Shabbat message

Anxiety and Anticipation

The Torah portion of Emor includes in it the mitzvah of the offering of the measure of an omer of barley and the counting that links Pesah to Shavuot. It came to be associated with the span of days designating the passage from the servitude of Egypt to the proclamation at Sinai of God’s Word and Command.

Anxiety, according to psychologists, is often evidenced by counting. People count days anticipating something big with excitement as well as anxiety. Rabbi Jacob Milgrom suggests that our agricultural ancestors may have counted the days of the omer as a ritual response to anxiety about the agricultural yield of the season. The period of khamsin, which also means fifty, occurs from late March through late May, when the hot dry winds sweep desert dust throughout the Middle East.

The harvest would be affected if there were too much moisture or too little rain. As the Mishnah (Rosh Hashanah 1.2) teaches, “The world is judged regarding grain on Pesah.”

The rabbis of the Talmud remembered the fifty-day interval not only for the anticipation of the love-embrace of God and the people of Israel at Shavuot but also because of the fearful period of Roman persecution in the first half of the second century. In medieval Christian communities, the Omer period became a time when Jews feared attacks because of the “teaching of contempt” linked to Easter.

In the 20th century, the period between Pesah and Shavu’ot became associated with contemporary trauma. Holocaust remembrance (Yom Hashoah v’haGevura) and the sacrifices to create and defend the State of Israel, marked on Yom Hazikaron (Memorial Day), added new layers of angst. Thankfully, these 50 days also include the celebration of Lag B’omer and, in contemporary times, of Israeli Independence.

This year, the surge of antisemitism and the uncertainty about the war against Hamas have made the Omer period, mentioned in the Torah portion this week, a period of anxiety.