Leviticus 23:16-17
You must count until the day after the seventh week—fifty days; then you shall bring an offering of new grain to God. You shall bring from your settlements two loaves of bread as an elevation offering; each shall be made of two-tenths of a measure of choice flour, baked after leavening, as first fruits to God.
Through the incremental change of the Omer, the bread of affliction we ate on Passover transforms into two full, risen loaves of hametz. The agricultural Shavuot reminds us that there will come a time when worry and uncertainty is behind us. On Shavuot we remember that security is possible, fullness and plenty can be restored, our cup can run over. In the rhythm of the Jewish calendar, we are invited into the safest moment of the year. We are invited to feel full, satiated, warm, and secure.
As we harvest, our fear eases, and turns to gratitude, which overflows into offerings of thanks to God. But why is it that bread makes an appropriate offering for God? Why is the first produce a grain-product, and not primarily fruit? It is the baking, according to an early midrash:
Sifrei Be-midbar 44:1
When are they “to God?” After they have been baked.
It is the act of baking—the human intervention—that designates this first grain as ready to be offered “for God.” Unlike fruits and vegetables, grain is not eaten by human beings before first being processed by us. We don’t eat wheat, we eat bread. It is not enough to simply receive the blessings of God’s world and be grateful—we are expected to take the resources we are given, and make something new.
