By Richard Siegel (4-23-09)

Today is fourteen days, which is two weeks of the Omer.

 

It is a tradition to count the days between Passover and Shavuot, as we mark our freedom from slavery and celebrate our freedom to accept Torah. This is called "counting the omer." This year we will observe the tradition of "counting the omer" by sharing stories about the many different ways that we have been turned on to Jewish learning, and through Jewish learning to Torah.

When I was in Israel for a semester in my junior year at college in 1967, I took a class with the former director of Ulpan Etzion, one of the first of the modern day Hebrew immersion schools in the country.  I still remember one lesson in particular. 

I think we were parsing the Birchat Ha-Mazon, the Jewish "Grace After Meals."  The idea for this "grace" is based on a line from Torah which says, "...and you shall eat, and you shall be satisfied, and you shall bless."   He focused on the word translated as "to be satisfied," savey-ah in Hebrew.  And he asked us if we knew what the real meaning of savey-ah was, with its full Hebrew inflection and undertones.  "It doesn't mean 'to be full,'" he said.  "To be 'full' is an American value," he observed.  "Savey-ah," he explained, "is the feeling you have when if you eat one more bite, you will be full."

I was impressed with that Hebrew lesson and have often thought about this concept, both when eating, as well as in other contexts.  When is the point after which a pleasure begins to turn negative?  And can I be content to just be satisfied, to stop before I become full?

By Richard Siegel

These stories are brought to you by the Temple Emanuel RE-IMAGINE project, an 18-month initiative sponsored by Hebrew Union College, devoted to re-thinking and re-structuring our religious school.