Summer news from Camp Ramah in California, Week ending July 2, 2010

Summer never seems to arrive quickly enough. Sometime in the spring, a part of
the hearts of Jewish parents, teachers, children, and camp staff have already turned toward the summer. A dual countdown begins - one of the seven weeks of the Omer, from Passover to Shavuot, and another from spring to the start of camp. For all holy encounters in the Jewish cycle of seasons includes some sort of countdown. And now that summer has arrived the holy days of camp are sanctified here, nestled in the hills of Ojai.

Camp certainly is holy time, which is an appropriate topic for the summer as we
encounter Parshat Pinchas - the Torah portion of time par excellence. Chapters twenty eight and twenty nine of the Book of Numbers detail the offerings of the Jewish calendar, including the daily rites, new months, and annual festivals. Pinchas teaches us that the experience of time is a hallowed arc, circling and repeating through the seasons of nature, as the spirit simultaneously progresses forward. Acknowledging time enables the mind to settle and comfortably reflect on the direction of the soul.

Of course, camp is not a traditional season for which the Torah obligates a designated offering or even a prayer. It is, however, a spiritual marker in time for all who know it. After all, how many of us found our Jewish neshamah during a summer at Ramah? How many of us discovered our distinct Jewish identity because of the activities, language, and yes, even davenning at camp? How many of us have been reinvigorated, motivated to learn, and spiritually renewed by the vivid summer energy found amongst camp friends and counselors? How many of us have been injected with hope and joy upon seeing the smiles of campers during the summer?

Indeed summer is sacred time and it moves playfully to the rhythms of adolescence. Summertime at camp is both too fast and too slow all at once. It pushes and pulls us with counterintuitive forces. The noontime sun sluggishly saps our strength, while the cool evening moon and stars quicken our hearts and freshens our intellects. During the summer at camp, no matter how old we may be, we feel as though we are growing younger. And, even though we may not be in classrooms and doing homework, somehow, we seem to be learning much more and more quickly than ever.

The important thing about holy time is that we identify it as the blessing that it is. It is hard, maybe impossible to express just how wondrous summer can be. A.J. Heschel used metaphors to describe the power and sanctity of holidays and Shabbat because there is no other humanly mechanism to indicate sanctity - he called them "palaces in time." One might ask what metaphor he would use for camp.

Rabbi Paul Steinberg (whose Hebrew name is Pinchas) is an associate rabbi at Valley Beth Shalom.