(ב) דַּבֵּ֞ר אֶל־בְּנֵ֤י יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ וְאָמַרְתָּ֣ אֲלֵהֶ֔ם כִּ֤י תָבֹ֙אוּ֙ אֶל־הָאָ֔רֶץ אֲשֶׁ֥ר אֲנִ֖י נֹתֵ֣ן לָכֶ֑ם וְשָׁבְתָ֣ה הָאָ֔רֶץ שַׁבָּ֖ת לַיהֹוָֽה׃ (ג) שֵׁ֤שׁ שָׁנִים֙ תִּזְרַ֣ע שָׂדֶ֔ךָ וְשֵׁ֥שׁ שָׁנִ֖ים תִּזְמֹ֣ר כַּרְמֶ֑ךָ וְאָסַפְתָּ֖ אֶת־תְּבוּאָתָֽהּ׃ (ד) וּבַשָּׁנָ֣ה הַשְּׁבִיעִ֗ת שַׁבַּ֤ת שַׁבָּתוֹן֙ יִהְיֶ֣ה לָאָ֔רֶץ שַׁבָּ֖ת לַיהֹוָ֑ה שָֽׂדְךָ֙ לֹ֣א תִזְרָ֔ע וְכַרְמְךָ֖ לֹ֥א תִזְמֹֽר׃
(2) Speak to the Israelite people and say to them: When you enter the land that I assign to you, the land shall observe a sabbath of יהוה. (3) Six years you may sow your field and six years you may prune your vineyard and gather in the yield. (4) But in the seventh year the land shall have a sabbath of complete rest, a sabbath of יהוה: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.
Alshikh on Leviticus 25:2
"When you come to the land which I give you:"
There is none who does know that it is God Who gives, for the earth is the Eternal's and the fullness thereof, and this is also stated several times in the Torah. It therefore seems superfluous here-- so why does the Torah mention it?
"When you come to the land which I give you:"
There is none who does know that it is God Who gives, for the earth is the Eternal's and the fullness thereof, and this is also stated several times in the Torah. It therefore seems superfluous here-- so why does the Torah mention it?
Why do you think the Shmita year is compared to the Sabbath?
שבת לה' שתהיה כל השנה הבטלה מעבודת האדמה מוכנת לעבודתו כמו שכיון בשבת בראשית באמרו שבת לה' אלהיך:
'שבת לה, so that during this whole year the farmer instead of “serving” the soil which requires cultivation, will turn his efforts to serving G’d directly instead. Just as the weekly Sabbath is a day set aside for intensive service of the Lord, so the sh’mittah year is to serve the same purpose.
(י) וְקִדַּשְׁתֶּ֗ם אֵ֣ת שְׁנַ֤ת הַחֲמִשִּׁים֙ שָׁנָ֔ה וּקְרָאתֶ֥ם דְּר֛וֹר בָּאָ֖רֶץ לְכׇל־יֹשְׁבֶ֑יהָ יוֹבֵ֥ל הִוא֙ תִּהְיֶ֣ה לָכֶ֔ם וְשַׁבְתֶּ֗ם אִ֚ישׁ אֶל־אֲחֻזָּת֔וֹ וְאִ֥ישׁ אֶל־מִשְׁפַּחְתּ֖וֹ תָּשֻֽׁבוּ׃ (יא) יוֹבֵ֣ל הִ֗וא שְׁנַ֛ת הַחֲמִשִּׁ֥ים שָׁנָ֖ה תִּהְיֶ֣ה לָכֶ֑ם לֹ֣א תִזְרָ֔עוּ וְלֹ֤א תִקְצְרוּ֙ אֶת־סְפִיחֶ֔יהָ וְלֹ֥א תִבְצְר֖וּ אֶת־נְזִרֶֽיהָ׃ (יב) כִּ֚י יוֹבֵ֣ל הִ֔וא קֹ֖דֶשׁ תִּהְיֶ֣ה לָכֶ֑ם מִ֨ן־הַשָּׂדֶ֔ה תֹּאכְל֖וּ אֶת־תְּבוּאָתָֽהּ׃ (יג) בִּשְׁנַ֥ת הַיּוֹבֵ֖ל הַזֹּ֑את תָּשֻׁ֕בוּ אִ֖ישׁ אֶל־אֲחֻזָּתֽוֹ׃
(10) and you shall hallow the fiftieth year. You shall proclaim release throughout the land for all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you: each of you shall return to your holding and each of you shall return to your family. (11) That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you: you shall not sow, neither shall you reap the aftergrowth or harvest the untrimmed vines, (12) for it is a jubilee. It shall be holy to you: you may only eat the growth direct from the field. (13) In this year of jubilee, each of you shall return to your holding.
Rabbi Marc Margoluis "Bitachon—Trust: Trusting the Process" in Block, Rabbi Barry H.. The Mussar Torah Commentary: A Spiritual Path to Living a Meaningful and Ethical Life (p. 200). CCAR Press.
Unlike most mitzvot, which can be performed in the moment, the Sh’mitah and Yoveil mitzvot are enacted over a period of a full year. In a midrash on Psalm 103:20 (“Bless the Eternal, O the Eternal’s angels, mighty creatures who do God’s bidding, ever obedient to the Eternal’s bidding”), Rabbi Yitzchak Nafcha comments:
"This refers to those who observe Sh’mitah. It is customary for a person to perform a mitzvah for a day, a week, or a month. Does one usually observe a mitzvah for an entire year? Yet the farmer lets the field lie fallow for a year, the vineyard for a year, and remains silent. Is there greater strength of character than this?"
Unlike most mitzvot, which can be performed in the moment, the Sh’mitah and Yoveil mitzvot are enacted over a period of a full year. In a midrash on Psalm 103:20 (“Bless the Eternal, O the Eternal’s angels, mighty creatures who do God’s bidding, ever obedient to the Eternal’s bidding”), Rabbi Yitzchak Nafcha comments:
"This refers to those who observe Sh’mitah. It is customary for a person to perform a mitzvah for a day, a week, or a month. Does one usually observe a mitzvah for an entire year? Yet the farmer lets the field lie fallow for a year, the vineyard for a year, and remains silent. Is there greater strength of character than this?"
Keeping these commandments is difficult, though they come with great rewards. What might get in the way of someone observing Shmita, or a Jubilee year?
Rabbi Marc Margoluis "Bitachon—Trust: Trusting the Process" in Block, Rabbi Barry H.. The Mussar Torah Commentary: A Spiritual Path to Living a Meaningful and Ethical Life (p. 200). CCAR Press.
For the medieval Spanish Jewish philosopher Bachya ibn Pakuda, B’har teaches that each of us must be “ready to move on and relocate, and not feel settled and secure,” noting that “the soul is also a stranger in this world; all people are like strangers here, as the verse says: ‘because you are strangers and temporary residents with Me.’”
The mitzvot of the Sabbatical and Jubilee years therefore teach us to notice our natural human inclination toward attachment and to strive, over and over, to surrender that predilection. In a sermon entitled “To Hold with Open Arms,” Rabbi Milton Steinberg captured this paradox after he recovered from a near-fatal heart attack. Steinberg stressed the need to live fully and joyfully with the awareness of our impermanence, learning to “clasp the world, but with relaxed hands; to embrace it, but with open arms.” Practicing bitachon means, as Steinberg taught, to care for ourselves, others, and our world, without succumbing to the illusion that we “possess” anything.
For the medieval Spanish Jewish philosopher Bachya ibn Pakuda, B’har teaches that each of us must be “ready to move on and relocate, and not feel settled and secure,” noting that “the soul is also a stranger in this world; all people are like strangers here, as the verse says: ‘because you are strangers and temporary residents with Me.’”
The mitzvot of the Sabbatical and Jubilee years therefore teach us to notice our natural human inclination toward attachment and to strive, over and over, to surrender that predilection. In a sermon entitled “To Hold with Open Arms,” Rabbi Milton Steinberg captured this paradox after he recovered from a near-fatal heart attack. Steinberg stressed the need to live fully and joyfully with the awareness of our impermanence, learning to “clasp the world, but with relaxed hands; to embrace it, but with open arms.” Practicing bitachon means, as Steinberg taught, to care for ourselves, others, and our world, without succumbing to the illusion that we “possess” anything.
(ז) בָּר֣וּךְ הַגֶּ֔בֶר אֲשֶׁ֥ר יִבְטַ֖ח בַּיהֹוָ֑ה וְהָיָ֥ה יְהֹוָ֖ה מִבְטַחֽוֹ׃ (ח) וְהָיָ֞ה כְּעֵ֣ץ ׀ שָׁת֣וּל עַל־מַ֗יִם וְעַל־יוּבַל֙ יְשַׁלַּ֣ח שׇׁרָשָׁ֔יו וְלֹ֤א (ירא) [יִרְאֶה֙] כִּי־יָ֣בֹא חֹ֔ם וְהָיָ֥ה עָלֵ֖הוּ רַעֲנָ֑ן וּבִשְׁנַ֤ת בַּצֹּ֙רֶת֙ לֹ֣א יִדְאָ֔ג וְלֹ֥א יָמִ֖ישׁ מֵעֲשׂ֥וֹת פֶּֽרִי׃
(7) Blessed is he who trusts in the LORD,
Whose trust is the LORD alone. (8) He shall be like a tree planted by waters,
Sending forth its roots by a stream:
It does not sense the coming of heat,
Its leaves are ever fresh;
It has no care in a year of drought,
It does not cease to yield fruit.
Whose trust is the LORD alone. (8) He shall be like a tree planted by waters,
Sending forth its roots by a stream:
It does not sense the coming of heat,
Its leaves are ever fresh;
It has no care in a year of drought,
It does not cease to yield fruit.
1) Why does this verse insist that a person trusts "in God alone"?
2) Is a tree by water an apt metaphor for bitchon?
3) Why does trusting in God allow a tree to thrive even in years of drought?
2) Is a tree by water an apt metaphor for bitchon?
3) Why does trusting in God allow a tree to thrive even in years of drought?
Bachya ibn Pekuda, Hobot HaLebabot 1040, 4
Who trusts God fears no man.
Who trusts God fears no man.
Rabbi Marc Margoluis
"...practicing bitachon does not require passive reliance on that flow; Rabbinic tradition calls upon us not to trust in supernatural intervention, but rather to exert our own efforts to make manifest the divinity latent in the world. Practicing bitachon involves active, intentional engagement with an underlying, often unnoticed and supportive process that we perceive, trust, and reveal through our words and actions."
"...practicing bitachon does not require passive reliance on that flow; Rabbinic tradition calls upon us not to trust in supernatural intervention, but rather to exert our own efforts to make manifest the divinity latent in the world. Practicing bitachon involves active, intentional engagement with an underlying, often unnoticed and supportive process that we perceive, trust, and reveal through our words and actions."
(כ) וְכִ֣י תֹאמְר֔וּ מַה־נֹּאכַ֖ל בַּשָּׁנָ֣ה הַשְּׁבִיעִ֑ת הֵ֚ן לֹ֣א נִזְרָ֔ע וְלֹ֥א נֶאֱסֹ֖ף אֶת־תְּבוּאָתֵֽנוּ׃ (כא) וְצִוִּ֤יתִי אֶת־בִּרְכָתִי֙ לָכֶ֔ם בַּשָּׁנָ֖ה הַשִּׁשִּׁ֑ית וְעָשָׂת֙ אֶת־הַתְּבוּאָ֔ה לִשְׁלֹ֖שׁ הַשָּׁנִֽים׃ (כב) וּזְרַעְתֶּ֗ם אֵ֚ת הַשָּׁנָ֣ה הַשְּׁמִינִ֔ת וַאֲכַלְתֶּ֖ם מִן־הַתְּבוּאָ֣ה יָשָׁ֑ן עַ֣ד ׀ הַשָּׁנָ֣ה הַתְּשִׁיעִ֗ת עַד־בּוֹא֙ תְּב֣וּאָתָ֔הּ תֹּאכְל֖וּ יָשָֽׁן׃ (כג) וְהָאָ֗רֶץ לֹ֤א תִמָּכֵר֙ לִצְמִתֻ֔ת כִּי־לִ֖י הָאָ֑רֶץ כִּֽי־גֵרִ֧ים וְתוֹשָׁבִ֛ים אַתֶּ֖ם עִמָּדִֽי׃
(20) And should you ask, “What are we to eat in the seventh year, if we may neither sow nor gather in our crops?” (21) I will ordain My blessing for you in the sixth year, so that it shall yield a crop sufficient for three years. (22) When you sow in the eighth year, you will still be eating old grain of that crop; you will be eating the old until the ninth year, until its crops come in. (23) But the land must not be sold beyond reclaim, for the land is Mine; you are but strangers resident with Me.
Amy Newman
God knows that the people will worry about not having enough to eat in the seventh year, and God promises to provide extra in the sixth year - before shmita. Bnei Yisrael haven’t yet had the chance to show God that they will fulfill the mitzvah and let the land rest, but God seems to trust that they will, and promises extra food in advance of shmita. God is teaching us here about the nature of trust. God demonstrates that by trusting us, we will know that we can trust God. As we try to mend our communal structures and begin to come back together, the parsha’s lessons about bitachon and trustworthiness can help us forge stronger bonds with God and with each other. And if we are able to cultivate this bitachon, God assures us - at the end of Behar - that we will have security and peace:
God knows that the people will worry about not having enough to eat in the seventh year, and God promises to provide extra in the sixth year - before shmita. Bnei Yisrael haven’t yet had the chance to show God that they will fulfill the mitzvah and let the land rest, but God seems to trust that they will, and promises extra food in advance of shmita. God is teaching us here about the nature of trust. God demonstrates that by trusting us, we will know that we can trust God. As we try to mend our communal structures and begin to come back together, the parsha’s lessons about bitachon and trustworthiness can help us forge stronger bonds with God and with each other. And if we are able to cultivate this bitachon, God assures us - at the end of Behar - that we will have security and peace:
Rabbi Aviva Fellman, Keep the Faith
Shmita is not a call to live for one year with different rules that help us adjust or compensate for the unequitable accumulation of debt or dissatisfaction and injustices of the other six years, only to dump us back, unchanged, into that “real” world. Shmita is a rehearsal of a new way, a time to practice living in a world of “enoughness,” where each of us is filled and flourishes with enough, where disproportionate inequities would not, and could not, exist. And when Shmita is over, and we re-enter the other six years, we take a bit of what we learned with us and put it into practice in our everyday live.
Shmita is not a call to live for one year with different rules that help us adjust or compensate for the unequitable accumulation of debt or dissatisfaction and injustices of the other six years, only to dump us back, unchanged, into that “real” world. Shmita is a rehearsal of a new way, a time to practice living in a world of “enoughness,” where each of us is filled and flourishes with enough, where disproportionate inequities would not, and could not, exist. And when Shmita is over, and we re-enter the other six years, we take a bit of what we learned with us and put it into practice in our everyday live.
Alan Morinis. Everyday Holiness (pp. 211-212). Shambhala.
"...it’s not our job description to become happy and fulfilled.... the truth is that everyone who is alive is subject to “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.” Yet it is only when you are running after the elusive goal of being happy that this world seems so terrible. If you think that you are supposed to be the master of your life—as if that were possible—the terrible happenings that inevitably come your way in this imperfect world are defeats. They make happiness impossible. But the Jewish tradition actually gives us a different job description, one that fits much better with this world just as it is. It advises us not to seek happiness but to recognize instead that we are meant to be servants of God. From that vantage point, the world seems a rather fitting place to live, even with all its shocks and sorrows. As a servant of God, the challenges of life are just the stuff of a day’s labor in the fields of the Lord. Though the direct pursuit of happiness is a surefire recipe for suffering, living your life as a servant of God paradoxically makes happiness possible."
"...it’s not our job description to become happy and fulfilled.... the truth is that everyone who is alive is subject to “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.” Yet it is only when you are running after the elusive goal of being happy that this world seems so terrible. If you think that you are supposed to be the master of your life—as if that were possible—the terrible happenings that inevitably come your way in this imperfect world are defeats. They make happiness impossible. But the Jewish tradition actually gives us a different job description, one that fits much better with this world just as it is. It advises us not to seek happiness but to recognize instead that we are meant to be servants of God. From that vantage point, the world seems a rather fitting place to live, even with all its shocks and sorrows. As a servant of God, the challenges of life are just the stuff of a day’s labor in the fields of the Lord. Though the direct pursuit of happiness is a surefire recipe for suffering, living your life as a servant of God paradoxically makes happiness possible."