The Call of Shmita (Deirdre Gabbay)
The Call of Shmita in Our Time
By Deirdre Gabbay
The world seems to be collapsing around us, ecologically as well as socially. Climate change, which we have been warned about for more than 30 years, has arrived, and is in the early stages of reshaping life on Earth, already creating waves of human climate refugees across the world, including here in the United States. Meanwhile, the almost unimaginable financial wealth of the planet is held by a vanishingly small number of individuals, some of whom are striving to escape the Earth and colonize space, while others are snapping up increasingly scarce “natural resources” such as fresh water and arable land, and monetizing them as commodities to be traded by global investors.
But what if we are being dragged in exactly the wrong direction by the twin powerhouses of technology and financial markets? What if our actual goal is not to leave behind this place where we live—to seek out new worlds to exploit and then abandon—but to hold onto it as a sacred trust to be passed on, l’dor v’dor, from one generation to the next, an embodiment of love?
The religious worldview offers a unique toolkit for challenging these seemingly irresistible forces. It is equipped with concepts such as commandedness, limits, and the idea of the sacred. It engages with the world in communities of practice rather than as atomized individual consumers. It is unconstrained by national boundaries. It is experienced in the practice of counterculture. Furthermore, in the words of Amitav Ghosh writing in the Great Derangement.
Organizations with religious affiliations possess the ability to mobilize people in far greater numbers than any others. Moreover, religious worldviews acknowledge intergenerational, long-term responsibility. They are capable of imagining nonlinear change – catastrophe, in other words. Finally, it is impossible to see any way out of this crisis without an acceptance of limits, and this is intimately related to the idea of the sacred, however one may wish to conceive of it.
It is in this context that we turn to investigate the Hebrew Bible’s obscure commandment of Shmita – which means “letting go.” The values of Shmita feel provocative and relevant, as well as paradoxical: how do we hold on by letting go? That paradox is at the very heart of Shmita.
Shmita
Shmita is a practice that is analogous to the weekly sabbath, or Shabbat, the day of rest which is required in the Ten Commandments. Shmita is referred to in Torah as a Shabbat for the land, a Sabbath to the Lord (Leviticus 25:4). While the day is shaped by the astronomical relationship between the Earth and the sun (in one day, the Earth spins one time on its axis, experiencing night, morning, day, and evening), the week is Jewish time, delineated by the story of Creation, with the holy Sabbath occurring as a day of rest for the human being, taking place every seventh day. Likewise, while the year is shaped by the astronomical relationship between the Earth and the sun (in one year, the Earth revolves completely around the sun, experiencing winter, spring, summer, and autumn), the Shmita cycle, the week of years, is Jewish time, delineated by the requirement found in Torah that the land must likewise rest for one year out of every seven years.
Both Shabbat and Shmita sit at the nexus of two stories which embody two distinct deep value systems with Judaism. Torah offers two parallel rationales for the commandment to keep Shabbat. One is to remember the act of Creation, and the fact that when creation was complete, G-d rested; this is the process by which the beloved profusion of diversity and life were brought into being, and is deeply related to our experience of being alive and embedded in a living world. The second rationale given for Shabbat is to recall the exodus from Egypt, when the relentless exploitation exacted by Egypt on the Hebrew slaves was dramatically brought to an end. “Let my people go that they may serve Me,” G-d demanded of Pharaoh, before inflicting plague after plague upon Egypt. This parallelism places the human’s embeddedness in creation side by side with the requirement for human dignity and self-determination inherent in Torah’s critique of Egypt’s system of exploitation and oppression.
We find this same parallelism embedded in the laws of Shmita.
The commandment to observe Shmita is stated three times in Torah:
For six years you are to sow your land and to gather in its produce, but in the seventh, you are to let it go and to let it be, that the needy of your people may eat, and what remains, the wildlife of the field shall eat. Do thus with your vineyard, with your olive grove.
Exodus 23:10-11
The Lord spoke to Moshe at Mount Sinai, saying: Speak to the Children of Israel, and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land is to cease, a Sabbath-ceasing to the Lord.
For six years you are to sow your field, for six years you are to prune your vineyard, then you are to gather in its produce, but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of Sabbath-ceasing for the land, a Sabbath to the Lord: your field you are not to sow, your vineyard you are not to prune, the aftergrowth of your harvest you are not to harvest, the grapes of your consecrated-vines you are not to amass; a Sabbath of Sabbath-ceasing shall there be for the land!
Now the Sabbath-yield of the land is for you, for eating: for you, for your servant and for your handmaid, for your hired-hand and for your resident-settler who sojourn with you; and for your domestic-animal and the wild-beast that are in your land shall be all its produce, to eat.
Leviticus 25:1-7
At the end of seven years, you are to make a Release [Shmita].
Now this is the matter of the Release: he shall release, every possessor of a loan of his hand, what he has lent to his neighbor. He is not to oppress his neighbor or his brother, for the Release of the Lord has been proclaimed…
When there is among you a needy-person from any-one of your brothers, within one of your gates in the land that the Lord your G-d is giving you, you are not to toughen your heart, you are not to shut your hand to your brother, the needy-one.
Rather you are to open, yes, open your hand to him, and you are to give-pledge, yes pledge to him, sufficient for his lack that is lacking to him.
Take care lest there be a word in your heart, a base-one, saying the seventh year, the Year of Release, is nearing- and your eye be set-on-ill toward your brother, the needy-one, and you not give to him, so that he calls out because of you to the Lord, and sin be incurred by you.
You are to give, yes, give freely to him, your heart is not to be ill-disposed in your giving to him, for on account of this matter the Lord your G-d will bless you in all your doings and in all the enterprises of your hand!
For the needy will never be gone from amid the land; therefore, I command you, saying: You are to open, yes, open your hand to your brother, to your afflicted, and to the needy-one in your land!
Deuteronomy 15: 1-2, 7-12
Shmita for the Land
The first two of these texts teach that through Shmita, the land has its own mitzvah, its own commandment, to fulfill; to rest for one year out of seven. When we prevent it from resting, insisting on its continued productivity, we inflict on it a system of exploitation deeply analogous to the one that Pharaoh inflicted on the Hebrews through slavery in Egypt. “Let my people go that they may serve Me,” (Exodus 8:1) has much in common with “When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land is to cease, a Sabbath-ceasing to the Lord.” (Leviticus 25:1) This might be paraphrased or reinterpreted as, “Release the land, that it may serve Me.”
These texts focus on the requirement that the land must rest, while still allowing its abundance to flow out into the world. Later interpretation stipulated that the fences that surrounded the farm fields were to be torn down and that food could not be hoarded or even stored indoors after it was no longer freely available to animals in the fields having gone out of season. Produce could neither be owned nor sold.
By exerting control over how landowners were permitted to use the land, G-d asserted authority over it, placing the laws of Shmita alongside other laws pertaining to use of the land, such as pe’ah (not harvesting the edges of the field), leket (not sending workers to go back through the fields to glean them for profit) and shichikah (leaving behind in the fields any forgotten produce). What was left behind was for the needy. What they left could be eaten by wildlife, and what was left after that would drop to the ground and re-seed the land.
Shmita and Debt Release
The third text above requires the release of debts and the extension of an open hand to the needy. Farming practices even in modern times are often characterized by the need of a farmer to take on debt in order to make up-front investments in seed and fertilizers before planting a field, with the hope that when the produce is sold the debt will be repaid. In a Shmita year, the ability to repay debts based on selling agricultural products would be greatly diminished; indeed, the size of the market economy overall would be radically reduced if commercial agriculture ceased. Thus, debt release was essential to making Shmita observance possible.
Shmita and Yovel/Jubilee
The relatively small reminders about land ownership found in the seven-year Shmita cycle pale in comparison with the laws of Yovel. After seven Shmita cycles, or 49 years, the community is commanded to sound a blast on the Shofar on Yom Kippur day in the 50th year. This was to signal that the Yovel (or as it is commonly known today, Jubilee) had begun. Not only were debts released in this year, but the land itself was redistributed back to the original holdings that were assigned to the twelve tribes in Torah. People who had amassed larger land holdings would see them shrink to their original size, while those who had fallen behind or been forced to sell all or part of their land to repay a debt would see it restored. Everyone would begin the Yovel cycle with a productive allotment of land upon which to build a secure future. According to this system, the human being may truly own, and therefore sell, only the produce of the land, not the land itself.
The land is not to be sold in-harness, for the land is mine; for you are sojourners and resident-settlers with me…
Leviticus 25:23
In a similar fashion, by freeing debts and also slaves, Yovel asserts that while one person may be entitled to a share of the labor of another, neither the entirety of another person’s labor, nor the entirety of their life, can belong wholly or forever to another.
If a lifespan is between 50 and 100 years, this meant that at some point in each person’s life, the nation’s land would be redistributed to ensure that everyone had the means upon which to build a secure future, one free from debt or slavery. Good fortune, hard work, misfortune, laziness—all of these things were part of life, and would inevitably result in some growing prosperous while others fell behind. However, Yovel guaranteed that wealth would be redistributed periodically, ensuring that intergenerational poverty would not become a feature of life in the “holy land.” This system corrected the imbalances in wealth and power which inevitably accrue in an unchecked marketplace by establishing a mechanism to ensure that poverty could not compound from one generation to the next.
The Author of Torah was well aware of the counterarguments to the Shmita cycle: What will we eat if we can’t plant food crops? Will anybody give loans if they know they might not be repaid?
You are to observe my laws, my regulations you are to keep, and observe them, that you may be settled on the land in security, that the land may give forth its fruit and that you may eat to being-satisfied, and be settled in security upon it.
Now if you should say to yourselves: What are we to eat in the seventh year, for we may not sow, we may not gather our produce?
Then I will dispatch my blessing for you during the sixth year so that it yields produce for three years; as you sow the eighth year’s seeds, you shall eat of the old produce until the ninth year; until its produce comes in, you shall be able to eat what-is-old.
Leviticus 25. 18 – 22
Take-you-care, lest there be a word in your heart, a base-one, saying: the seventh year, the Year of Release, is nearing – and your eye be set-on-ill toward your brother, the needy-one, and you not give to him, so that he calls out because of you to the Lord. You are to give, yes, give freely to him, your heart is not to be ill-disposed in your giving to him, for on account of this matter the Lord your G-d will bless you in all your doings and in all the enterprises of your hand.
Deuteronomy (15.9-10)
What is interesting is that the texts which address these deeply human anxieties make a case that the Shmita-observant society would flourish not despite adhering to the laws of Shmita, but rather through and because of them. Grasping and exploitation are counterproductive. The Torah asserts (or promises) that we can have abundant food and a stable and peaceful society only through this process of letting go. This is the paradox at the heart of Shmita.
Shmita and Social, Racial, and Environmental Justice
It is noteworthy that the modern environmental movement is recently coming to terms with the message that how we care for the Earth and how we care for one another are two sides of one coin. A willingness to view either the land or the human being as a means to an end rather than an end in itself, an “it” rather than a “thou,” to paraphrase Martin Buber, is ominous. The human being and the land both exist to serve a Creator whose intention is that they should be mutually responsible for and protective of one another.
Moreover, the U.S. is in the midst of an awakening with respect to confronting the twin sins of its origin: the violent displacement of the Indigenous peoples by European colonizers, followed by the horrific institution of slavery; both systems of theft cast long shadows that extend into the present day. The specific practices of Shmita and Yovel may have particular resonance for those seeking a way forward that acknowledges these offenses. The study of Shmita can and should serve as a valuable opportunity to raise awareness that the only forward path is one that simultaneously recognizes the needs and binds the wounds of both the human being and the planet.
Open your hand, Oh Lord, your favor sustains all that lives.
Psalms 145
Practicing Shmita in these Uncertain Times: Shmita Project Northwest
After all that has been said, it should be noted that as a matter of Jewish practice, the laws of Shmita do not even theoretically apply outside of the Land of Israel. This is liberating, because it allows an open-ended discussion of the values they embody and how our culture might become infused with them without becoming entangled with halacha (Jewish law).
The process of envisioning a contemporary practice of Shmita and bringing its vision to life is the work of the Shmita Project Northwest, an organization which I helped to found in Seattle in the Jewish calendar year of 5781/2020. Shmita Project Northwest (SPN) is a partnership between a Congregation Beth Shalom, Seattle, a Conservative synagogue of which I am a member, and Earth Ministry, a multi-faith, faith-based environmental nonprofit which hosts Washington Interfaith Power & Light, where I serve on the board of directors. SPN’s goal is to raise awareness and understanding of Shmita, to build community around bringing Shmita values into the world, and to support the emergence of projects that embody Shmita values and ideas.
The Maximalist Vision
The maximalist vision for SPN is that one day, the whole world will observe Shmita and Yovel in some recognizable form, the way it does with the weekly sabbath. In doing so, these elements might be recognizable:
The land is given one year out of seven free from human exploitation; humans rest alongside the land and it is typical to take a sabbatical-type extended period to work less;
People are able to find food close to home within the local landscape, enough to be able to live for a full year without the need to exchange cash for food; permaculture food forests permeate most inhabited areas;
Along with the cessation of agriculture comes a cessation in shipments of agricultural products and a reduction in global trade;
With less cash circulating, many people learn to make, mend, and barter;
Pollution from factories diminishes and the waters and the skies become clear;
Every seven years there is a national re-evaluation of personal debt, with the goal of understanding which forms of borrowing are working to expand opportunity, and which are predatory; the latter type is reformed.
Every 50 years, a redistribution takes place that guarantees each person the wherewithal to build a secure future.
The maximalist vision is far off and it is not at all easy to see how to get from here to there.
The Near Term Vision
In the near term, SPN is actively working to build out a dense network of relationships with organizations and groups located in the Pacific Northwest who share Shmita-related values, and through them, to bring into existence small, manageable, short-term projects.
One such project implemented through Congregation Beth Shalom was to build a Little Free Food Pantry outside our building, then make the plans and materials list for it available to our Shmita partners for replication. Our religious school students will be decorating it, stocking it with food staples, and developing educational materials about Shmita to share with the community.
We are actively forming partnerships with local synagogues and getting to know each other, educating ourselves about Shmita, and sharing programmatic materials and resources.
Last year we received two grants. One was from the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle; it enabled us to roll out a Jewish version of Earth Ministry’s Greening Congregations Toolkit and to produce a kick-off program that enabled our community to get together in person to welcome the arrival of Shmita year 5782. The other was an award from the United Synagogue for Conservative Judaism in recognition of our innovative use of technology to offer programming during the Covid pandemic. It enabled us to offer honoraria to the individuals who taught our distinguished speaker series titled “Approaching the Shmita Year.”
We are currently exploring ways to build onramps to our work for organizations and individuals that share Shmita values but are not necessarily working through the Shmita lens.
The Medium Term Vision
While the Near Term Vision is very easy to visualize and accomplish, and the Maximalist Vision is very difficult to visualize, there is a medium term vision that sits in an interesting gray area, enticing us to set goals that we cannot reach right away, but which we can envision making significant progress toward over the upcoming six-year Shmita cycle.
For instance, the table below depicts how an area like Sabbatical Food Systems can generate ideas that fall into the Short, Medium, and Long term categories.
Short term goals involve few people or materials to execute, and rely on resources that are for the most part privately controlled.
Medium-term projects are more ambitious, involving larger communities or operating in public places, and may involve the use of resources that share many stakeholders, all factors which mean they will require a higher level of organization and a longer timeline to accomplish.
Long term goals are depicted below as phrases that express complex, holistic achievements that have been accomplished at the community or regional level. They may consist of multiple interconnected projects, decision-making across many communities or levels of government, and involve complex interactions among many stakeholders. They dramatically transform the experience of the overall community, and represent the achievement of significant elements of a Shmita-infused way of living.
As we accomplish hopefully many easy and short-term goals during the current Shmita year, it is my hope that together, we will also begin to formulate several medium- and longer-term goals that will keep our organization alive and relevant through the upcoming six non-Shmita years, enabling us to drive meaningful social transformation and progress toward a Pacific Northwest that is better equipped next time to welcome a Shmita year.
Shmita offers a unique framework for confronting several of the most pressing problems we face today. It is rooted in an ancient source, and is analogous to traditions that we understand well and value, but feels fresh and new because it has not yet been fully unpacked for meaning and inspiration. We find an allusive reference to it in one of our cherished and deeply familiar cultural artifacts, the Liberty Bell, which is inscribed with words from Leviticus, “Proclaim LIBERTY Throughout All the Land Unto All the Inhabitants thereof.”
You are to hallow the year, the fiftieth year, proclaiming freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants; it shall be a Homebringing for you, you are to return, each man to his holding, each-man to his clan you are to return.
Leviticus 25:10
There, stamped in the heart of our nation’s earliest history, is the call for Jubilee.
And so, with faith that the greatest challenges of our time can be overcome not with closed and grasping fists, but with open hands and hearts, we offer the paradox of Shmita. Release the land and the people from relentless exploitation. Break the bars of exploitation and ensure that every person walks upright and with dignity.
I will place my Dwelling in your midst and I will not repel you. I will walk about in your midst; I will be for you as a G-d, and you yourselves will be for me as a people. I am the Lord your G-d who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from your being serfs to them; I broke the bars of your yoke, enabling you to walk upright!
Leviticus 26: 11-13
We invite everyone who is interested to join this journey of social transformation with Shmita Project Northwest.
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Deirdre Gabbay is director of The Shmita Project Northwest, an organization dedicated to bringing attention to the Hebrew calendar's seven-year Shmita cycle which centers the relationship between the earth and the wellbeing of the human and more-than-human world, through education, inspiration, community-building, and programmatic support. She founded Ahavat v'Avodat HaAdamah, "Love and Service of the Earth," in 2015 to establish an environmental presence for the Pacific Northwest rooted in Jewish text, tradition, and practice, specifically to support a response to climate change. Deirdre is a member of Congregation Beth Shalom, Seattle, and a member of the board of directors of Earth Ministry/Washington Interfaith Power & Light. She blogs at shmitainseattle.com, where all of her divrei Torah (sermons) can be found. You can also listen to Deirdre talk about shmita and Shmita Project Northwest in this podcast.
This article is part of our Winter 2021 collection, Shmita Now, guest-edited by Yaira Robinson.
