Sha'ar HaNun: The Gateway to the 50th 50th

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Yesterday, Shavuot 5776, was the 50th Shavuot since the Unification of Yerushalayim in the 6 Day War.  It was therefore the 50th 50th, beyond the natural count of 7 x 7 =49.  It was a very very special Shavuot.  It is even hinted at in the very name Shavuot.  We all know from the verses in the Holy Torah that the "classic" count to fifty from Pesach is most represented by Pesach actually falling on a Shabbat so that the count for each week ends each week on Shabbat so that Shabbat is the 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th, 35th, 42nd, and finally the 49th days of the Counting of the Omer.  When that happens about 30% of the time when Pesach Seder night does NOT fall on Motzei Shabbat, Monday night, or even Wednesday night, Shavuot 7 weeks and one day later falls on a Motzei Shabbat.  Now as it happened this year and last year, we say a special havdalah when saying kiddush for this one day of YomTov here in Eretz Yisrael, Bein Qodesh leQodesh.  You see, normally when one goes from Shabbat immediately into YomTov we go DOWN  in Qedushah.  We go from a day where we can't cook at all or transfer fire on Shabbat to a day where we can cook and transfer fire on YomTov which fell on Motzei Shabbat.  We go from a day which has 7 Aliyot to the Torah to a day that has only 5 Aliyot to the Torah when YomTov falls on a weekday.  So normally as we traverse the barrier directly from Shabbat to YomTov we descend a bit in Qedushah.  YomTov is still holier than Rosh Chodesh or Chol HaMoed or a regular Motzei Shabbat/ Yom Rishon, but it does not approach the holiness of Shabbat which comes every week at the end of the week.  Yet, how can this be with going from the 7th Shabbat, the 49th day of the Counting of the Omer, to Shavuot (the holy holy 50th day), a day whose greatness and specialness and purity cannot be attained by our natural efforts?  Well, we are a practical people.  We live with what G-d gives us.  In the year of the Exodus, Pesach "Seder" night fell on a Wednesday night.  The Exodus from Egypt was therefore on a Thursday, but since Moshe Rabbeinu was counting days and nights starting that Friday intentionally and not nights then days, he arrived at the 49th day on a Thursday and the 49th night on a Thursday night.  This way the 50th day began on Friday morning so that the Torah could not be given until Shabbat when we could begin to count in accordance to the Torah that was given at that time where days begin at sundown.  So the "Torah's" 50th day was at sundown Friday night.  Moshe Rabbeinu intentionally wanted for the Torah to be given on Shabbat precisely because Shabbat has an extra measure of holiness and compassion where the sick would be miraculously healed because of those extra measures.

So what Moshe was able to accomplish because he was counting days as Noach would have counted days (Days and then nights from Gen. 8:22 as Noach counted days)  was for Shavuot to fall on a "holier" day than just a weekday like Friday.  By nudging the process with G-d's permission to extend the count so that the Torah's 50th day should be on Shabbat, we received the Torah at that special level of holiness that only Shabbat can provide......until now, the 76th year of the 8th Century of the 6th Millennium (the 5700s).   So what is different this time around?  Well we have to analyze the discussion of Shavuot in two places in the Torah.  In Lev. 23 we see this:
  ו  וּסְפַרְתֶּם לָכֶם, מִמָּחֳרַת הַשַּׁבָּת, מִיּוֹם הֲבִיאֲכֶם, אֶת-עֹמֶר הַתְּנוּפָה:  שֶׁבַע שַׁבָּתוֹת, תְּמִימֹת תִּהְיֶינָה. 15 And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the day of rest (the word Shabbat), from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the waving; seven weeks (but it says Shabbatot or 7 Shabbatot) shall there be complete;
טז  עַד מִמָּחֳרַת הַשַּׁבָּת הַשְּׁבִיעִת, תִּסְפְּרוּ חֲמִשִּׁים יוֹם; וְהִקְרַבְתֶּם מִנְחָה חֲדָשָׁה, לַיהוָה. 16 even unto the morrow after the seventh week (It says after the 7th Shabbat) shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall present a new meal-offering unto the LORD.
יז  מִמּוֹשְׁבֹתֵיכֶם תָּבִיאּוּ לֶחֶם תְּנוּפָה, שְׁתַּיִם שְׁנֵי עֶשְׂרֹנִים--סֹלֶת תִּהְיֶינָה, חָמֵץ תֵּאָפֶינָה:  בִּכּוּרִים, לַיהוָה. 17 Ye shall bring out of your dwellings two wave-loaves of two tenth parts of an ephah; they shall be of fine flour, they shall be baked with leaven, for first-fruits unto the LORD.    Verse 17 is about Shavuot day itself.  Yes, we know from the Oral Torah and because of how we count the omer as it is mentioned in Devarim 16, that we count from the first day of Pesach when we could not leave our homes until HaShem slew the firstborn of Mitzraim.   The word Shabbat, a three letter root, is the combined two letter root Shev Bayit, which means "stay put at home" or "Sit in your House".  So the year of the Redemption from Mitzraim, the first night of Pesach was Shabbat that fell on a Wednesday night in the truest sense of the word.  We literally sat in our homes eating the Korban Pesach until immediately after Midnight.  Some say we waited to leave until the following morning so that we would not leave like slaves sneaking our of their masters' homes, but the Mitzrim wanted us to leave already by 1am that very night with their firstborn dying or already dead lying before them.

So let us look at the same corresponding verses in Devarim 16:
  שִׁבְעָה שָׁבֻעֹת, תִּסְפָּר-לָךְ:  מֵהָחֵל חֶרְמֵשׁ, בַּקָּמָה, תָּחֵל לִסְפֹּר, שִׁבְעָה שָׁבֻעוֹת. 9 Seven weeks shalt thou number unto thee; from the time the sickle is first put to the standing corn shalt thou begin to number seven weeks.
י  וְעָשִׂיתָ חַג שָׁבֻעוֹת, לַיהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ--מִסַּת נִדְבַת יָדְךָ, אֲשֶׁר תִּתֵּן:  כַּאֲשֶׁר יְבָרֶכְךָ, יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ. 10 And thou shalt keep the feast of weeks unto the LORD thy God after the measure of the freewill-offering of thy hand, which thou shalt give, according as the LORD thy God blesseth thee.

Here it says Shavuot for weeks not Shabbatot, but Shavuot for weeks is spelled with no Vavs in verse 9.  Yet, when we get to the day of Shavuot (7 weeks plus one) itself in verse 10 it is spelled like so  שָׁבֻעוֹת with one Vav. and a qoobootz (three dots in a diagonal row) under the Bet.  So notice the important difference between these two accounts of Sefirat HaOmer.  In the first account we count days where each week ends with or includes one Shabbat.  In the second count in Devarim the word Shabbat is not included in the commandment to count 7 weeks.  Interesting, nu?  But alas there is one more difference and perhaps it makes all the difference.   In the account in VaYiqra (Leviticus), the Torah lists the offerings (qorbanot) for Shacharit (the offerings for Musaph are listed in Parshat Pinchus in BaMidbar).  The Shacharit qorbanot including two leavened loaves of bread. 7 yearling lambs, one bull, and two rams as fully burnt Olah offerings + one male goat as a sin offering + two yearling sheep as a peace offering which is partially eaten by the Kohanim with the two loaves of Chametz bread from the newly harvested wheat.  But notice what is missing here.  This particular description of Shavuot does not mention the place where G-d will place His Name in Eretz Yisrael.  Because the Mishkan here was in the process of being built or had just been built, these sacrifices were likely brought when the Mishkan resided in Shilo and in the other places it was in Eretz Yisrael before the Mishkan was erected in Shilo from the time that wheat could actually be harvested in Eretz Yisrael.  Because there was no wheat grown in the Midbar, these Shacharit sacrifices were not brought in the Midbar.  But when we get to Devarim 16, we get to the following pasuk which distinguishes between the description of weeks in Leviticus as Shabbatot and the description of weeks in Devarim as Shavuot:
א  וְשָׂמַחְתָּ לִפְנֵי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ, אַתָּה וּבִנְךָ וּבִתֶּךָ וְעַבְדְּךָ וַאֲמָתֶךָ, וְהַלֵּוִי אֲשֶׁר בִּשְׁעָרֶיךָ, וְהַגֵּר וְהַיָּתוֹם וְהָאַלְמָנָה אֲשֶׁר בְּקִרְבֶּךָ--בַּמָּקוֹם, אֲשֶׁר יִבְחַר יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ, לְשַׁכֵּן שְׁמוֹ, שָׁם. 11 And thou shalt rejoice before the LORD thy God, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, and thy man-servant, and thy maid-servant, and the Levite that is within thy gates, and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, that are in the midst of thee, in the place which the LORD thy God shall choose to cause His name to dwell there.

So at least part of the difference between counting Shabbatot and counting Shavuot is to reach the place where HaShem will place His Name that we have profaned amongst the nations of the world.  We profaned it so badly, that we ourselves have fallen to the 49th level of impurity most likely by the end of WW1 when more Jews chose Bolshevism over HaShem's Shabbat.  It is just the way it is.  Before WW1 the majority of the world's Jews were shomer Shabbat.  After WW1 they were not, and the main change was a massive shift away from Shabbat toward the ideas of the Bolshevik Revolution.  Gedolim of the era including the Chafetz Chaim spoke about this, and we accepted it as a fait accompli.  As mentioned in my previous posts, the last exceptional nation in Malkhut Edom, the United States of America over a period of 98 years descended in two different stages through all 49 levels of impurity.  From 1918 until 1967, the most avant garde third of American culture plunged through 49 levels ending in the Summer of Promiscuous Sex in the Summer of 1967.  From 1967 until 2016, the Middle third of American culture most affected by that Summer of Promiscuous Sex in 1967 took the plunge, and now as of this second week in June, 2/3rds of American culture is now at minus 50.  From random acts of immorality in Golden Gate Park in 1967 in San Francisco to Granting ketubot (marriage contracts) to homosexuals over the past year, American culture died on this very Shavuot in 2016 (5776) so much so that on that very day of Shavuot, 50 died in a Bar for homosexuals in Orlando, Florida at the 50th gate to impurity which is no gate at all.  It really is an Abyss, a Tehom, where the entire culture is built upon a quicksand of nothingness.  Now the 50 who died does include the ISIS mass home grown mass murderer who in a moment of intense cruelty brought 49 others down with him.  America is now utterly finished with no real hope for reaching any path to its former glory.  Now that the last real exceptional nation in Malkhut Edom has reached -50, by default and not by our merits Yerushalayim along with its Holy Temple will now be spiritually rebuilt.  Spiritual Caesaria lies in total ruin, and it is a spiritual law of nature that Yerushalayim will now be spiritually rebuilt.

So now we get back to the hints in our story.  Between the Yovel years 5678 (1918) and 5727 (1967), HaShem stressed Aliyah to Eretz Yisrael.  That 49 year period was kicked off by the Balfour Declaration in the Fall of 5678.  The next 49 year period that began in the Yovel 5727 (1967) kicked off 49 years of Aliyat HaRegel to the Kotel HaMaaravi in the holier half of Yerushalayim where the Temple Mount and the walled Holy City rest.  In each case we made Aliyah in spurts of 600,000 people to kick off the next stage.  By the fall of 1947 the Jewish population of Eretz Yisrael reached 600,000, and the modern physical state of Israel was founded.  By 1967 there was an Army of 600,000 men between 20 and up in Eretz Yisrael, and now in the year 2016 while there are 6 million Jews now in Eretz Yisrael, there are now 600,000 Jews in the Greater Yerushalayim metro area from Geva Binyamin in the north to Givat Rimon (Pomegranate Hill) in Efrat in the south (as described by Zecharia HaNavi in chapter 14 verse 10).  So what is the next stage?  For that we have to ask "the legs" of Aliyat Har HaBayit whose rise into the Knesset began with the resignation of Defense Min Yaalon on the 25th day of Sefirat HaOmer at Netzach that is in Netzach.  He then resigned from the Likud party the next day allowing Yehudah Glick to be inaugurated at Hod that is in Hod on Lag B'Omer.  Keep in mind that he is only the legs of Aliyat Har HaBayit in Shamayim.  He is the premier Aliyat Har HaBayit specialist in the world, and HaShem has allowed him to fulfill that role.  Try to ignore some of the dumb things that come out of his mouth because the mouth of this Messianic process is Mashiach ben David while the Netzach and Hod belong to the legs of Yehudah Glick.  So now that we have arrived at the stage of Aliyat Har HaBayit, we have to realize that the first two stages of Aliyah lead to Jews building their homes in Eretz Yisrael and then in the Old City of Yerushalayim, but in this stage, the Aliyah is totally spiritual because only G-d lives on Har HaBayit.  Since it is the place to which He will place his name, the pasuk in Devarim 16 now comes into play that we will rejoice over the Festival of Shavuot in the place where HaShem will place His Name.  And when does that occur?

For that we look at the difference between the words Shabbat שַּׁבָּת and Shavuot שָׁבֻעוֹת because as mentioned above we are talking about the penultimate year when unlike most years where this is the case, we go from the 7th Shabbat of Sefirat HaOmer with its qedushah of Shabbat to the actual 50th Gate (Shaar HaNun) of the Final Redemption.  In this year while Shavuot falls immediately after Shabbat, unlike under normal circumstances, we go up in Qedusah going into Shavuot on Motzei Shabbat by going up in qedushah and not down from Shabbat to YomTov (as would usually be the case).  So what is the difference?  One Ayin and One Vav, the 76th year, and not only a 76th year of a Jewish Century, but that 76th year is itself a Motzei Shevi'it year, the year after a Sabbatical year (or Shmittah year).  So not only is it a year where Shavuot is on Motzei Shabbat, but the year itself is Motzei Shevi'it.  So do we have a hint to the Century?  Of course, the other three letters which the two words Shabbat and Shavuot have in common are a Tav, Shin, and a Bet.  Of those three letters, the two letters which refer to the "hundreds" are the Tav and the Shin, the 700s.  So there you go, the very year where this actually takes place is this very year Tav Shin Ayin Vav!  So as America has fallen to minus 50 with 50 dead in a gay bar in Orlando, by default and b'itah (as Caesaria now lies in total spiritual ruin) we here in Eretz Yisrael have just entered the Gateway to the 50th, the Golden Gate to the Temple Mount!

I will clean this up tomorrow, but I wanted this published as Jews in Chu"l finish the 2nd day of Shavuot.  The leftover Bet likely refers to the two years of transition because as Mashiach is revealed in Motzei Shmittah having the status of Chezkat Mashiach, he needs to prove himself  over the course of two years.  I would urge those to look at this post as a Shiur AND NOT A PROPHESY for what will occur from here on out.