Counting the Omer – 5/25/24

Saturday, May 25th, (after dark, the 33rd day of the Omer)

Counting the Omer
Each Saturday (after sundown) for seven weeks, before we receive the Torah on Shavu’ot, we’ll email you the text of the blessing one says while counting the Omer. Along with it, a meditation written by clergy or fellow congregants.

The Prayer

Baruch atah, Adonai Eloheinu, Melech haolam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu al s’firat haomer.

Praised be You, Adonai our God, who rules the universe, instilling within us the holiness of mitzvot by commanding us to count the Omer.

Today is the _______ day of the Omer.

Netzach

What Remains Behind
by Andi Rosenthal

In our tradition of counting the days of the Omer, we have arrived at week five out of seven. This week, our sefirah of Hod is a moment for becoming aware of the blessings of our lives and of creation, and is translated in multiple different ways. In Hod, there is gratitude, from the Hebrew word Hodayah, meaning “giving thanks.” It also translates to the word humility, which emerges when one considers its proximity to the previous week where we consider Netzach, which symbolizes endurance and victory. 

Hod acknowledges that nothing – not even victory – is sacred without the presence of G-d and the wisdom of others. It mirrors other spiritual teachings, one of which, espoused in Pirke Avot 1:6, and echoed centuries later by the Indian guru Yogananda, is that in life, we are all students, and every person we encounter is our teacher.

But sometimes in life, teachers must deal with recalcitrant pupils. It’s one thing to inspire us to seek meaning and sanctity in the liminal moments of our days. Yet in certain times, the right teacher is the one versed in the nightmares of challenge, grief, loss and monotony.

In September of 2022, I was found semi-conscious in my apartment by my neighbors. The doctors who performed my emergency surgery in the ensuing hours brought me back from a bridge so narrow and fearful that I’m still not sure how I managed to cross it. 

In a flash of days I can’t consciously remember, I knew that my sister Laura was by my side at every moment. We soon learned that I was in end-stage renal failure and were told that until I received a kidney transplant, I could no longer work, live alone, or manage thrice-weekly dialysis sessions by myself. 

While I knew that the right thing was to feel grateful for my life, I couldn’t help but find myself drowning in despair and bitterness. Despite the reality of my life as a chronically exhausted and unhealthy workaholic, I romanticized my past — out of fear of the future. What remained behind seemed familiar and safe and comforting, and I couldn’t bear the idea of having to make such radical changes.

I was scared, and trying hard to accept that I could no longer return to the routine of my old life, just as the Children of Israel mourned for their lives in Egypt. But Hod took me there the long way.

Without discussion, or even a moment of deliberation, Laura moved me up to her house in Connecticut. For the next 11 months, along with her generosity and dedicated care, Laura taught me the essentials of Hod. How to have the humility to ask for help when I needed it. How to have morning coffee together in the garden and listen to birdsong. How to remember that underneath the countless medications and doctor visits and dialysis sessions, my divine spark was still shining. And finally, how to accept that there is no career, no matter how worthy or meaningful, more important than the people you love.

And Laura learned from you, as her teachers — that Larchmont Temple afforded me a loving circle of friends and teachers, a spiritual community that held me in prayer, and the friendship of extraordinary people whose acts of loving-kindness smoothed our path to a new reality. Together, Laura and I – and our circle of teachers – made it to August 2, 2023, where with an immeasurable sense of humility and gratitude, I received a healthy kidney from a living donor.

It is no coincidence that Hod also contains the presence of Lag B’omer – the 33^rd day of the Omer, when we remember that the students of Rabbi Akiva suddenly stopped dying from a plague, is it said, that was rooted in the failure of the students to show kindness and respect to one another. It is a fitting commemoration for anyone who has unexpectedly, magnificently, and miraculously been given the opportunity to start again – with the newfound perspective of bearing witness to the love, kindness and holiness that continually surrounds us.

I leave you – my beloved teachers – with an excerpt from Wordsworth that exemplifies our Exodus from the enslavement of daily routine and regret, to discovering the resilience within us along the journey to Hod. From here, we look onward to the awakening of our souls at Sinai, no matter how damaged or deadened we may feel. Together, with courage and community, we walk towards the promise of renewal, with gratitude for our blessings: our own everyday miracles.

Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendor in the grass,
Of glory in the flower,
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind.

Today is the 31^st Day of the Omer (May 23, 2024)