​Counting the Omer

By Jaime Noriega | 2015

INTRODUCTION
The commandment for counting the Omer is recorded within the Torah in Leviticus 23:15-16. However the obligation in post-temple destruction times is a matter of some dispute. While Rambam (Maimonides) suggests that the obligation is still biblical, most other commentaries assume that it is of a rabbinic origin in modern times.

Counting the Omer (Hebrew Sefirat HaOmer) is an important verbal counting of each of the forty-nine days between the Jewish holidays of Passover and Shavuot as stated in the Hebrew Bible: Leviticus 23:15-16.

The mitzvah (commandment) derives from the Torah commandment to count forty-nine days beginning from the day on which the Omer, a sacrifice containing an omer-measure of barley, was offered in the Temple of Jerusalem, up until the day before an offering of wheat was brought to the Temple on Shavuot. The Counting of the Omer begins on the second day of Passover (the 16th of Nisan) for Rabbinic Jews (Orthodox, Conservative, Reform), and after the weekly Shabbat during Passover for Karaite Jews, and ends the day before the holiday of Shavuot, the ´fiftieth day´.

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