Conference taveng::bagels

	RE: .-1

	Yes.

	Na'aseh v'nishmah.

don

    To Dave, the famous DECSIM guru,
      
    Mazel tov on your silver anniversary with Digital.  
    Wishing you continued success, good health and all 
    the best to you and your family. 
                                    
    Bernice

    
    I have a question that comes from relative ignorance...
    
    My observant brother (he's the relative and I'm ignorant :-})
    organizes, every year around Shavuot time, a celebration/study 
    group--a large group of folks who stay up all night and study 
    Parshot and Talmud.  My question is, is this a traditional 
    celebration or something created by his group of friends?  If 
    it is traditional, what connection does it have to the holiday?
                                       
    thanks for any comments,
      Cheryl
            
    

>    My observant brother (he's the relative and I'm ignorant :-})
>    organizes, every year around Shavuot time, a celebration/study 
>    group--a large group of folks who stay up all night and study 
>    Parshot and Talmud.  My question is, is this a traditional 
>    celebration or something created by his group of friends?  If 
>    it is traditional, what connection does it have to the holiday?

I have the same question. My temple has an all-night study session planned for
tonight. It is Beth El in Sudbury. Feel free to drop in if you are in the area.
I believe they plan to bring in bagels for breakfast.

It seems appropriate to celebrate the holiday that commemorates the giving of
the Torah by spending extra time to study the Torah. The problem I have with
this holiday is that I grew up in a non-observant family and Hebrew school
always ended before Shavuot so I know very little about it.

Dave

When I was growing up, we used to study all night, too.  It's one
of my fondest memories.

I THINK that the "TIKUN" tradition is based on the story that the
Israelites slept late the day that they were to receive the Torah, and
had to be roused.  We study all night to make up for their behavior.

Edie

>    To Dave, the famous DECSIM guru,
>      
>    Mazel tov on your silver anniversary with Digital.  
>    Wishing you continued success, good health and all 
>    the best to you and your family. 

Thankyou very much.

I have an anecdote from the "early" days of Digital. I think my informant was
Marv Horowitz and even tho I'm not certain it was he, here is the story.

On an afternoon in September, many years ago, Marv was a supervisor of a small
group in Maynard (where else? - we're talking about 25 years ago). As he was
leaving he told his people he'd see them in three days after the holiday. His
workers weren't sure what the holiday was, but they all stayed out of work.
Must be some unique DEC holday, right? It was Rosh Hashanah of course.

Dave
 ... and a happy and healthy holiday to all of you.

re .-1

A great "follow through" to that story would have been "and they were all 
Jewish!", but we weren't.


ed

About the origins of the TIKUN of Shavuot...
The following soudns crazy but was told me by a very serious Jewish
historian who made a study of the topic:
All the "late night" and "all night" Jewish ceremonies, such as
TIKUN SHAVUOT, TIKUN CHATSOT, SHALOM ZACHAR, etc. became popular
only with the arrival of ... COFFEE ! Until that time the general
practise was to wake early in the morning for the precursors to these
minhagim. In fact, you can track the spread of these minhagim westwards
(by noting the membership fluctations in the all-night-chavurot as opposed
to the early-morning-chavurot, all of which fortunately left behind
detailed membership rolls!) and show that there is a strict correlation with
therise of coffee clubs. In the early days coffee was considered a
drug (ha ha!) and there were many responsa concerning it, e.g. is one 
allowed to sip some coffee before davening in the AM, etc. The point is:
the arrival of coffee was significant in redefining the late night hours as
a time for human activity. The "powers" of coffee were exaggerated and
celebrated.
An interesting aside: in Italy the rabbis were very concened about those
who would show up for midnight prayers after spending several hours in
lewd company in the coffee houses. Figures, right? The Italians know how
to enjoy life! Italian Jews also!
-ZAITCH

Re < Note 710.8 by VAXWRK::ZAITCHIK "VAXworkers of the World Unite!" >
                         -< COFFEE and TIKUN SHAVUOT >-

>... In the early days coffee was considered a
>drug (ha ha!) and there were many responsa concerning it, e.g. is one 
>allowed to sip some coffee before davening in the AM, etc...

Why laugh?  It *is* a drug.  The fact that it is legal is irrelevant.

/Mike