Historically, the period between Pesach and Shavuot was meant to be a period of great joy and anticipation. Our redemption from Egypt was the precursor to receiving the Torah and consummating our relationship with Hashem. Yet it changed to a period of mourning with the passing of the 24,000 students of Rabbi Akiva. Rabbi Akiva rebuilt his yeshiva with just five students who were responsible for the transmission of the oral Torah. Perhaps the most preeminent of these students was Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who died on Lag BaOmer, the thirty third day of the counting. This day is celebrated with great joy, to honor the memory of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. What is the connection between these seemingly disparate details? Further, asks Rabbi Y. Hillel, why did our Rabbis decree four weeks of mourning for the deaths of Rabbi Akiva's disciples, a longer period of mourning than for any other tragedy in our history? Why did Hashem choose this specific time of the year for their death?
Rabbi Goldwicht describes the stages of the human intellectual process. On the first level there is chochmah, factual knowledge. However, facts alone are not very useful unless one can build on them, make inferences, and derive truths. This is the next level, binah, understanding, derived from the same root word as boneh, to build. At the stage of binah, man begins processing the knowledge. The final level is daat, wisdom, where full integration takes place. Rabbi Goldwicht continues by explaining how Adam was charged with naming all the creatures. Using his intellect, he called himself Adam, because "From adamah, from earth was I taken." Earth is the medium for growth and for creating beauty, a quality no other element possesses. If it is nurtured properly, it can produce so much good. Similarly, each person is charged with improving himself, growing, and creating beauty and goodness in the world.
This is also the main aspect of the period between Pesach and Shavuot. On Pesach, Hashem removed us from the depravity of Egypt without any real effort on our part. He then gave us forty nine days so that our efforts towards self-improvement would make us worthy to receive the Torah. This division also parallels the two aspects of Torah, the Written and Oral Torah. The written Torah was a direct gift given to Moshe at Sinai, transmitted to Yehoshua, and passed down the line through the generations. However, it was not meant to be static facts, but rather studied and understood. This is the Oral Torah which requires work to interpret and to apply as situations change.
Each week of Sefirah corresponds to one of the ushpizin, the special Succot guests. The first three weeks of Sefirah correspond to our forefathers, who form the basis for factual knowledge of God. Moshe, who brought the Torah down from Hashem as a direct gift to Bnei Yisroel, represents the Written Torah. Aharon, who explicated the Torah to the masses, is represented by the fifth week of Sefirah, when we begin building and working on ourselves.
Rabbi Akiva is the historical paradigm of the Aharon model who would transmit and explicate the Torah to the nation. When the disciples of Rabbi Akiva demonstrated a lack of sensitivity to each other, being separate individuals instead of one heart, they became unworthy of being the transmitters of Torah and inheritors of the legacy of Aharon, who fostered peace and love among Bnei Yisroel. These days became a period of mourning because we mourn the death of so much of our oral tradition and, as Rabbi Hillel points out, the immeasurable amount of wisdom and Torah that was lost when these great men died.
The Shvilei Pinchas notes that the seven weeks of Sefirah correspond to the seven attributes of Hashem through which He manifests His presence in the world. Each week we are meant to focus on the corresponding attribute and improve ourselves in that area, both in our relationships with others and in our relationship with God. Rabbi Friedman cites the Bnei Yissaschar to expand this concept. Using Pirkei Avot, he parallels the forty nine days of Sefirah with the trait of a lev tov, a good heart. This was the righteous path that Rabbi Elazar ben Arach suggested to his teacher, the great Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai. Rabbi Yochanan accepted this path as all inclusive. The numerical equivalent of lev tov is forty nine, with lev equaling thirty two and tov equaling seventeen. The heart is how we relate to others, and during the first thirty two days of Sefirah, we should focus on improving our interpersonal relations. Similarly, tov refers to Torah which is called lekach tov, a good portion, and implies focusing on those mitzvot that form and solidify our relationship with Hashem.
The thirty third day, then, forms the link between the first thirty two and the last seventeen, which will ultimately lead to God's coronation on earth through His Torah and the people who teach its precepts to the world. However, this would not be possible without the link of the oral tradition, a link that was almost permanently broken with the death of Rabbi Akiva's disciples.
Now we can begin to understand why Hashem meted out such harsh punishment to these great learned men. We are told that they did not interact with each other respectfully. Rabbi Yosef Fogel explains that this does not mean they were actually disrespectful. Rather on their level they were expected to relate to each other with extra sensitivity. Because they were on such a high spiritual level, they could not tolerate imperfection in others. It is to this end of judging others favorably that we should turn the magnifying mirror on ourselves and the minimizing or standard mirror on others.
Our Sages tell us, "Derech Eretz kadmah leTorah." (Proper manners precede the Torah.) If the disciples were lacking in this regard, how could they be the appropriate vehicles for the transmission of Torah? Rav M. Solomon uses this premise to compare Sefirah and the month of Elul. Both Sefirah and Elul culminate with the coronation of the King, Sefirah with our acceptance of Hashem's sovereignty through our acceptance of the Torah on Shavuot, and Elul with the coronation of Hashem as King over the world on Rosh Hashanah. During both periods, we need to work on refining our middot. Without doing so, no resolution we make will be fulfilled. As the Netivot Shalom says, character is the root of our tree, and if our roots are bad, neither Torah nor anything else good will grow.
Rather than thinking of the period between Pesach and Shavuot in negative terms of mourning and restrictions, we can look at it as an opportunity to perfect our middot so that we can become strong links in the mesorah and transmit our traditions to future generations.
