Blogging the omer
In addition to Jewschool‘s series in which we argue over the mitzvot and Mah Rabu‘s fun with numbers, an assortment of other blogs are counting the omer daily, each with a different spin.
- Counting the Omer is providing 49 different reasons (1 a day) to go vegetarian.
- Every day, Counting the Amirs gives us another person or thing named Omer, Amir(a), etc.
- Divah World, Life Cultivating Life, Crawling to Uman, and Blogshul are all focusing on the kabbalistic associations of each day of the omer, linking each day to a set of sefirot and writing related observations.
- BeardFest07 is some guys who aren’t shaving during the omer and are posting periodic photographic updates.
- And for a competely different count, here’s the Karaite perspective. The Karaites (like the Boethusians, well-known to Jewish calendar geeks) interpret “the day after the sabbath” (Leviticus 23:15) literally, to mean the day after Shabbat, so they start counting the omer on the Saturday night of Pesach, and Shavuot always comes out on Sunday. (Rabbinic Jews interpret “the sabbath” to mean the 1st day of Pesach, so they start counting the omer on the 2nd day of Pesach, whatever day of the week that is.)
Who else is blogging the omer?
I was blogging the oymer thru jewish music, but I slipped up already… a bunch of great shows coming up and I’m going to catch up!
A “Jewish calendar geek” would correct your questionable use of the Boethusians. There is little documentary evidence about the group, nor is there any external corroboration of their existence outside of some isolated anecdotes in rabbinic literature.
We have plentiful evidence, both within rabbinic literature and without, regarding the Sadducees and their solar calendar. It is unlikely that a Sadducee would “count the Omer” in the same manner as a rabbinic Jew.
Lonely Man of Cake,
Though there are few references to Boethusians in Rabbinic litereature, one does happen to come up specifically within the context of the counting of the omer at Menahos 65a-b.
I’m blogging the omer over at anotherqueerjubu.typepad.com from this particular pov
“We have plentiful evidence, both within rabbinic literature and without, regarding the Sadducees and their solar calendar. It is unlikely that a Sadducee would “count the Omer†in the same manner as a rabbinic Jew.”
Do you have any links for this? Your comment aroused my curiosity.
Curt
“We have plentiful evidence, both within rabbinic literature and without, regarding the Sadducees and their solar calendar.”
Correction: those were at best *some* of the Sadducees, not “the” Sadducees. In question are the folks usually more known as “the Dead Sea Sect”.
Most Sadducees seemed to have followed the lunar calender which was mainstream in Judaism until the Pharisaic current’s triumpth after the Temple’s destruction in 70AD.
“Most Sadducees seemed to have followed the lunar calender which was mainstream in Judaism until the Pharisaic current’s triumpth after the Temple’s destruction in 70AD.”
hi Jay,
Now we’re getting somewhere. Do you have any specific information on this?
Curt
Hi Curt,
Please read the webpages on the Karaite Korner site discussing the calendar and the New Moons.
It really was unlikely that a Sadducee would count the `Omer in the same manner as a Pharisaic (proto-Rabbinic) Jew.