Song of Songs, Havdallah
February 16, 2007
Kudos to Bowie for the service on Wednesday. I loved how multisensory it was - could the Songs of Songs really be done any other way?
It also got me thinking about how Havadallah, the traditional Jewish service for the ending of Shabbat, done at dusk on Saturday. That service includes:
~filling a cup full of wine (and tasting it)
~passing around spices (and smelling them)
~lighting a candle (and examining your fingernails in the light)
~snuffing out the candle in the wine (and getting a very satisfying pssssst)
I thought it was very interesting that we did all of these thing even though Bowie’s never been to a Havdallah. Well, ok, we snuffed out matches in water (instead of a candle in the wine) but the effect was the same. It’s interesting to me how some elements of ritual seem be archetypical, transcending culture and religious tradition.