Shavuos is coming soon! It falls this year on Friday and Saturday of next week (Thursday evening through Saturday evening, of course, and for only the first day in Israel).

Outside traditional circles, Shavuos is an oft-neglected holiday. It comes just as summer arrives (in the Northern Hemisphere), and it has no special symbols — nothing to correspond to the Matzah, Seder plate, Esrog or Sukkah.

More’s the tragedy, because in reality, Shavuos does have its symbol — the Torah itself. To millions of Jews throughout the millenia, this is the day that G-d gave us the Torah… that which has preserved the Jewish People as a distinct nation ever since.

It remains a unique time for grasping our own individual portions of that Torah — described in Chapters of the Fathers as one of the three pillars upon which the world stands.