Ask almost anyone who celebrates Shavuos what he or she is celebrating, and you’ll probably get the right answer: Shavuos marks and celebrates the decisive moment of kabalas HaTorah. But then follow up by asking what exactly we are seeking to recreate, and you’ll probably get an inaccurate answer. Most would answer, Shavuos represents the time we received the Torah and became obligated in mitzvos. The problem is that most of the Torah and the overwhelming amount of mitzvos were given at different periods in the desert — in Arvos Moav, Marah, and each time Moshe came to the Ohel Mo’eid. In fact, at Sinai, at least according to Rebbe Yishmael, only ten commandments were given. Six hundred and three were given elsewhere and at other times. Why, then, is Shavuos special, what makes it exceptional and worth celebrating?

Almost forty years ago, a book was written that would turn out to be prophetic. In A Nation of Strangers, Vance Packard documented how, already then, America was rapidly becoming splintered, fragmented, and divided. Packard argued that increasing mobility was destined to have negative effects on society. His prediction came true and his work did not even include any anticipation of the proliferation and impact of technology. 

Long before this pandemic, we were already experiencing an epidemic of loneliness. Despite social networking that was designed to connect people and create bonds, in a 2018 survey conducted by Cigna, nearly half of Americans reported sometimes or always feeling alone. People clearly crave community, and no matter how many belong to various online communities or cultures, they are struggling to find authentic connection in ways that will take away the feeling of loneliness.

In his Sifsei Chaim, Rav Chaim Freidlander explains that when we were liberated from Egypt, we were a group of individuals, a conglomerate of people, but we were not yet a community. Only after gathering around Har Sinai with a shared purpose and a collective mission did we achieve peoplehood and did we become a sacred community. 

When we stood at the base of that modest mountain as one entity, one person with one heart, we formed an eternal entity — Knesses Yisroel, the people of Israel. Yet before mitzvos defined us, independent of our obligation to perform hundreds of positive and negative commandments, we created a bond and a link that would transcend barriers and boundaries. We reveled in our shared history and pledged a common destiny.

When we recite Birchos HaTorah in the morning or when we get an aliyah, we say asher bachar banu mikol ha’amim, v’nassan lanu es Toraso. Before acknowledging having received the Torah, we recognize having been formed as a sacred nation with a divine mission — first, asher bachar banu (He chose us from all the nations), and only then, v’nassan lanu es Toraso (He gave us His Torah).

Shavuos is undoubtedly a time for renewed commitment to mitzvah observance. It is unquestionably an occasion for reinvigorated dedication to Torah study. But above all, it is a time to reflect on what it means to be a member of a sacred community. Shavuos mandates us to think and consider how the community empowers us and how we can empower the community. At the Pesach Seder we proclaimed that it would have been enough to arrive at Har Sinai even if we never received the Torah. Shavuos reminds us that dayenu, to be a member of a sacred society and purpose-driven people would have been enough to obligate an expression of gratitude.

Human beings are wired with a longing for belonging and a great desire to be connected. The antidote to loneliness is community. Each day in our Birchas HaTorah we express gratitude and praise for the gift and blessing of having a community and people to belong to. 

Belonging to community is not about conformity, but commitment. We don’t have to forfeit our individuality or our diverse needs. However, we do have to come together, to collaborate and complement, not compete with one another. 

This past year, among other things, the pandemic helped us learn a lot about ourselves. When locked down, many created a mini “community” in their own home, serving as president, gabbai, ba’al tefillah, rabbi or rebbetzin. As things began to open up, outdoor minyanim formed, creating small communities within the community, bringing neighbors together and creating new bonds. Some of these groups persevered through extreme cold, others extreme heat and still others, both. Talents, skills, and leadership abilities, which might otherwise have remained dormant, were discovered and harnessed. 

As things slowly come back to normal, we must embrace the opportunity to come back together, to draw on those discoveries and recruit those talents in a way that collaborates and complements, never competes. We have learned that we can grow larger and smaller at the same time when we simultaneously empower individuality and diversity, always with a sense of unity and community. 

This Shavuos, as we b’ezras Hashem continue to emerge from a horrific pandemic that divided and isolated us, let’s affirm our commitment to the central role community must have in our lives. Let’s pledge our participation and promise to contribute our talents and gifts.