Tafsiran Ulangan 16:9: Rashi, Chizkuni, Ramban & Sforno

מהחל חרמש בקמה [BEGIN TO NUMBER SEVEN WEEKS] FROM THE TIME THOU BEGINNEST TO PUT THE SICKLE TO THE CORN — i.e. from when the “Omer” has been cut (from the sixteenth of Nisan) which is the first produce to be harvested (Leviticus 23:10) (cf. Sifrei Devarim 136:2-3; Menachot 71a).

שבעה שבעות, “seven weeks;” the reason why this verse too is a kind of repetition, i.e. we had already heard that unleavened bread was to be eaten during the festival of Passover, after which seven weeks were to be counted, etc. in Leviticus 23,14-22, is that there is a new element here, i.e. that the count is to begin when the first offering of the new barley harvest, the omer, is offered to G-d in the Temple. The validity of this law as a Biblical law is related to the Jewish people living on their own land at that time. (Compare verse 11)

FROM THE TIME THE SICKLE IS FIRST PUT TO THE STANDING CORN. The meaning thereof is “from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing corn,” seeing that He has already mentioned when we are to begin to raise the sickle upon the standing corn in bringing the omer [a measure of the new barley brought as a meal-offering on the second day of Passover] which is the first-fruit of our harvest.³⁵⁷Leviticus 23:10. and the Midrash [of this verse] is:³⁵⁸Sifre, R’eih 316. “It teaches that the omer be reaped only with a sickle.”