It is referred to in this manner in our holiday prayers, and especially in the absence of Temple service for all of these many centuries, the granting of the Torah is undoubtedly the centerpiece of the commemorative holiday. So how is this day observed and commemorated? Well, I doubt there is any other people that would commemorate such a day by staying awake all night studying and discussing serious topics, eating dairy foods, decorating all premises abundantly with flowers, adding special melodies to the Torah reading, and somehow as well, marking the anniversary of the death of the greatest king of Israel, David.

 

In reality, there is really no human way to truly capture and commemorate the most momentous occasion of all societal civilization. So, the human heart and spirit searches for ways to define the indefinable and to experience physically the incorporeal reality of the spiritual and the eternal. And that is the role of custom and tradition in Jewish life. It says what logic and reality, rationality and law alone cannot ever say to later generations, who were not physically present on that day of revelation at Sinai.

 

Custom speaks to one’s soul while the law speaks to our minds. So undoubtedly the customs of Shavuot are the conduit to our past – to that great day and event, the turning point of all human civilization. And these customs conduct us to our future and the realization of the goals that Sinai presented before us.

 

That is the reason why custom has such a long-lasting and tenacious hold on us. Rabbi Yaakov Emden ruefully remarked that he regretted that the prohibition against stealing was law and not custom for if it were custom people would have an emotional brake against stealing that law alone cannot do. So we can never discount the power and necessity of custom.

 

On the other hand, custom alone can never do the job of transmitting Torah from generation to generation. Over-emphasis on custom, ignoring law and rationality, falling victim to superstition and false forms of spirituality is a terrible distortion of that day at Sinai. The Torah always demands a sense of balance and perspective from us. Every generation, even every individual Jew, has to find this balance and equilibrium in one’s religious life.

 

Over the past century, with its terrible and wondrous events, all of them mysterious and unbelievable, the Jewish people as a whole and each individual Jew has searched for this secure footing of balance and perspective. I would be dishonest if I told you that I, and in fact our generation as a whole, has found that secure and correct place.

 

But Shavuot, with its combination of custom and law, spirit and food, natural beauty and rigorous scholarship, is a day that can help us achieve that security and balance so necessary to truly be a loyal and good Jew. After all, that is the true test of our lives and existence. That is how we will be judged and how we will be remembered.

 

Shavuot, like all Jewish holidays, reminds us that a good life, a Jewish life, requires sacrifice and focus. There are harsh realities in Jewish history, as in all human history as well. Shavuot commemorates terrible pogroms against innocent and hapless Jews – the Crusades and the events of 1648-9 – that occurred at this time of the year over the centuries of our exile, persecution and dispersion.

 

It is somewhat ironic that the memorial prayer of Yizkor is also part of the gala Shavuot prayer experience. But that is the reality of human existence, the mix of the bittersweet that is always part of living. Once again, we are witness to the balance that is the essential part of Jewish life and Torah understanding and values. Here in Israel the whole holiday is over in an instant. But the lessons that it imparts to us last for a lifetime and constantly challenge us to live up to our commitment to the events of Sinai.

 

Shabat shalom

Chag sameach

 

Berel Wein