Timeless Torah

Counting Up and Down: Nature vs. Nurture

Why, in the counting of the Omer do we move down instead of up? Why do we move from chesed of chesed down to malchus of malchus? Why not move up from malchus to chesed and then finally to the 50th Gate, bina?

On the second day of Pesach, a special offering was brought, the Omer. Until then, the new grain crop was forbidden. The Omer was harvested amidst much fanfare. Briefly: On the day before Pesach, agents of the court would go out to a barley field near Jerusalem and tie together fistfuls of barley stalks. At the end of the first day of Pesach, inhabitants of all nearby towns would assemble. As soon as it became dark, three appointees began to ask of all those assembled: Did the sun set? Is this the sickle I am supposed to use? The basket? Should I reap? For each question, the crowd answered yes.
Why the fanfare? To refute the opinion (Talmud, Menachot 65a) of the Baysusim concerning, “m’macharas hashabbos - the day after Shabbat.” The Omer was brought to the Temple, roasted, coarsely ground, sifted, and oil and frankincense were added, etc.

1) Omer is a measure. Is it not strange that the offering should, in effect, be called the i.e. Quart Offering?
2) What happened on the 16th of Nissan that the Omer should be brought specifically then?
3) Why barley?
4) Why does the Torah write, “the day after Shabbat” which is ambiguous?

Be'er Yosef: Midrash quotes G-d, “In the wilderness I provided a daily Omer of manna. As payment, let the Jews now bring for Me an Omer offering on the 16th of Nissan.”
The manna stopped falling on Adar 7 (Moshe's death) and they had left over in the vessels until the 16 of Nissan. On the day they ran out of manna and they had to scrounge for their own food. The Omer offering on that day signified that just as in the wilderness we clearly saw that it was G-d who gives us our livelihood, so too now (in these new circumstances) we must remember that as much as we work, it is still bread from ‘Heaven’.
Similarly, every year when we are harvesting our new crop we might think that, “the power of my hand, brought me all this wealth,” therefore we are commanded to bring the Omer to remember the truth.
OMER MORAL: All that we have and accomplish is from G-d.

Only twice is barley offered; by a Sotah (the suspected adultress) and the Omer. Why? Barley was primarily animal feed. Counting the Omer is meant to purge our animal characteristics and make them holy.
The verse says, “Count (lochem) for yourselves…” The purpose is not quantitative (to merely count the days); we elevate ourselves (qualitatively). Note: G-d told Abraham, “Go for yourself.” Rashi: “for your own good.”
OMER MORAL: All that we have and accomplish is by the sweat of our own brow.

Which one is it?

Advances in medical technology such as in vitro have raised complex legal questions. In the case of surrogacy - where the egg comes from one woman, but the fertilized embryo is carried by another - who is the mother?
Some authorities: The host mother is not just an incubator, she develops and therefore has ‘ownership’ over the child. Proof: Concerning Leah’s seventh child (Gen 30: 21) says: And afterwards, she gave birth to a daughter, whom she named Dinah. Targum Yonasan: The male fetus in Leah's womb and the female in Rachel's womb were transposed. Hence, the host mother is the mother for all legal purposes.
Another opinion: maternal identity is purely genetic. It is determined by conception, not birth. One proof is this week's Torah reading: “When a woman conceives and gives birth to a boy.”
The word 'conceives' seems superfluous. The ‘tumah’ of the mother has to do with birth, not conception. The term 'conceives' shows that it is conception that determines motherhood.
Which is decisive: nature or nurture? February 2001: the human genome contains not 100,000 genes, as originally postulated, but only 30,000. Conclusion: there are not enough human genes to account for the different ways people behave. We are shaped by nurture as well as nature.
The two are not separate, but interact. Conception (genetic endowment) and gestation (the fetus' pre-birth biological environment) both play a part in the formation of a child.
The same is true for both lessons of the Omer.

Three Times - Three Kinds of Food
On Pesach there is Matzah. The Omer was barley. Shavuos had two loaves of fine flour baked with leaven.
Song of Songs (1:4) - “Draw me, we will run after you; the king has brought me into his chambers.”
Draw me (passive and singular) is the Exodus. We will run after you (active and plural) is the Counting of the Omer. The king has brought me into his chambers is the Giving of the Torah.

Zohar: Jews were not deserving of redemption. They had to be drawn out of their captivity by the initiative of G-d. Although their G-dly soul responded, their animal soul was unchanged. Their capacity for evil remained. The Israelites fled from Egypt (Exodus 14:5), as they were running from was the evil within themselves.
1. Draw me: When we take possession of an object, nothing is changed in the subject itself; it merely changes hands: In this case, from Israel's being in the hand of Pharaoh to the hand of G-d. Israel itself was unchanged.
It was passive (achieved by the hand of Heaven), and singular (the sudden revbelation affected only one side of their being).
2. We will run after you: The purpose of a revelation is that the spirit should change the physical nature of man as well. In the words of the Talmud: "You shall love the L-rd your G-d with all your heart - with both your inclinations.
This interplay not only elevates the physical side of man, but also his spiritual life, by adding to it the drive and energy of animal passion. This is why the Omer was of barley, animal food; the labor of that period is to transform the unaffected animal soul.
We will run, because our service is quickened by this new source of energy. We will run, because it is we, not G-d, who take the initiative. And we in the plural, because both sides of our nature are caught up in this effort, each gives impetus to the other.
3. The king has brought me into his chambers: At the Exodus, there was the Divine call. During the Omer, there was man's response. But at the Giving of the Torah, there was the final abnegation of man in the face of G-d.
At Sinai, "With every single word that went forth from the mouth of the Holy One the souls of Israel departed" (Talmud, Shabbat 88b). The only reality was G-d.
On Pesach we may not eat leaven. Our ego must be suppressed.
At the stage of the Omer, we use our understanding to redirect our emotions. We use the leaven in ourselves to change ourselves.
On Shavuos, when all our being belongs to G-d, then we are obliged to use the leaven, our ego is a channel for the light of G-d.

On the day after the Shabbat:
To bring the Israelites out of their entrenched impurity needed more than an "angel" it needed G-d Himself. If this was true of the escape from evil, it is more so for the transformation of evil into good.
Shabbat is a source of intense spirituality. It is the apex of the week. But it still belongs to the week, and thus to time and the finite. "The day after the Shabbat" refers to the step beyond Shabbat, beyond time itself: A revelation higher than the world.

In line with the dynamic behind all Jewish prayer and meditation, we move upwards in order to bring something down!
In counting, we move up from 1 to 49. In sefiros we move down from chesed to malchut. In this sense, two movements are taking place at the same time. Certainly we are trying to refine and elevate ourselves, but this itself is only possible if we bring G-d’s light from Above.