To Each Their Portion: Counting the Omer

(1) And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: . . . (4) These are the set times of the Lord, the holy occasions which you shall proclaim, each at its appointed time. (5) In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at dusk, there shall be a Passover offering to the Lord. . . . (9) And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: (10) Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: When you come into the land which I give to you, and shall reap the harvest, then you shall bring the Omer of your harvest to the priest. (11) And he shall elevate the Omer before the Lord, to be accepted for you; on the day after the Shabbat the priest shall elevate it. . . . (14) Until that very day, until you have brought the offering of your God, you shall eat no bread, nor parched grain or fresh ears; it is a law for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings. (15) And from that day on which you bring the Omer of elevation offering -- the day after the Shabbat -- you shall count seven complete weeks. (16) You must count until the day after the seventh week -- fifty days; then you shall bring an offering of new grain to the LORD. . . . (21) And you shall make proclamation on that same day; it shall be a sacred occasion to you; you shall not work at your occupations; it is a statute for ever in all your dwellings throughout your generations. (22) And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corner of your field, neither shall you gather the gleaning of your harvest; you shall leave them for the poor, and for the stranger: I am the Lord your God.

(1) Setting out from Elim, the whole Israelite community came to the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departure from the land of Egypt. (2) In the wilderness, the whole Israelite community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. (3) The Israelites said to them, "If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots, when we ate our fill of bread!

(4) And the Lord said to Moses, "I will rain down bread for you from the sky, and the people shall go out and gather each day that day's portion, that I may thus test them, to see whether they will follow my instructions or not. (5) But on the sixth day, when they apportion what they have brought in, it shall prove to be double the amount they gather each day." (6) So Moses and Aaron said to all of the Israelites, "By evening you shall know it was the Lord who brought you out from the Land of Egypt; (7) and in the morning you shall behold the presence of the Lord because He has heard your grumblings agains the Lord. For who are we that you should grumble against us?" ...

(14) When the fall of dew lifted, there, over the surface of the wilderness, lay a fine and flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground. (15) When the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, "What is it?" -- for they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, "That is the bread which the Lord has given you to eat. (16) This is what the Lord has commanded: Gather as much of it as each you requires to eat, an Omer to a person for as many of you as there are; each of you shall fetch for those in his tent." (17) The Israelites did so, some gathering much, some little. (18) But when they had measured it by the Omer, he who had gathered much had no excess, and he who had gathered little had no deficiency: they had gathered as much as they needed to eat.

(19) And Moses said to them "Let no one leave any of over until morning." (20) But they paid no attention to Moses; some of them left of it until morning, and it became infested with maggots and stank. And Moses was angry with them. (21) So they gathered it every morning, each as much as he needed to eat; for when the sun grew hot, it would melt.(22) On the sixth day, they gathered double the amount of food, two Omers for each; and when all the chieftains of the community came and told Moses, (23) he said to them, "This is what the Lord meant: Tomorrow is a day of rest, a holy Shabbat of the Lord. Bake what you would bake and boil what you would boil; and all that is left put aside to be kept until morning." (24) So they put it until morning, as Moses had ordered; and it did not turn foul, and there no maggots in it. (25) Then Moses said, "Eat it today, for today is a Shabbat of the Lord; you will not find it today on the plain. (26) Six days you shall gather it; on the seventh day, the Shabbat, there will be none. (27) Yet some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather, but they found nothing.

(28) And the Lord said to Moses, "How long will you people refuse to obey my commandments and my teachings? (29) Mark that the Lord has given you the Shabbat; therefore, he gives you two days food on the sixth day. Let everyone remain where he is: let no one leave his place on the seventh day." (30) So the people rested on the seventh day. (31) The house of Israel named it man; it was like coriander seed, white, and it tasted life wafers in honey.

(32) Moses said, "This is what the Lord has commanded: Let one Omer of it be kept throughout the ages, in order that they may see the bread that I fed you in the wilderness when I brought you out from the land of Egypt." (33) And Moses said to Aaron: "Take a jar, put an Omer of man in it, and place it before the Lord, to be kept throughout the ages." (34) As the Lord had commanded Moses, Aaron placed it before the Ark, to be kept. (35) And the Israelites ate the man forty years, until they came to a settled land; they ate the man until they came to the border of the land of Canaan. (36) And the Omer is a tenth of an Epha.

Rabbi Berachyah said: The Holy One, Blessed be He said to Moses: Go and tell Israel that when I gave them the man, I provided enough for each person, as it says "an Omer for a person." Now that you give me the Omer, I only ask for one Omer from all. And moreover, the Omer is of barley not wheat. Thus, Moses instructed Israel and said to them: "And you shall bring the Omer."

(2) At that time the Lord said to Joshua: ‘Make knives of flint, and circumcise again the children of Israel the second time.’. . . (8) And it came to pass, when all the nation were circumcised, every one of them, that they abode in their places in the camp, till they were whole. (9) And the Lord said to Joshua: ‘This day I have rolled the disgrace of Egypt from off you.’ So he called the name of that place Gilgal to this day. (10) While the Israelites were encamped in Gilgal they kept the passover in the evening on the fourteenth day of the month in the plains of Jericho. (11) On the day after the passover, on that very day, they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. (12) The man ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land, and the Israelites no longer had man; they ate the crops of the land of Canaan that year.

The Holy Blessed One makes [the taste of manna] according to their desires. Rabbi Abba said, even if the thing is not said out loud, rather it is only thought of in his heart, as the Scripture says, "from his soul he has a desire," thus the Holy Blessed One makes according to his desire the flavor of [manna] according to each one's desire. Know that this is so, for as the prophet Ezekiel said, "My bread which I give to you is flower, oil, and honey that you may eat of it." It is written one place saying, "Behold I will rain down bread from heaven" and in another saying, "the taste is of a dripping honey" and another saying, "its taste is the taste of the finest flower." How do these three texts compare? Young ones taste bread, the elders taste honey, the babes taste the oil.

(1) These are the things that have no measure: Peah [corner of the field which, while harvesting, must be left for the poor], Bikurim [First-fruits that must be brought to the Temple and given to the priest], the appearance-sacrifice [brought to the Temple on Pilgrimage Festivals], acts of kindness, and the study of the Torah. These are things the fruits of which a man enjoys in this world, while the principal remains for him in the World to Come: Honoring one's father and mother, acts of kindness, and bringing peace between a man and his fellow. But the study of Torah is equal to them all.