Rabbi Art: This week in the Torah 5/14

We learn in this week’s sedra that according to the Torah, God told the Jewish people that planting and harvesting crops were to be done for six years, but every seventh year the land must rest. The seventh year, called the Sh’mittah, or Sabbatical year, is to be observed by not doing any farming.

This law is only used in the land of Israel. During the seventh year the land may not be farmed, but everyone must share whatever it produces naturally. The landowners and farmers must let poor people share whatever the land gives during the seventh year.

Other laws found in Parashat Behar include not allowing interest to be charged on a loan for poor people. A person forced to sell himself or herself as a servant because they are poor, may not be treated unkindly. Such a person has to be freed after six years of service. The person must be freed in the Yovel, or Jubilee Year, even if they have not served the full six years, still they must be let go free.

As usual there is much wisdom to be gleaned from the Torah’s approach to its agricultural roots.  Just as the Torah emphasizes over and over the need for a weekly Shabbat, the rules of the Sh’mittah informed its approach to the agricultural use of the land.

In Israel today, there is growing interest in environmental concerns as many rivers have been polluted and both the Kinneret (Galilee) and Yam HaMelakh (Dead Sea) have seen dramatic loss of water.  It goes without saying just how important water is to Israel and its neighbors. For more information about Israel’s environmental organizations check out the following website:  http://www.heschel.org.il (named for the late Rabbi Abraham J. Heschel, who, besides being a prolific author and professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary, was an advocate of social and political justice in the United States in the 1960’s).

B’shalom,

Rabbi Art Donsky