Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac (1040-1105), the perceptive and erudite Bible and
Talmud commentator known as Rashi, said of Shavuot: "One should rejoice
on it by eating and drinking to demonstrate that this day on which the Torah
was given is acceptable to him."[1]
Accordingly, certain culinary customs have evolved to give due honor to Shavuot.
Dairy dishes characterize
the Shavuot meals served on the first day of the festival celebrating the
revelation on Mount Sinai. Various reasons have been advanced for this tradition.
The Bible itself compares the Torah to milk and honey. The verse "honey
and milk shall be under your tongue" (Song of Songs 4:11) implies that
the words of the Torah shall be as dulcet to your heart and ear as milk and
honey are sweet to your tongue. The psalmist declared that "the precepts
of the Lord are...sweeter than honey and the honeycomb" (Psalms 19.9-11).
Hence it is obligatory to partake of honey on Shavuot.[2]
Another rationale for eating these foods on the Feast of the Harvest derives
from the biblical description of the Land of Israel as "a land flowing
with milk and honey."[3]
Rabbi Moses
Isserles (c. 1520-1572) states: "It is a universal custom to eat dairy
food on the first day of Shavuot. The reason appears to be that just as on
the night of Passover two cooked dishes are taken in remembrance of the paschal
sacrifice and the festival offering, so one should eat a dairy dish and then
a meat dish [as a reminder of the two sacrifices offered on Shavuot...."[4]
Some commentators maintain that, prior to their receiving the Torah, the children
of Israel were permitted to eat nonkosher meat that was not ritually slaughtered.
However, when the Torah was given on Shavuot, they were thenceforth obligated
to adhere to the laws pertaining to ritual slaughter and to forbidden foods.
All their cooking utensils and eating vessels were forbidden: they could not
be purged because it was on a Sabbath and a festival that the Torah was given.
Thus they had no alternative but to eat dairy foods, which were relatively
easy to prepare.[5]
Another explanation relates to the fact that the law of the first fruits is
placed in juxtaposition to a law concerning milk (Exodus 23:19).[6]
The custom
of indulging in dairy fare on Shavuot is also derived from this biblical verse:
Minhah hadashah la-Adoshem be-Shavuotekhem (your Feast of Weeks, when
you bring an offering of new grain to the Lord; Numbers 28.26). The initials
of the four Hebrew words spell me-halav (from milk), implying that
foods made from milk are acceptable on Shavuot.
Mystics see
a reason in the fact that the numerical equivalent of halav (milk)
is forty the number of days Moses tarried on Mount Sinai.
Finally, in Psalm 68, which is read on Shavuot, the mountain on which the
Divine Presence rested is called Har Gavnunim, a word akin to gevinah,
the Hebrew for cheese.
Perhaps the
most delectable of Shavuot foods are blintzes, rolled pancakes filled with
cheese. Among other tempting tidbits are cheese knishes, butter cakes and
cheesecakes and cheese kreplakh. The kreplakh are three-cornered, a shape
based on the talmudic statement: "Blessed be the Merciful One who gave
the threefold Law [Torah, Prophets, Writings] to a people comprising three
classes [Kohen, Levi, Israel], through a thirdborn [Moses, the third child
of his parents], in the third month [Sivan].[7]
In some communities it is also customary to stuff these triangular pancakes
with meat.
Jewish women
in oriental countries took pride in baking for Shavuot a seven-layer cake
called Siete Cielos (Seven Heavens), symbolic of the traditional seven
celestial spheres God traversed to present the Torah to Moses on Mount Sinai.[8]
Fashioned in seven circular tiers, one smaller than the other with the smallest
on top, it was decorated with various symbols such as a star of David, the
rod of Moses, the two tablets of the Law, manna, Jacob's ladder, and the ark
of the covenant. Others topped the cake with a seven-rung ladder to recall
Moses ascending Mount Sinai. Similar elaborate pastries called Sinai Cake
alluded to the mountain. A large cake or bread with raisins, generally known
as pashtudan or floden when baked for Shavuot, was also called
Sinai. Some oriental Jewish women baked baklava —
a very sweet cake made with nuts, sugar, and honey.
Jews of Kurdistan
prepare large quantities of butter and cheese for the festival. Their special
dish was ground wheat cooked in sour milk with dumplings of butter and flour.
Jewish housewives in Tripoli baked wafers in various shapes: a ladder, to
recall that Moses went up Mount Sinai; a hand, denoting hands extended to
receive the Torah; the two tablets of the Law; eyeglasses, to see the words
of the Torah, and other symbolic forms.[9]
In some communities
it was customary to serve matzah remaining from Passover as a reminder
that Shavuot is the culmination of the exodus from Egypt. In North Africa
the matzah was shredded into bowls of milk and honey.
Pious Jews
herald Shavuot with an all-night vigil devoted to study of tikkun leil
Shavuot, and partake of cheesecake and coffee to refresh themselves. Yemenite
Jews read the tikkun in the synagogue on the second night of Shavuot.
Each brings a choice delicacy such as spiced coffee or candy to share with
those spending the night in study.
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Shavuot
recipes from The Book of Jewish Food:
An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York (with more than 800 Ashkenazi
and Sephardi Recipes), by Claudia Roden:
"For the Ashkenazim,
the specialities for Shavuot are cheese blintzes and strudel,
cheese, kreplach, lokshen pudding with cream cheese, borscht
with sour cream, cheesecake, and paschko.
For the Sephardim, they are filas and sambousak
with cheese, milk puddings like sutlach, and
pastries like ataif, stuffed with cheese. Shavuot is also regarded as
a harvest festival of fruit, and all kinds of fruit puddings and cake
are eaten."
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