Emor: This Isn’t A Countdown

Hi, this is Rabbi Lopian with the Parsha in 5, where in 5 minutes we try to give you insight into the Parsha. And could we do better than this this week? Because we have, of course, in Parshas Emor, the Parsha of the Moadim. There's only two places where we cover all of the holidays. It's over here in Parshas Emor and it's in Parshas Pinchas. With the Shalosh Regalim, we have it in Mishpatim, we have it in Ki Sisa, we have it in Re'eh, but uh all of the holidays, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur included, are only in Parshas Emor and in Parshas Pinchas. And in Parshas Emor is called the Parshas Hamoadim, where we define what all the holidays are. And we have a holiday. Uh it's called Sefiras HaOmer. Very strange. It's a holiday. It says, you'll celebrate Pesach, and on the second day of Pesach, you will bring an offering of barley, and then you will count 7 weeks, and then you'll come to the 50th day, and you'll bring a new offering of wheat. So, this period of Sefiras HaOmer is seen as being a holiday. We're told to count these days. The Ramban famously says that it's one long Chol HaMoed from Pesach till Shavuos, one long continuity. Yeah, interesting concept. But Sefiras HaOmer is a time that the Kodesh Baruchu gave us to focus on the connection between coming out of Egypt and receiving the Torah. Uh and to prepare ourselves for that. And we're supposed to count every day. I don't know which wit came up with the expression. It wasn't me. Yeah, I've used it, but I didn't think it up. Uh you count every day of the Omer because every day counts. Brilliant. Yeah? But what it means is I'm supposed to be working every single day to perfect myself in order to be mekabel Torah. That's what I'm working on. That's what I'm trying to accomplish. And so I count it because when I count, I have to try to keep my consciousness on what I'm doing. I've told the story before. Uh Reb Boruch Ber was in America, and he was staying with a baal habayis. And he says, "What would the Rosh Yeshiva like for lunch?" He says, "Fleishigs." Right? Basari. Meat. Every day. And after a while, he said, "The Rosh Yeshiva never wants milchigs?" Now, you appreciate this cuz when I was in South Africa, every meal was fleishigs. Uh I I landed in Cape Town and they took me to a restaurant called the Pie Shop, where they make meat pies. Uh too early in the morning for a meat pie. I said, "Do you have anything that's not meat?" They said, "We have an apple pie." I said, "I'll take that." I said, "Can I get a cup of coffee, you know?" The guy looked at me and goes, "I guess, you know." Mixes up a little instant coffee, and has those little powder packets that you put in, and they clumped together. It was not It was not a fun time. And by the way, they make very good pies, just to give a shout-out. I don't know if they're still open anymore even, but uh I came back to Eretz Yisrael, I brought a bunch of pies from the pie shop for my kids. Uh Everybody had a good time. But anyway, um uh he says, "You only want fleishigs?" He says, "When I eat fleishigs, for at least 6 hours, I have to remember that there's a God." Well, we we tend to forget. And we need to be able to keep ourselves focused. And that's very important. And that's the that's the secret. That's the secret of of Sefiras HaOmer. Is that for 7 weeks, we maintain a sense of consciousness, I'm going to be receiving the Torah. And I'm building up to this event. Yeah? Uh when I was a kid, in the last month of school, people would make a calendar and cross off each day till they finally had vacation. We do something similar. We climb up every day until we reach that height. Some people count down. Very interesting, before a launch, you know, they count down, 10, 9, 8, 7, you know. T minus 3 hours and 22 minutes till lift-off, yeah? So, wha- what is that for? It turns out it was in a science fiction movie. The guy who made it and wanted to blast off the rocket, and they realized the audience wouldn't know when it was going to take off. If they start counting up, they don't know what you're counting up to. So, he started counting down, and that um created the concept of a countdown. NASA took it from them. That was interesting. So, uh you count down to something. But for Sefiras HaOmer, we count up because every day we're moving up. We're not moving down. We're moving up, higher and higher until we're on a level that we're zocheh to be mekabel the Torah and to be mekabel the Shechinah. So, during these days, this is the time that we should be preparing ourselves for this very, very special opportunity. And im yirtzeh Hashem, we'll be zocheh to an emes se kabbalas haTorah. Shabbos.