Jewish Holidays

Shavuot

The Yom Tov (holiday) of Shavuot is when we stay up all night learning, decorate our synagogues and homes with flowers and greenery, and eat lots of cheesecake, blintzes and other dairy foods. The Yom Tov begins at sundown of the 5th day of Sivan, exactly fifty days after Pesach/Passover.

This year, Shavuot, also called Zman Matan Torateinu, (the “Time of the Giving of Our Torah“) starts this evening at sundown, Tuesday, May 22nd 2015 and continues on Wednesday, May 23rd 2015, the 6th of Sivan.

You are invited to the services at the Gil starting at 18:30 on Tuesday evening and at 10:00 Wednesday morning.

Shavuot also celebrates the time when the first fruits of the Seven Species with which Eretz Yisroel is blessed, were harvested and brought in elaborately decorated baskets to the Bait Hamikdash, and is also known as Chag Ha-Bikkurim (the Festival of the First Fruits). Shavuot is also the wheat harvest festival – Chag HaKatzir (the Feast of Harvest). The beginning of the wheat harvest throughout Eretz Yisroel was preceded by the offering of shtay halechem (two loaves) as a meal-offering in the Bait Hamikdash.

Shavuot commemorates the giving of the Torah by Hashem to the entire Bnei Yisroel (Jewish people) on Har (Mount) Sinai over 3,300 years ago.

In the Torah, Shavuot is also called Feast of Weeks. In Hebrew, the word “Shavuot” means “weeks” and stands for the seven weeks during which the Bnei Yisroel prepared themselves for the giving of the Torah. During this time they rid themselves of the scars of bondage and became a holy nation ready to stand before Hashem.

The period from Pesach / Passover to Shavuot is a time of great anticipation. We count each of the days from the second day of Pesach to the day before Shavuot, 49 days or 7 full weeks, The counting reminds us of the important connection between Pesach and Shavuot: Pesach freed us physically from bondage, but the giving of the Torah on Shavuot redeemed us spiritually from our bondage to idolatry and immorality.

The giving of the Torah was far more than an historical event. It was a far-reaching spiritual event — one that touched the essence of the Jewish soul then and for all time. Our Sages have compared it to a wedding between Hashem and the Bnei Yisroel. We became His special nation and He became our G-d.