabbalah's Zohar. R'Shimon died on Lag B'Omer, and revealed the deepest secrets of the Kabbalah.
In Meron, near Safed, Israel, at Rabbi Shimon's tomb, thousands of Jews gather throughout Lag B'Omer with bonfires, study, song and feasting. The bonfires symbolize R'Shimon's spiritual light and revelation of the Zohar.
R'Shimon taught that no one can be indifferent to the fate of others, for it is his fate, too, as we are all connected. ''This idea is to be compared to people who were in a boat, and one of them took a drill and began to drill a hole beneath his seat. His companions said to him: Why are you doing this? He replied: What concern is it of yours? Am I not drilling under my own seat? They replied: But you will flood the boat for us all (Midrash Rabbah Leviticus 4:6).''
Rabbi Arthur Segal is an international lecturer, author, and teacher. Visit him at www.JewishSpiritualRenewal.org . Email at RabbiASegal@aol.com .
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Hilton Head Island, SC; Bluffton, SC; Savannah, GA
