Welcome to a new column of The Jewish Press.
The plan is to present various calendar and Torah sedra facts, as well as “TorahStats” and “CalendarStats,” as you will soon see, with an occasional “Gematria Match” from the weekly sedra.
Let’s start this week with Lag B’Omer, which falls this year on Thursday night/Friday, May 15-16. Lag B’Omer’s Hebrew date is 18 Iyar, which has a much earlier significance compared with its Omer-related significance. According to tradition, the supply of matzah, hastily baked when the Jewish people left Egypt, lasted one month. Thereafter, the people complained that they were hungry, and they received the manna from Hashem for the first time on…the 18th of Iyar.
In our fixed calendar, Lag B’Omer cannot fall out on a Monday, Wednesday, or Shabbat. The frequencies for the days of the week on which it can fall are: Sunday (31.89%), Tuesday (28.57%), Thursday (28.03%), and Friday, like this year (11.51%).
As an aside, there are 385 possible dates on the Jewish calendar. Of them, 295 dates follow a pattern of three days of the week on which they cannot fall; three days of the week, as you can see above, on which they can fall, with a frequency in the 30% range; and one day of the week on which they occur least frequently – specifically, in 11.51% of years – as with our Friday Lag B’Omer this year.
Interesting halachic fact: Although Ashkenazim take haircuts and shave on Lag B’Omer day, many eidot of Sephardim do not. But when Lag B’Omer falls on Friday, they do take haircuts and shave in honor of Shabbat.
Now let’s turn to Parshat Emor.
With Tazria-Metzora read two weeks ago, Acharei-Kedoshim read this past Shabbat, and Behar-Bechukotai coming up next Shabbat, this week’s single parsha of Emor seems funnily out of place.
But of course, it isn’t out of place – it is right on time!
Let me put Emor into context. This past Shabbat, we, Bnei Yisrael, were commanded “Kedoshim tihyu” – Be holy. And the plethora of mitzvot in Parshat Kedoshim give us the answer to the question: How are we supposed to be holy? How do we move in that direction? The answer – by doing mitzvot. Not just by going through the motions, but by doing mitzvot and chesed with enthusiasm, with proper kavanah, with joy.
In Pirkei Avot, we find the statement, “Schar mitzvah, mitzvah” – the reward for doing a mitzvah is the mitzvah itself. Or perhaps it means that the reward for doing a mitzvah is another mitzvah to do. A statement attributed to the Baal Shem Tov about the reward for doing mitzvot is: “Schar mitzvah, simchat mitzvah” – the reward for doing a mitzvah is the joy of doing the mitzvah.
Which brings us to this week’s sedra, Parshat Emor.
It is the Avis, K2, and Buzz Aldrin sedra. What does that mean? I’ll tell you and you can use it at your Shabbat table as a riddle for your family and guests to figure out. (Even if they too read this column, you can still use it as a discussion starter about the sedra.)
Mitzvot are not at all evenly distributed throughout the Torah. Take a look at the numbers, Book by Book:
Bereishit – 3, Shemot – 111, Vayikra – 247, Bamidbar – 52, Devarim – 200.
Bereishit – with 12 sedras and more pesukim, words, and letters than all the other books of the Torah – has only three of the Taryag (613) mitzvot! Vayikra, the smallest of the Chumashim, has the most mitzvot – 247. It’s also the only book of the Torah with mitzvot counted from all of its sedras.
There are 17 sedras in the Torah (almost a third of the 54 total) with no mitzvot counted among the 613. Another 11 sedras have between one and three mitzvot, while a further 17 sedras have from 5-18 mitzvot. That leaves only nine sedras with 20 or more mitzvot.
The sedra with the most mitzvot is Ki Teitzei in Devarim – it has 74 mitzvot.
Emor is number two on the Torah’s mitzvah chart, with 63 mitzvot – 24 mitzvot asei (positive commandments) and 39 mitzvot lo taasei (prohibitions).
And that’s the answer to the riddle:
Avis Rent-a-Car’s slogan used to be (might still be) “We’re number two. We try harder.”
Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world. How about the second highest? The answer is K2 (a.k.a. Qogir Feng or Mount Godwin Austen).
And ask someone who was the first man on the moon, and they will most probably remember that it was Neil Armstrong, but ask about the second man on the moon and fewer people will remember Buzz Aldrin (in whose honor Buzz Lightyear was named).
Emor has 124 pesukim (average for the Torah is a bit over 108), 1,614 words, and 6,106 letters.
It is significant to note that following Kedoshim, with its challenge for all of us to “Be holy,” Emor begins with the theme of the higher kedushah that is the challenge for Kohanim. And then, an even higher level for the kohen gadol.
Towards the end of Parshat Emor, we find the portion of the Festivals, which is also the Torah reading for the second day of Pesach and the first day of Sukkot (the first two days of Sukkot outside of Israel).
In this account, we find that each holy day – the first and seventh days of Pesach, one day of Shavuot, Rosh Hashana, and Yom Kippur, and the first and eighth days of Sukkot (the latter being Shemini Atzeret) – has the same three mitzvot: bringing a Korban Mussaf, abstaining from melacha, and not doing melacha. (The distinction between the identical-sounding latter two mitzvot I hope to explore in a future column.) Here in Emor we also have the mitzvot relating to the Omer period and to Sukkot. Other mitzvot relating to the chagim are counted elsewhere in the Torah.
Let me end with this: Mitzvot are not just about numbers. In our challenge to be holy, G-d-fearing, and G-d-loving people, it is the attitude and enthusiasm to do Hashem’s bidding that is so important. Hopefully, you’ve learned more than just numbers, since offering an enhanced appreciation of our Torah is the greater purpose of this column.
Shabbat Shalom and, as we say in Israel, Lag B’Omer Same’ach!
