In Parasha Emor, the verses in Leviticus 23:1-44 describe for us the festivals and holidays as sacred dates and times on the Jewish calendar. The torah expounds on the celebrations and commemorations: Shabbat, Rosh HaShanah, Yom Kippur, and the Three Festivals of Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot. Time becomes holy and the concept of sacred time versus secular time is born.
Though the festivals are appointed for God, they are not actually appointed by God. Leviticus 23:2 states, "The appointed seasons of the Eternal, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are My appointed seasons." In other words, once we as humans proclaim a day holy, it becomes holy to God. Maimonides makes a startling statement of law about the declaration of those times, in his code of law, Mishneh Torah, he tells us regarding the Sanctification of the New Month: "A court which sanctifies the month, whether by accident, whether they were mistaken, whether they were forced, it is sanctified and everyone is obligated to fix the festivals on the day they sanctified…” In other words, if a holiday is declared, even though it might be an error, the community must still observe the holiday as has been declared.
What about if we -as as the Milan Jewish community wanted to move Shabbat? Let’s say that Friday night and Saturday just isn’t convenient and we wanted to move Shabbat to Tuesday night and Wednesday? If the community leaders decided to do this- according to Maimonides and other Jewish theologians, seemingly this would be possible. So on Tuesday night we would gather (either in person or as we do now on Zoom), people would show all the challah they had baked, we would sing “Ma yafe hayom” and “L’cha dodi” and we would declare Tuesday night and Wednesday Shabbat. How would we feel? Would it really be Shabbat?
I do not want to try this experiment—but I can imagine how we would feel. At first it might be a lot of fun: Shabbat in the middle of the week!! But we would most likely conclude that it doesn’t feel like Shabbat. And we would have to wonder why?
First, we would know were out of synchronization with the rest of the worldwide Jewish community. Why we were singing Shabbat melodies on Tuesday night, the rest of the Jewish world was not. When we celebrate Shabbat on Friday and Saturday, when we sit down to seder, when we light Chanukah candles on the first night of Chanukah, when we hear the sound of shofar on Rosh HaShanah, we imagine how Jews all over the world are celebrating. On Passover evening, as we sit a our tables, we can see Jews in Italy, the United States, Israel, and even South America dipping their parsley into salt water. Through our appointed times and seasons and their associated rituals we can see images of other Jews celebrating as we do.
This image of Jewish community is a concept expanded by Benedict Anderson in his book “Imagined Communities” (1991). In this volume he explored how nations, states, and ,communities imagine themselves as part of a people often connected by culture, religion, and language. Although we do not know most of the members of this world-wide community of Jews, we are connected by the sheer fact that we share culture, food, language, and a calendar.
I look forward to seeing you on this upcoming Friday on Zoom and I can’t wait to see the challah you’ve been baking and I can’t wait to imagine all the millions of Jews all over the globe basking in the glow of Shabbat candles, tasting the wetness of the Sabbat wine, and showing friends and family the beautiful loaves of challah they have baked. Even though we are currently singing and praying via a computer screen---we are still part of this strong community of worldwide Jews celebrating.