The Jewish Year Seen Through Its Months SeasonsSeasons ofof thethe MoonMoon
The Month of Sivan Sivan / 5757 June 6, 1997 - July 6, 1997
he first two When the Jewish People camped months of the THIS MONTHS SIGN at the foot of Mt. Sinai in prepa- year are both TEOMIM / TWINS ration to receive the Torah, they TTsymbolized by achieved a harmony and unity animals: Taleh (Aries) the lamb, which was unparalleled before or and Shor (Taurus) the bull. It is only with since. Israel was united in heart and mind the sign of Teomim (Gemini) the like a single person. It was only in this Twins, that we find a sign which is state of unity, of being one, that they symbolized by Man. could receive the Torah which is one. The Torah was given under the sign For the Torah is the mind of the of the Twins to indicate that only with Creator, who is One. the giving of the Torah does man fulfill The sign of Teomim (Gemini) his potential, being raised above the identical twins symbolizes different level of an animal. On Wednesday, people, physically separate, joined in a June 11th this year, we will celebrate spiritual kinship in which they resem- Shavuot the festival of the giving of ble each other to the point that they the Torah. are identical.
hen you say youre Hoshana Rabba, the time when the going to stay up all decrees of Yom Kippur are given W night, people might over to those Heavenly agents who W ALL-NIGHTER will carry them out, there is a tra- think youre doing the disco round, and partying the dition to learn all night. night away. On the night of Shavuot too, Staying up all night doesnt sound very religious. But there is a widely observed custom to stay up all night. The there are several times during the Jewish Year that there is a sages of the Kabbala formulated an order of study call a tikun custom to burn the midnight oil until the sun peeps through (lit. fixing) for the night of Shavuot. This includes passages the blinds. from the written Torah, the oral Torah, the mystical Zohar, as well as a list of all 613 mitzvos. Many people stay up after the Seder on Pesach until the time of the morning prayer to recount and analyze the great The Zohar commends those who stay awake in anticipa- miracles of the Exodus. As the Haggada itself says: Rabbi tion of receiving the Torah. The giving of the Torah was, as Eliezer, Rabbi Yehoshua, Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah and it were, the wedding of the Jewish People and the Torah, and Rabbi Akiva stayed up all night talking about the Exodus so it is fitting that we should be engaged in preparing the until their talmidim (students) came to tell them that it was ornaments of the bride the previous night. time to recite the morning Shema Yisrael. Another reason: On that first Shavuot morning, there On Yom Kippur, those with sufficient strength stay up all were some who overslept and had to be awakened to receive night in prayer and supplication atoning for their sins. On the Torah. In order to rectify this, we stay up.
Continued over seasons of the moon
ut there is a Torah breathes deeper rea- THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION life into Man. But it B son that we was not always this Bdont sleep way. When Hashem on the night of first created Man, he Shavuot. was animated by Gods utterance: Let Us make Man. The power of these words, spoken by the Creator, gave Sleep is the taste of death. Man the ability to live, breath, think and act. If fact, the Talmud tells us that sleep is 1/60th part of However, this was only until the Jewish People stood at death. One part in 60 is the threshold of perception. the foot of Sinai. When Hashem said I am Hashem, Similarly, Shabbat is a taste of the your God.... the first command- World-to-Come. Its precisely ment the life-force that animated 1/60th of the World-to-Come. Man parted from the body and the Sleep is the taste of death in this entire Jewish People died. world. King David died on Shavuot. SLUMBERSLUMBER Miraculously, their souls were put But before he died, he never even back into their bodies; but what ani- tasted the taste of death, because he mated them now was a different never fell into a deep sleep. Thus on LANDLAND utterance. No longer did their life- the occasion of his yahrtzeit (the force derive from Let Us make anniversary of his death) we avoid Man. Now they were like new cre- the taste of death by staying up all ations. Their inner essence was pow- night. ered by I am Hashem, your God.... This is a world of slumber. The angel of death came to King From this moment, the Torah became Some sleep the sleep of centuries, David to try and take his life. But it the animating dynamic of the Jewish had no power over him for he was Some sleep their lives awake, Soul. immersed in learning Torah and Some sleep with hollow And when the Mashiach, the Torah is the essence of the life-force frightened eyes scion of King David, arrives to herald in this world. The only way that the that see no Reason, the era of the resurrection of the angel of death could take King no Hand, no Fate. dead, it will be the Torah, the dew of Davids life from him was through life, which will be the mechanism to cunning: He managed to distract But one man never slumbers awaken the body from its long sleep. King David from his learning, and in The Sweet n Singing King. Then we will finally understand that split second, he was able to take When the midnight Northern the words we have sung for so long: his life from him. So on this night of Winds caress the harp-strings, Shavuot, which is both the anniver- David, Melech Yisrael, chai He will rouse his tired limbs, sary of the giving of the Torah and vkayam! the end of King Davids life, we stay and coax the song David, king of Israel, lives and awake all night and immerse our- that will awaken Eternity. exists! selves in Torah study.
SOURCES: This Months Sign - Rabbi M. Glazerson; All-Nighter - Tehillim 73:5, Yalkut Shimoni; Talmud Berachot 3b; Tehillim 19:9; Book of Our Heritage, Rabbi Eliyahu Kitov, translated by Rabbi Nachman Bulman; Time Pieces, Rabbi Aaron Lopianski Slumberland - Time Pieces, Rabbi Aaron Lopianski
SEASONS OF THE MOON is written by Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair and edited by Rabbi Moshe Newman. Designed and Produced by the Office of Communications - Rabbi Eliezer Shapiro, Director Published by OHR SOMAYACH/TANENBAUM COLLEGE, 22 Shimon HaTzadik Street, Jerusalem, Israel. tel: 972-2-581-0315; fax: 972-2-581-2890; E-mail: [email protected] WWW: http://www.ohr.org.il This publication contains words of Torah. Please treat it with due respect.