The Forgotten Most Important Holiday

Matzah, Shofar, Sukkah, Fasting, Menorah, Graggers – these conjure up warm fuzzies about our Jewish connection. They remind us of those special times during the year when we sit around the table with our family and friends and celebrate our Judaism.

But there is one holiday that seems to fall through the crack and there is an element to this holiday that makes it more important than all the other holidays.

Relationships:

There are two types of relationships; there is the pleasure relationship and the compelling relationship. Pleasure relationships are those relationships that bring benefit to me and therefore bring pleasure to me – friends, business associations, etc. Then there are the compelling relationships. These are those relationships that we can’t do without. Children and marriage are an example. (This is not to say that there isn’t or G-d forbid shouldn’t be pleasure in these relationships too, but the relationships are not built on the pleasure but on something more compelling.)

Our relationship with G-d kind of works the same way. There are times that G-d gets pleasure from us and us from him. This is the pleasure relationship. But in its deeper sense our relationship with G-d is a compelling relationship. It is not something we choose. 3330 years ago G-d chose us and we stood at the foot of Sinai and chose Him. It was at that moment that we committed to G-d that even if we didn’t experience pleasure we would remain committed. And G-d made the same commitment to us.

We commemorate this commitment and the day that King Solomon calls our wedding day with G-d by celebrating the Holiday of Shavout. It is considered one of the three major Jewish holidays. It is celebrated by staying up on the eve of Shavout (Saturday night May 19) and studying Torah (join us beginning at 10:30 PM for TedShavout and other classes). Then on Sunday, we will read the Ten Commandments and celebrate the Jewish children who the Midrash tells us serve as Guarantors (join us 10:30 AM for a special children’s program, ice cream party and more). Finally we celebrate these two days (Sunday and Monday) by partaking of the physical pleasure of the holiday meals for the Talmud tells us that this holiday needs to be celebrated with the body. We need to integrate our compelling relationship with our pleasure relationship. (On Monday those that have lost a loved one participate in the reciting of Yizkor as we do on all major holidays – 10:30 AM.)

So don’t let these two days slip by you, take the lead and celebrate our compelling relationship with G-d and the Torah. Hey, you just might get some pleasure!