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One of our favorite activities as a family is to do a puzzle together. We usually choose a 500 or 1000 pieces, get on the floor and start having fun with finding the edges, sorting out the colors... Each one of us "takes care" of a specific portion of the picture, and you often hear: "hey, take this, I think it belongs to your part".
It is real teamwork. We all help each other and have a similar goal: complete the picture. The success of one person completing his part of the puzzle is the success of all of us.
I thought about puzzles in connection to the happy day of Lag Baomer, which was yesterday. It is the 33rd day of the period between Pesach and Shavuot, called Sfirat Haomer (find out more here). This is a sad period, as we remember the 24,000 students of Rabbi Akiva, who died in a plague because, in the words of our Sages, "they did not respect each other". The plague stopped on Lag Baomer, so we celebrate it as a joyful day.
Lag Boamer teaches us that we need to respect each other even if we are different and don't agree. We do not need to be similar in order to be united. Just the pieces of the puzzle, which have different shapes and different colors, but find a way to be connected and all together form a beautiful picture. Just as with our family solving the puzzle together, each one of us has a particular mission and an individual way to fulfill it has his part, and each one contributes to the completion of the final goal. We can get there only with respect one for another and helping one another.
Lag Boamer teaches us that there can be unity without uniformity.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Mendel and Nehama Hendel