Keeping Count – Shemini 5785

Being a parent to two young children (and this may be familiar to many of us), there are times when children get sick and they need antibiotics for a set number of days. Whenever this happens in our house, we make a chart on the whiteboard on the refrigerator. It’s usually a grid that lists 10 days with two boxes per row, which we check off when we give them their medicine in the morning and evening. There was one time where everyone in our house, including the dog, was on their own cycle of antibiotics for one thing or another and we had 5 different 10-day cycles of medication to keep track of at once. 

Luckily, that was a one-time occurrence. However, there are times when I’m used to counting days over a set period of time. It’s no surprise that over the last two weeks I’ve been counting a lot of things. During this time between Pesach and Shavuot, we’re counting the 49 days of the Omer. As was mentioned at our Yom HaShoah service on Wednesday night, it’s 80 years since the liberation of Auschwitz and the end of the Second World War. Yom HaShoah occurs on the twelfth day of the Omer (unless that day is a Friday, which means it gets pushed back a day, like this year). One week later is Yom HaZikaron, Israel’s Memorial Day, followed by Yom HaAtzma’ut, Israel’s Independence Day. Each of these days have their own rhythm and feeling; it’s actually very hard to not count the days on the calendar during this time.

Our parsha this week, Shemini, also begins with a count. The parsha begins:

וַֽיְהִי֙ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַשְּׁמִינִ֔י קָרָ֣א מֹשֶׁ֔ה לְאַהֲרֹ֖ן וּלְבָנָ֑יו וּלְזִקְנֵ֖י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל׃

“On the eighth day Moses called Aaron and his sons, and the elders of Israel.”

This eighth day is the final day of the inauguration of Aaron and his sons as priests who will serve in the tabernacle. Eight days is symbolic for us in other ways. As we sang at our Passover seders earlier this month: “Shemonah, mi yodea?” Who knows 8? (Eight are the days before a bris). Another example: we sit seven days of shiva when a family member dies, and on the eighth day fully rejoin the world. 

All of Jewish time marches to a set rhythm. There are the fixed times for Shabbat and holidays, and even the day itself is divided into fixed proportions when one can pray shacharit, mincha, and ma’ariv depending on the position of the sun. Even with this daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly schedule- working together like tiny gears in a watch- during this time of the year, the persistent drumbeat of counting each day feels a little stronger to me.

Where does this commandment to count these days between Pesach and Shavuot come from? As we read in Leviticus chapter 23 verses 15-16:

וּסְפַרְתֶּ֤ם לָכֶם֙ מִמָּחֳרַ֣ת הַשַּׁבָּ֔ת מִיּוֹם֙ הֲבִ֣יאֲכֶ֔ם אֶת־עֹ֖מֶר הַתְּנוּפָ֑ה שֶׁ֥בַע שַׁבָּת֖וֹת תְּמִימֹ֥ת תִּהְיֶֽינָה׃ עַ֣ד מִֽמָּחֳרַ֤ת הַשַּׁבָּת֙ הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔ת תִּסְפְּר֖וּ חֲמִשִּׁ֣ים י֑וֹם וְהִקְרַבְתֶּ֛ם מִנְחָ֥ה חֲדָשָׁ֖ה לַיהוה׃

And from the day on which you bring the sheaf of elevation offering—the day after the sabbath—you shall count off seven weeks. They must be complete: you must count until the day after the seventh week—fifty days; then you shall bring an offering of new grain to the LORD.

An omer is this measure of elevation offering. It’s a certain amount of barley that is brought to the priests as a wave offering after Passover. After counting 49 days, on the 50th day we bring an offering of new grain, counting each day until we reach that time. 

When we count the Omer, you may have noticed that we count up instead of counting down; we say “today is x day of the Omer”, and not “there are x more days until Shavuot”. The Sefer HaChinuch, an anonymous thirteenth-century work from Spain which explains the reasons behind the mitzvot, takes note of this and explains it thusly:

“The reason that we count from the [bringing of the] Omer “So many days have passed in our counting,” rather than counting how many days remain, shows our great desire to reach the time [of Shavuot]. Therefore, we do not want to mention at the beginning of our counting such a large number of days that remain until we reach [Shavuot]. 

My own interpretation is that when we count down, we often are counting with the motivation of wanting it to be done. When we count up, on the other hand, we’re often savoring something and enjoying it to the fullest extent.

And yet, paradoxically, the Omer is in one way a time of mourning. The Talmud teaches in masechet Yevamot that we observe mourning customs during the Omer because Rabbi Akiva’s 24,000 students died during this period. Because they were not being respectful, so the story goes, they were struck with a plague. On the 33rd day of the Omer- known as Lag b’Omer- his students ceased dying, so on this day the mourning customs of the Omer are suspended. Some people, myself included, observe certain mourning customs only until Yom HaAtzma’ut, with the rationale that we shouldn’t be in mourning on the anniversary of the founding of the modern state of Israel. 

When you get down to it, the Omer is really a period of self-refinement. This happens on several levels. We move from mourning through the beginning of the Omer into happiness on Lag b’Omer and beyond. We begin bringing barley as an offering, and then on day 50 bring an offering of new grain- wheat, which is considered more refined and pure because it’s used to make bread.

On a mystical level, each of the seven weeks of the Omer are associated with a particular sefirah– one of the divine qualities of G-d, among which seven are considered the “upper” sefirot. Each day of the omer represents an intersection of two of these divine qualities, and some people use each day of the Omer as an opportunity for personal growth and goal setting, working on their own divine attributes. 

Most profoundly, though, the Omer is the 49 days between when we leave Egypt and receive the Torah at Mount Sinai. The Israelites need seven complete weeks to shake off the slave mentality of Egypt and purify themselves before agreeing to the covenant with Hashem. This purification process, as we’ll read on Shavuot, accelerates in the immediate days before the giving of the Torah, when the people are told to purify themselves bodily and to wash and clean their clothes. 

Pesach and the Omer takes a through a season when nature itself seems perhaps a little cleaner. During the majority of this past week, we kept our front door open but the screen door closed to get some fresh air in the house. We caught up on our own laundry while the kids are on school vacation (which is itself a big feat), did some housework outside, and are finally shaking off the winter in earnest. And yes, I’m still counting- how many rows of plants I planted in our garden, how many days until the pool opens, and how many weeks left in the school year.

We each count those things that are important to us, both personally and communally. Keeping track of time, through both the good and the bad, can bring stability. But in addition to merely counting days, I hope that we can also count on each other for the support that we need.

The Jewish people have always found strength in community. Each one of us counts– so much so that we need 10 for a minyan. There’s even a prayer one says if one ever finds themselves in a group of 600,000 or more Jews together. As we move through the Omer with its 49 yamim, including 3 yoms, let us remember that we all need each other, and that the Jewish community needs us all. On that, you can count.