Agriculturally speaking, this is the time when the harvests would begin in earnest. Harvest time, to a farmer, is one of the most critical times of the year. Your whole livelihood and survival would depend on getting the crops in. In Wiccan mythology, the God sacrifices himself at Lammas to ensure a prosperous harvest for His followers. During harvest festivals and modern Lammas rituals, corn doll effigies may be symbolically sacrificed.
Why the sacrifice? The God willingly goes to his death so that his blood and body will help nourish the crops in their final stage of growing. He gives himself to the crops, so the crops will eventually give themselves to us and to the Goddess. At Yule, he will be born again, completing and renewing the cycle. The sacrifice is symbolic of the lives given up, plant and animal, so that we can continue to live.
In our modern times, Lammas is probably the most difficult sabbat to celebrate. For the most part, we aren't tied to the land any longer in the ways that farmers of the past were. We go to the supermarket for our food, not the garden, and we can get tomatoes and strawberries in January if we like. This sacrifice, at this time in the cycle, isn't really something we can relate to in a strictly agricultural sense.
