The Jewish annual biblical holiday Shavuot, which means “Festival of Weeks,” will begin the night of Thursday, May 21. It is an agricultural holiday celebrating the seasonal transitional period from the first ripening of the barley grains to the season of the ripening of the first wheat stalks, seven weeks later.  In ancient times, two loaves of wheat bread were offered at the Temple on Shavuot as a thanksgiving offering. Wheat and barley were important crops because the flour is used for baking bread, and bread was the staple food in ancient Israel. Today, there is no ancient temple and no temple offerings.

Ironically, the practice of counting seven weeks toward the ripening of the wheat for the Shavuot Temple-offering continues even though there is no longer The Holy Temple to bring it to. The Jewish Temple can be destroyed, but the Jewish people live on, and the Jewish spirit of religious thanksgiving adapts itself to continue in Jewish religious practice even without the Holy Temple. One doesn’t have to live on a farm to see that when Shavuot is on the way, Spring is already in its glory. The trees have all their leaves back. Dandelions are all over the grass.  Stores are selling bouquets for Mother’s Day. My lilac bush is in bloom. My wife recently told me that her mother had a custom of putting flowers on the table for the Shavuot holiday. I told her, “If you want flowers on the table, I could take them from our lilac bush.” She said, “That’s alright. I think they look better on the bush.” I know some Jews have flowers on the table for Shavuot, but I much prefer the Shavuot custom of placing cheesecake and blintzes covered with sour cream on the table.

I remember a Hebrew School teacher (who happened to be a Holocaust survivor) telling the small children he was teaching to read Hebrew prayers, “When you feel really grateful, you feel really happy.” I think that is a good thing for Jews to remember when observing Shavuot and many other Jewish holidays.

Hersh Goldman is a Swampscott resident.