What Exactly Do We Celebrate on Lag B'Omer?

What is Lag B’Omer?

Lag B’Omer, the 33^rd day of the Omer (it falls out on Sunday this year), is a festive day on the Jewish calendar.  For many, it marks the end of the subdued behavior and no haircuts of the Omer period.  It is celebrated with outings on which children play outdoors – traditionally with bows and arrows, bonfires, parades and other joyous events.  Many people travel to visit the resting place (in Meron, northern Israel) of the great sage and mystic Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, the anniversary of whose passing is on this day.

Say what???

Where does all this come from?  Why the joy?  Why the bonfires?  Why anything on a day which is not mentioned ANYWHERE in the Talmud or early Jewish sources?

One reason recorded is that Rabbi Akiva’s students, who died during the Omer period, stopped dying on the 33^rd day of the Omer.  If we are sad during the Omer period due to our continuing grief over the loss of all of the Torah of Rabbi Akiva’s students, then the cessation of their dying is a reprieve from that grief.  The day became memorialized as a day of relief and celebration.

A second source for Lag B’Omer being a happier day is based on a number of Kabbalistic explanations that find spiritual significance in the 33^rd day of the Omer.  Since the day is spiritually elevated, it deserved to be celebrated.  The most well-known of these spiritual reasons is the tradition that Lag B’Omer is the yahrzeit of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, whose teachings form the basis for the Zohar, the primary book of Jewish mysticism.  On this yahrzeit, we celebrate the “light” of the Torah that Rabbi Shimon revealed.

This is all very nice, and I enjoy a nice bonfire just as much as the next person, but do these reasons rate a holiday?  I am not alone in my skepticism.  Not everyone is so enthusiastic about Lag B’Omer.

Rabbi Moshe Sofer (1762-1835, Hungary) questions whether it is permissible to establish a new holiday that is not based on any type of miracle.  (So Yom Ha’Atzmaut and Yom Yerushalayim are safe!)  Rabbi Yosef Shaul Nathanson (1808-1875, Poland) also objects to the celebration on similar grounds.  He notes that the proper response on a yahrtzeit is to fast and not to celebrate.  He also questions the practice of making bonfires to burn clothing as it seems like it is bal tashchit, wasteful.

So where does that leave us?  What is the message of Lag B’Omer?

As usual, my Friday Torah session with Ramaz Third Graders shed some light on the matter.

The two major sources for celebrating Lag B’Omer are the end of Rabbi Akiva’s students dying and Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s passing.  Both of these episodes teach an important lesson of continuity. 

How did the passing of Rabbi Shimon impact his students?  They rededicated themselves to spreading his teaching. 

What did Rabbi Akiva do after losing his students?  He immediately taught new ones. 

Lag B’Omer is the holiday of moving forward.

This may be why the day revolves around children.  The children have outings, and the young children get their first haircuts.  On Lag B’Omer, we look to tomorrow.

I realize this may not fully answer the question, but it makes me smile and gives me a reason to celebrate.