LAG BA’OMER
Lag Ba’omer is a mysterious holiday. Its origins are obscure, its purpose less clear.
What we know is that there is a 50 day period between the second day of Pesach and Shavuot where we are commanded to count. “And you shall count from the day after the Sabbath [the first day of Pesach is what is meant] from the day of your bringing the sheaf for an elevation offering, seven Sabbaths. You shall count until the day after the seventh Sabbath, fifty days. And you shall bring forward a new grain [made from the just harvested wheat, rather than last year’s wheat] offering to YHVH” (Leviticus 23:15-16).
We know that this fifty day period was the period of the all important grain harvest in ancient Israel. Grain provided more than half of the diet, so a failed grain harvest was a serious problem indeed. Barley was harvested first, and then the wheat. Barley was a coarser grain, not as desirable as wheat. We also know that the period somehow became a period of semi mourning with no weddings, parties, listening to music as normative practices. We also know that somehow the 33rd day of counting the Omer for Ashkenazi Jews and the 34th day for Sephardi Jews (who call the Holiday Lag L’omer) became a day where the mourning restrictions were lifted and people got married, listened to music and had bonfires with shooting bows and arrows.
Now why any of these practices came about is a matter of utter speculation. The great news about the obscurity of the holiday is that we can see the traditional Jewish practice of interpretation at play. We can and should feel free to participate in traditional Jewish practice by creating our own meanings (rooted in what we have already been given. Let’s look at some of the speculation.
There’s the theory about the death of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, the second century Palestinian Rabbi and hero of the 13th century foundational work of Jewish mysticism, the Zohar. There’s a theory about the ending of the plague that killed students of Rabbi Akiva, a contemporary of Shimon Bar Yochai. There’s a theory that it might have something to do with Bar Kochba’s rebellion against Rome in the 130’s CE, the last time there was any kind of functioning Jewish state from the time of the destruction of the second Temple in 70CE until the modern state of Israel. All of this is speculation—and it is fairly late speculation. The first mention of any connection to Shimon Bar Yochai, for instance, is from Chaim Vital, a 16th century mystic who was the lead student of Isaac Luria. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lag_BaOmer).
There’s also speculation about the practices of bows and arrows. No one knows its origin, but Theodore Gaster, an interesting scholar for earth based Jews because of his orientation towards reading Hebrew myths and rituals cross culturally rather than through a theological lens, connects it to pagan may day celebrations (Strassfeld The Jewish Holidays, p. 51). Maybe? Someone in a class I attended speculated that the bows and arrows were connected to what would be necessary if the harvest were to fail. Thus shooting them might be a kind of necessary practice or maybe a magical prayer that they might not be needed (this is my interpretation).
The historical speculation about the bonfires that are characteristic of Lag Ba’omer celebrations are that they might be connected to the signal fires that Bar Kochba used. Or maybe this is a way to say thank you for the drying out of the weather, allowing for the grain harvest. I associate fire with heat and dryness, and that’s exactly what our ancient ancestors wanted in order to harvest grain. It’s also true that this is the time of the year when it is safe to light fires. There’s still a lot of green plants and the land still has water in it. Things won’t burn easily—but in a month the landscape will turn brown having lost its water, and fire will become a threat. So burn now while it is safe and actually will help the landscape.
Now I live in a different ecosystem. The associations of fire with heat and dryness means summer, not the spring time during which Lag Ba’omer occurs here in the Mid-Atlantic. It’s green outside right now, and if we are blessed with rain in season, it will stay green all summer long—our brown period starts with the leaves of the trees losing their green, unless there is a drought. So if fire doesn’t quite fit, I’m equally unsure about earth, air and water.
How do we celebrate Lag Ba’omer? What meaning do we make of it? Is it a day to put aside our worries about how out of balance we are with the more than human world and go out and play with the really archetypal element of fire and the core practice of hunting through which we used to feed ourselves? Is it a day to step back and not work because we’ve been working too much, a kind of Shabbat during the week six out of seven years and without all the strictures of Shabbat like extra long services? Maybe it is just that simple.
