A Happy Har Sinai to Everyone!

Have you ever noticed that our biblical holidays all have both historical and agricultural/Natural world significance?

On Pesach, we celebrate our Exodus as well as the springtime, Sukkot commemorates our pre-Israel desert experience but also marks the annual harvest- and Shavuot not only means receiving the Torah from Sinai, but the giving of our first fruits, as well as being permitted to enjoy the year's new yield of flour.

There is something very "Derech Hateva" about approaching our reality through both historical and Nature-based glasses: We walk the footsteps of our ancestors, seeing, visiting, learning about how we arrived at this point and place in time, but we also access a Nature not contingent upon a linear history, that represents time as being cyclical and expresses a constant relationship with our world and its Creator.

So as we get set for our big summer revelation- okay, so the Israel Trail Teen Adventure is no Sinai, but we think it's pretty great- we bring you The Footprint, to report to you on our goings on, to tell you about some exciting new programs, summer staff and volunteers flocking from all over the world to Jerusalem and Derech Hateva and to update you on the success of our leadership fellowship for immigrant/development town youth, Kehillat Natan (and to ask you for some help.)

May it be a time to receive wisdom from above, to give of our portions below,and to appreciate the opportuntiy for both.

Chag Sameach!

(As appeared in issue 3 of the Derech Hateva Footprint, Shavuot 5768/June 2008)