Timeless Torah

Don't look now but it's coming fast and furious. Pesach , that is. In fact, if my calendar is telling the truth, in exactly twenty one days Jews the world over will be reclining at their respective Seders. Years ago, growing up as a child , all of this meant my mother washing, scrubbing and polishing. It also meant, we once the living room was cleaned for the Holiday, it was off limits to us children. Soon afterwards we could not enter the basement, then another room, and another.....

I must admit as bad as it was then, now it's worse. These days, I'm one of the folks, sleeves rolled up and - you guessed it, cleaning.

Sometimes it seems that all of the endless preparations are not worth it. Let's face it, the Seder only lasts a couple of hours. Yet, we spend untold hours buying the special foods, grating the home made maror and charoses, cooking everyone's favorites, dragging out the Pesach dishes ... The list of chores goes on and on.

One could almost give up and say , "Why put in all the effort?" Thankfully, and just in time, the title of this week's Biblical portion, Shmini, provides us with the answer.

The Torah informs us that the Jews had amassed all the materials necessary for the construction of the Sanctuary and had finally finished the project. Seven additional days were spent in preparation for the official inauguration. This all brings us to the title mentioned earlier, Shmini, "It was the eighth day."

True that day was the culmination of the preceding seven days. Still it would have seemed more appropriate to emphasize that it was the first day of the functioning of the new Temple. Since the first week was nothing more than mere "practice" sessions, why is the eighthness of the day given such prominence?

Unless the Bible wants to teach us that the preparations one makes for doing a mitzvah is nearly as important as the mitzvah itself. By referring to the day of inauguration as the eighth, it highlights that the earlier seven cannot be dismisses as insignificant.

So for the next three weeks as you prepare for the family Seder, smile, you're doing something important.