The Lessons from the Prophets are the following:—Josh. v. (preceded in the German Ritual by iii. 5–7), on the first Passover kept by the Israelites in Palestine; 2 Kings xxiii. 1–9 and 21–25, on the Passover celebrated in the days of King Josiah; 2 Sam. xxii., the song of David after deliverance from his enemies, a parallel to the Song of Moses; Isa. x. 32—xii., on the defeat of Sennacherib, and the blessings of the Messianic days. According to Tradition the defeat of Sennacherib took place on Passover; moreover, the celebration of the deliverance from Egypt suggests the reflection on the final Redemption of Israel. The Lesson from the Prophets chosen for Sabbath chol-ha-moëd is taken from Ez. xxxvi. 1–14. The prophet sees in a vision how the dry bones of the dead are awakened to fresh life by the Will and the Spirit of the Lord: a precious lesson for us, designed to strengthen our hope of a revival of every good and noble idea, though for the present it be dormant within us. Nature around us awakening to fresh life in the spring supplies a parallel to the vision of Hezekiel. The Machzor (lit. Cycle) or Prayer-book for the Holy-days contains numerous additions to the ordinary prayers. They are called Piyyutim, and vary according to the custom and the taste of the congregation. The Piyyut added in the second paragraph of the Musaph-amidah on the first day of Passover is called tal, “dew,” or prayer for dew; the rain season having come to an end, we pray that the vegetation may, during the hot season, be refreshed by the regular descent of the dew. The praise for “sending down rain” in the same paragraph, viz., ‏משיב הרוח ומוריד הגשם‎, “Thou causest the wind to blow and the rain to fall,” is discontinued after the shacharith prayer of the first day of Passover. In the Portuguese Ritual the words ‏מוריד הטל‎, “Thou causest the dew to fall,” are introduced instead. Similarly, there is an additional prayer for rain (‏גשם‎) in the Musaf of Shemini-atsereth. The time chosen for these prayers is in accordance with the meteorological conditions of Palestine. This custom, however, does not exclude the addition of prayers for rain or dew, according to the needs of the country in which we live. THE DAYS OF THE COUNTING OF THE OMER, ‏ימי הספירה‎ The period from Passover to the Feast of Weeks is full of sad memories of massacres of Jews that took place in the days of the Crusades; also of the miseries that befell the Jews in Palestine in the days of the Emperor Hadrian. During the month of Iyar, the Jews abstain from rejoicings and weddings, [120] with the exception of the 18th of the month, which is the 33rd of the Omer, because, according to Tradition, a plague that had raged among the disciples of Rabbi Akiba ceased on that day. The 18th of Iyar, ‏ל״ג בעומר‎ is therefore called “the scholars’ festival.” THE FEAST OF WEEKS, ‏שבועות‎