Karaite Korner Newsletter #323
Aviv Not Found, Thirteenth Month to Begin after
ShabbatOn Tuesday March 4, Wednesday March 5, and Thursday
March 6, 2008 an
international team crisscrossed the Land of Israel searching for Aviv
Barley. We examined barley from
the Negev in the south all the way to
the border of
Lebanon in the north and from the Jordan Valley
in the
east to the Coastal Plain in the west. Most of the barley we found,
including the barley in the Northern Negev,
was no further than the
"cotton" stage also referred to as the "flowering" stage. In the
Jordan Valley we found small
amounts of barley in the "worm" stage,
also referred to as the "soft dough" stage. We did not find any barley
in the
Aviv stage anywhere in
Israel
and therefore we must wait until
after the Thirteenth Month before beginning the new Biblical Year. The
Thirteenth Month
will begin with the expected sighting of the New Moon
from
Israel on Saturday night March 8, 2008. The holiday of Chag
HaMatzot will run
from April 21 at sunset through April 28 at sunset.
For the dates of the other biblical appointed times please see:
http://www.karaite- korner.org/ holiday_dates. shtmlThis year's Aviv Search was truly an international effort with
participants from
Israel, the
United States,
England,
and
South
Africa.
The Karaite searchers were joined by adherents of several
different faiths and persuasions including members of "Yahweh's
Philadelphia Truth Congregation"
and "Hoshana Rabbah Messianic
Discipleship Resources".
Ruthanne Koch, a Certified Crop Advisor from
Colorado participated
along with her
husband Bernie, her brother Erich Draht, and his wife
Gloria. Other participants included Ferenc Illesy, Rivkah Michaeli,
Avi
Ben Mordechai, Johan Schutte, Glen Cain, Tracey Cain, Frank King,
Eileen King, Sharon King, Nathan Lawrence, Sandi Lawrence,
Linda
Lampkin, and Richard Bay. I want to thank American Karaites Yochanan
Labombarbe and Sean Reuland for making the
trip over to
Israel
to do
the Aviv Search and Devorah Gordon for helping make the Aviv Search a
success. Finally, I want to thank everyone
who supported the Aviv
Search both financially and in other ways.
I usually prefer to stick to the cold dry facts
in the Aviv Report but
I cannot help but relate an incident that happened to our group during
the Search. As we were
winding up our examination of the Northern
Negev we found ourselves on the road to Sederot, the Israeli town
which has
come under such cruel bombardment by Palestinian rockets
over the past year. Recently the attacks have increased from a
weekly
occurrence to a daily one. We decided we would stop in Sederot to show
our support for the citizens of this embattled
town. As we entered the
city, Devorah noticed a sign pointing to the Sapir College where a
young man was killed last
week by an Arab rocket while walking to his
car. Moments later we were driving into the very parking lot where the
man
was killed when we saw several people running in one direction.
Then we heard a woman announce over a loud speaker in Hebrew
"Code
Red, Code Red" which is the warning that the rockets are on their way.
Our caravan of cars quickly stopped and
we ran after the locals who
were scurrying into a nearby bomb shelter. After a few minutes, the
rocket attack was over
and everyone started to leave the cramped bomb
shelter. The young people continued about their usual activities
around
the college as if nothing happened but we were still shaken
from the experience. It is one thing to hear about a rocket
attack on
television but an entirely different matter to be in the midst of one.
When we finally left the shelter we
walked about 50 feet to a small
crater formed when the rocket killed the young man last week. We were
all shocked to
see a bloody glove in the crater dropped there the week
before by one of the paramedics. May Almighty Yehovah protect his
people
from their enemies who seek to dispossess us from the land
which he created out of nothing and gave to our ancestors as
part of
his eternal covenant!
(By the way, the last newsletter was supposed to be #322, not #321.)
Reporting
from
Jerusalem, Israel 
