[Avodah] Lag B'omer Am Yisroel Chai

Zev Sero via Avodah avodah at lists.aishdas.org
Fri May 12 13:01:06 PDT 2017


On 12/05/17 14:53, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> It's observed as a day of rejoicing because qabbalistically inclined
> communities -- Chassidim, and Sepharadim post-Chida and Ben Ish Hai --
> find a lot of significance in R Chaim Vital (in the name of the Ari)
> writes in Peri Eitz Chaim that it's yom simchas Rashbi. And then
> a copying error turned that into "yom shemeis Rashbi", by dropping
> the ches. However, it could well be two phrasings of the same idea.

No typo is necessary.  What could "yom simchas Rashbi" mean if not his 
yortzeit, which he explicitly instructed his talmidim to celebrate as if 
it were his yom hillula?  That's where the whole concept of celebrating 
yortzeits rather than mourning on them comes from, as well as the 
concept of referring to them as "wedding days".


> Also, as per other iterations, Lag baOmer at Meron appears to have
> originally been Shemu'el haNavi's yahrzeit (Mag beOmer? Yom Y-m) at Nabi
> Samwel, and only moved when Arabs going to Nabi Samwel (from Tzefat)
> dangerous.

This paragraph got garbled enough that if I didn't already know what you 
meant I could not have figured it out.  But it's my understanding that 
it wasn't danger from Arab marauders that put an end to the pilgrimages 
to Shmuel Hanavi (from all over EY) but rather a government decree 
barring Jews from the site.


-- 
Zev Sero                May 2017, with its *nine* days of Chanukah,
zev at sero.name           be a brilliant year for us all



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