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On the eve of Tuesday night May 18th, 2010 till May 20th
Jews will be celebrating the holiday of Shavout.
What is Shavout?
Shavout commemorates the revelation on Mount Sinai. In
the book noticing the Divine, John R. Mabry writes:
On Shavout “…the God of Israel called Moses to the top of
Mount Sinai and there gave him the tablets of the law –
establishing a covenant that would endure for all time.
In this radical covenant, the God of Israel offered humans
something they had never knows before. Adonai was proposing
something like a marriage between Godself and the people of
Israel… This “marriage” is a motif that is repeated time and
time again in Jewish scriptures. The Song of Solomon is a
love song that is not only highly charged erotically, but is also
very moving in its portrayal of the deep affection between the
lovers. These lovers have long been understood to be Adonai
and Israel, a bold and noble tradition.
It is novel because up to that point, Gods were almost always
depicted as kings, and the people as slaves. It may be that the
God of Israel was sensitive to this reality and knew that Israel
had had enough of slavery. Instead of treating them as chattel,
Adonai offered them something that no people had ever been
offered before : a relationship of mutual commitment and
responsibility – a marriage...”
Shavout then is the renewing of our vows to God, we are
committing ourselves again to the journey of being Bnai Yisreal.
Bnai Yisrael simply translated means the children of Israel. What
does being a child of Israel mean? Why do we prefer to be called
Israel when it is just another name for Jacob? When was Jacob’s
name changed to Israel?
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