According to tradition, the time from the Exodus from Egypt until the giving of the law at Sinai was forty-nine days, so we count the days from Passover until Shavuot (the word means "weeks" since we count seven weeks). Shavuot celebrates the giving and accepting of the Torah, the center of Jewish life. The seven weeks are also a time of intense reflection and self-improvement. Each week represents one of the Divine Attributes of God and its corresponding attribute in people. Since these attributes are not isolated, but intermingled, each attribute is represented in each week. We work at this self-improvement to deserve the continued giving and receiving of God's word.
Arnold Schwarzbart
Seven bronze rods cross a curved clay panel faced with repoussé gold; a copper triangle is moved along a rod each day, and the gold is embossed with forty-nine pairs of Hebrew letters for the sefirot to be meditated on. The first, larger version was one of the Five Easy Pieces and Arnold's first omer counter; this smaller version followed in 1997 and is in several private collections, including that of West End Synagogue in Nashville. Ori Soltes discusses it in Tradition and Transformation (2016), and it was shown at the B'nai B'rith Klutznick Museum in 1997 and Hebrew Union College in 2000.
The text
חסד גבורה תפארת נצח הוד יסוד מלכות
Kindness, strength, beauty, endurance, splendor, foundation, sovereignty.
The seven lower sefirot; each of the forty-nine tags pairs the initials of two of them, one attribute within another, for each day of the counting
Studio of Arnold Schwarzbart
Arnold Schwarzbart ז״ל · 1942 – 2015 · Knoxville, Tennessee