Tonight is Lag Ba'omer
WTF is the Lag Ba'Omer you ask, and what relevance can it possibly bear to the reality of The Now? Well, I'll tell you. The Omer is when you count the days between the Passover (the Exodus) and Moses' receiving of The Law at Sinai (Shavuot). Lag Ba'omer is the 33rd day of this count.
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You shall count for yourselves -- from the day after the Shabbat, from the day when you bring the Omer of the waving -- seven Shabbats, they shall be complete. Until the day after the seventh sabbath you shall count, fifty days... -Leviticus 23:15-16
You shall count for yourselves seven weeks, from when the sickle is first put to the standing crop shall you begin counting seven weeks. Then you will observe the Festival of Shavu'ot for the L-RD, your G-d -Deuteronomy 16:9-10
And So... what is Israel doing right now, today, on the 33rd day of this Omer?According to the Torah (Lev. 23:15), we are obligated to count the days from Passover to Shavu'ot. This period is known as the Counting of the Omer.
An omer is a unit of measure.
On the second day of Passover, in the days of the Temple, an omer of barley was cut down and brought to the Temple as an offering.
This grain offering was referred to as the Omer.
Every night, from the second night of Passover to the night before Shavu'ot, we recite a blessing and state the count of the omer in both weeks and days. So on the 16th day, you would say "Today is sixteen days, which is two weeks and two days of the Omer." The Orthodox Union has a chart that provides the transliterated Hebrew and English text of the counting day-by-day.
The counting is intended to remind us of the link between Passover, which commemorates the Exodus, and Shavu'ot, which commemorates the giving of the Torah. It reminds us that the redemption from slavery was not complete until we received the Torah.
Tonight, Thursday night, May 22, 2008, we count thirty-three days, which is four weeks and five days of the Omer.
Tonight is Lag Ba'omer
For detailed instructions on how to count the Omer, blessing text, omer calendar, and more information, click here
Earl Randolph's Orchestra - Count Those DaysLag BaOmer, the 33rd day of the Omer Count is a festive day on the Jewish calendar, celebrated with outings (on which the children traditionally play with bow and arrows ), bonfires, and other joyous events. Many visit the resting place (in Miron in Northern Israel) of the great sage and mystic Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, whose yahrzeit (anniversary of his passing) the day marks.
Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who lived in the 2nd century of the Common Era, was the first to publicly teach the mystical dimension of the Torah known as the "Kabbalah," and is the author of the basic work of Kabbalah, the Zohar. On the day of his passing, Rabbi Shimon instructed his disciples to mark the date as "the day of my joy."
The Chassidic masters explain that the final day of a righteous person's earthly life marks the point at which "all his deeds, teachings and work" achieve their culminating perfection and the zenith of their impact upon our lives. So each Lag BaOmer we celebrate Rabbi Shimon's life and the revelation of the esoteric soul of Torah.
Lag BaOmer also commemorates another joyous event. The Talmud relates that in the weeks between Passover and Shavuot a plague raged amongst the disciples of the great sage Rabbi Akiva "because they did not act respectfully towards each other"; these weeks are therefore observed as a period of mourning, with various joyous activities proscribed by law and custom. On Lag BaOmer the dying ceased. Thus Lag BaOmer also carries the theme of Ahavat Yisrael, the imperative to love and respect one's fellow.
Israel, Syria hold peace talks after 8-year break
Talking through Turkey to Assyrians about suicide.
Speaking PEACE where there is no peace
And America has been facilitating this for over a year. All those trips by American politicians to Syria last spring were a prelude to this day. [Search: Syria]
As we learned above the Omer is a unit of measure.
On the second day of Passover, in the days of the Temple, an omer of barley was cut down and brought to the Temple as an offering.
This grain offering was referred to as the Omer.
So this is the offering Israel now chooses to place before her G-d, this peace where there is no peace is the measure of her regard for The Covenant? All this and the backing, the babblewanky, and the bamboozling of our own government to boot.
Not so good.
Everything, Biblically speaking, can be reduced to this basic conceptual trinity:
Seed ~ Time ~ Harvest
All things in the natural and in the spiritual operate on this principle. All things can be stripped down to this level.
Which is why Jesus uses related parables so often.
So where are we?
We stand between the Exodus and the Law
Between slavery and deliverance
directly between time and harvest
mid way in a journey out of death into life
Today is Lag BaOmer.
On Lag BaOmer the dying ceased.
Lag BaOmer falls exactly one week before Ascension Thursday
The general and most common understanding of the Christian doctrine of Ascension holds that Jesus bodily ascended to heaven in the presence of his apostles, forty days following his resurrection. It is narrated in Mark 16:19, Luke 24:51, Acts 1:1-12,[1] and mentioned in John 20:17, Ephesians 4:7-13, Romans 10:5-7, 1 Timothy 3:16, 1 Peter 3:21-22. This is affirmed by Christian liturgy in the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed.
So,
The Omer, (The Early First Fruits) Lev 23:9-14:
A period of seven weeks (7 is the number for completion in Hebrew Gematria)
Each day is counted off for 49 days
ending on the fiftieth day known as Shavuot, and to the Christians, as Pentecost
(Pentecost means 50)
In the book of Acts, Pentecost is the day when the Ruach Ha Kodesh or Holy Spirit is reported to have entered the disciples.
It was also the exact number of days from the barley harvest to the wheat harvest.
When the Temple(s) stood, an elaborate ceremony developed where the Priest would meet the worshipers on the edge of the city and lead them up to the Temple mount with music, praise psalms and dance, everyone carrying sheaves of grain as thanks offerings or tithes to GOD.
On arriving at the Temple, the priest would take the sheaves of grain and lift some of them in the air, waving them in every direction, thus acknowledging God's provision and sovereignty over all the earth.
Also I am reminded of Joseph's dream and all that that implies....
Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. He said to them, "Listen to this dream I had: We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it."
His brothers said to him, "Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?" And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said.
~ Genesis 37 5:8
In a messianic context you can also say that the purpose of counting the omer relates to the resurrection of Jesus concurrently with the giving of the Torah. He is called the Word Walking, he is regarded as the physical embodiment of the Word. Whether you see messiah in the context of Jesus or if you await the coming of Messiah as a Jew, there is no denying that the seasons of the Jewish calendar and it's festivals are metaphorically representational of the life and purpose of Messiah and that the festival of first fruits has great significance in light of his life, his death and his resurrection.
It is always about deliverance from death and redemption to life.
"I tell you that unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it stays just a grain; but if it dies it produces a big harvest...
As for me, when am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself"
Sounds a lot like Joseph's dream to me.
Joseph was sold by his brothers into slavery and subsequently imprisoned, only to be raised into a position of ultimate power in Eqypt, at the right hand of Pharaoh, whereupon he was able to store seven years of grain up in advance of a famine which he had foreseen via his interpretation of Pharaoh's dream.
Moses, BTW is descended from Joseph
So... the way I see it is this:
Here we go round the prophecy bush again. People who interpret Biblical prophecy in a static and closed manner do not understand the nature of the word of GOD. The word is alive, it is multi dimensional and it transcends time. Biblical stories act as "templates" for reality on one level. There are only so many stories in the naked world. We just perceive them as being many.
We are being sold into slavery by our brothers
To an Assyrian enemy
they speak peace where there is no peace
these rulers who are corrupt and craven
while the world salivates over Israel's impending destruction
By the word of GOD alone we were created
and only by the Word of GOD will we be delivered
Trust in Him and you will not be put to shame
Trust in men and expect to be be forsaken.
This is a time of choosing. Choose well.
Long Live the Feral Remnants.
