As we count the Omer, we're counting down the days until Shavuot. (This year Shavuot begins on  the evening of Saturday, May 26 -- just under four weeks from now.) Like children counting the days until a birthday or vacation, like a bride or groom counting down the days until the wedding, we're counting the 49 days until we can celebrate the anniversary of standing at Sinai and receiving Torah.

The sages tell us that each of our souls was somehow mystically present on that day: not only the souls of every Israelite who had survived the Exodus from Egypt, but the souls of every Jew who ever was or will be. When we celebrate Shavuot with mindful intention, we can glimpse that ineffable moment of transmission.

My teacher Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi tells us that the divine broadcast is still happening -- that God broadcasts truth and love and kindness on all frequencies all the time. This is the frequency to which our community has historically been attuned. If we open the ears of our hearts and souls, we can hear it even now.

In my favorite understanding, the Torah we received at Sinai wasn't just the words we know and love, dance with and wrestle with, read each week in the scroll of Genesis through Deuteronomy. In that moment of mystical download we received too all of the commentaries, the Oral Torah, the writings of our sages of blessed memory, all the way down to every d'var Torah written even now.

Every insight, every interpretation, every mind-opening understanding was packaged with the Torah when it came down. Torah, the sages say, has 70 faces; turn it and turn it, for everything is in it.

If you're looking for a contemporary way to connect with Torah, allow me to humbly suggest my collection of Torah poems. It makes a great Shavuot gift for anyone in your life who loves poetry and/or loves Torah. If your community celebrates Confirmation at this time, consider giving it to confirmands! Or to b'nei mitzvah, or to your rabbi, or to a friend, or to yourself. Find out all about it, read the first few poems, etc, here at the Phoenicia Publishing website.

A great Shavuot gift for one and all!