Shavuot 2009

I've written about other holidays before but apparently I've never put down anything about the Jewish holiday of Shavuot. The most mention I've given to it was here in this post about Passover in 2008. Since tonight marks the beginning of Shavuot, I think that this is a good time to say something about it.

Shavuot is at its core the commemoration of the giving of the Torah to the entire Jewish People at Mount Sinai by God. In case you're not familiar with the story, there's a movie staring Charlton Heston that dramatizes the events... :-) Shavuot is the bookend of Pesach, the reason for Pesach. It is the moment essentially that the Children of the Patriarchs become Jews, become the nation of Israel rather than just the children of Israel. It is at the foot of Mount Sinai that God gives the Israelites their specific marching orders in the form of the Torah. Some rabbis have described it as a marriage between God and Israel while others have called it a mass conversion of sorts. Regardless of how you think of it, this is the moment when not just a nation, but a nation with a purpose is born. This is part of the reason that the Book of Ruth is read on Shavuot because the story of Ruth is the story of a woman who chooses in love and friendship to become Jewish - she finds and dedicates herself to a life with a purpose.

(The most amazing thing about the story is the account of revelation; in all other faiths that involve a God of some sort, the revelation is on an individual level - Jesus goes into the desert, Mohammad goes into a cave, Buddha sits alone under a tree - but here at Sinai on Shavuot is the only time I've ever heard that God reveals himself to an entire nation at once. To me that is part of what makes the holiday simply amazing.)

Regardless of whether you are religious or not, Jewish or not, I'd say that this occasion calls for some reflection. To me it represents a turning point in human civilization but then again I am a believer who thinks that the Torah has helped mankind to develop and grow. Take this holiday as an opportunity to look at that set of books and try to imagine how different the world would be without their presence. The foundation of the civilization we live in is built on if not all its words then at the very least the aura of its ideas and concepts. Shavuot is a moment in time which humanity can mark as a turning point; how many other times like that can we point to in history?