Winter Solstice Edition 2021, "Shmita Now" (Yaira Robinson, guest editor)
Guest Editor’s Introduction
Shmita Now: Exploring “The Sabbatical Year”
Perhaps the greatest task of our time is to figure out how to navigate and respond to the climate emergency. This is an enormous challenge for all reasons that might immediately jump to mind—fire, flood, frustrating political inaction, and corporate maneuvering, to name just a few. But in some ways, this task also presents unique opportunities. The cultural and economic systems that brought us not just the climate emergency but also staggering income inequality have shown that they will not save us. So we have an opening now to question the ways of being that brought us to this moment, and to reimagine pathways for ourselves and future generations that will be more just and equitable for all people and the planet we share.
The world’s wisdom traditions offer some of the most powerful tools we can bring to bear in this project of reimagining our future and transforming ourselves. As the climate emergency becomes increasingly impossible to ignore, people of every faith tradition around the world are coming to their traditions and texts with fresh eyes, seeking ancient wisdom that might help us find new ways forward.
It is in this spirit that for the Winter Solstice edition of AllCreation, we take a look at Shmita, the Sabbatical Year. Shmita is a practice described in the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible and part of what Christians refer to as “The Old Testament.” In the text, God gives the people instructions for how to live peaceably and faithfully together in the Promised Land. Part of that instruction is that people should work the land for six years and then let the land rest for a year—the shmita year of release.
During the shmita year, food that grows is to be free and equally accessible not just to all people, but also to wildlife. In addition, all debts are to be released. A shmita year is like a great reset for people, land, and wildlife—all connected in and through God’s vision for this ecosystem community.
While clearly a part of the texts in both the Jewish and Christian traditions for thousands of years, shmita practice has been largely unexplored until recently. In response to the perils of our moment, some Jewish thinkers have lifted it up and begun to ask questions like:
How would practicing shmita redefine our relationship with the land? With other people? With God?
Could we set up our communities in ways that enable us to share food rather than sell it for profit so that everyone gets enough, no one has more than their fair share, and no one goes hungry?
How would our communities and economy change if debt were wiped clean every seven years and crushing college loan, credit card, or medical debt became a thing of the past? Would we eliminate generational poverty? Homelessness? Would we still be able to take out loans to help us start new ventures?
In instructing us to observe shmita, what kind of vision for us and for the world is God casting, and what can we do today to bring our reality into closer alignment with that vision?
These and more are compelling questions in our age of climate change and profound economic inequality. And have no doubt, those two things are interconnected. Economic systems that exploit the natural world have a history of exploiting other people as well. This may feel like a new learning for many of us, and yet shmita has been concerned about equity for both land and people for thousands of years now!
I have to thank Nigel Savage and Hazon for introducing me and so many others to shmita possibilities. As I write, we are in the Jewish year 5782, a shmita year—and shmita consciousness is growing within Jewish communities worldwide. Because the Jewish conversation about shmita is already so rich and yet still developing, we wanted to share it here on AllCreation with a multifaith community of readers and listeners.
I stand now in gratitude to the gifted teachers and do-ers who have shared their shmita and creation care thoughts in this edition of the journal. I hope their gentle, passionate, and inspired explorations of shmita values will resonate with you, no matter what your faith tradition is or isn’t. Let’s start a conversation. And then, maybe, let’s see what we can do to reimagine pathways and transform our communities. There is much at stake.
- Yaira Robinson, guest editor
In this edition:
Podcasts
1. The Rev and Rav Talk Sabbatical Year (Shmita) – Austin, TX, clergy Rev. Daryl Horton, senior pastor at Mt. Zion Baptist Church, and Rabbi Neil Blumofe, senior rabbi at Congregation Agudas Achim, talk about shmita—exploring concepts such as economic justice, human nature, faith, and enoughness.
2. Shmita and the Climate Crisis – Joelle Novey, Director of Interfaith Power & Light (D.C., MA, NoVA), talks about climate grief, Jewish approaches to who owns the land, and how shmita teachings can inform the climate justice movement.
3. Sharing Shmita: The Shmita Project Northwest – Deirdre Gabbay, director of The Shmita Project Northwest, takes us on a journey of shmita possibilities, exploring how shmita could inspire change in our communities.
4. Shmita Values in Action – In this podcast, we explore different ways to put shmita values into action through congregational and community projects and by advocating at the local level. Two speakers—Naomi Edelson, Senior Director for Wildlife Partnerships at The National Wildlife Federation; and Dr. Mirele Goldsmith, an environmental psychologist and co-chair of Jewish Earth Alliance—lead the way.
Art
5. A Shmita Year: Healing, Connection, Transformation – Melanie Lewis, a retired science educator and artist, explores shmita concepts through her paintings.
6. The Story of “Rebirth” – Sandi Neiman, a therapist and a painter in Austin, TX, shares how a spiritual awakening and reconnection feeds her art, and the importance of being still and present to what is.
7. The Avian Rebbe: Shemitah and Release – Aaric Eisenstein, a.k.a. The Avian Rebbe, shares photographs of birds coupled with reflections based on Torah, including the shmita tradition.
Writing
8. Guardeners of the World: Yishuv ha'Olam – Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin explores a core Jewish concept that guides and informs all the mitzvot, or commandments, including shmita practice. That concept is yishuv ha’olam, the righteous establishment of the world—our greatest collective and personal calling.
9. The Power of a Fallow Field: What an Ancient Sabbatical Practice Can Teach Us Today – Rabbi Laura Bellows, who works to build climate resilient, justice-seeking, creative community rooted in Jewish practice and tradition, welcomes us to the shmita year by taking us on a walk through Torah and down to her neighborhood pond.
10. When the Land Takes its Rest: Shabbat, Shmita, and Yovel and Their Implications for Our Social, Economic, and Ecological Viability – Nati Passow, a leader in the Jewish environmental movement for the past two decades and current Operations Manager for Dayenu: A Jewish Call to Climate Action, examines the Shabbat, Shmita, and Yovel (Jubilee) cycle as an agricultural blueprint for maintaining a moral and ethical society.
11. The Call of Shmita in Our Time – Deirdre Gabbay, director of Shmita Project Northwest, explores the Biblical underpinnings of shmita practice and how we can work to more closely align our communities and world with shmita values and vision, to release the land and the people from relentless exploitation.
12. Moses’s Farewell Speech through the Lens of Shmita – Sarah Zell Young, Associate Director of National Programs for Hazon, the Jewish lab for sustainability, looks at how putting shmita values into practice is one way to “choose life!”
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Guest editor, Yaira Robinson, believes that economic and racial justice are part of creating true environmental sustainability and climate justice. In her career she has been a religious educator and a leader in interfaith advocacy and community organizing. She currently works for her local county to increase economic equity in her community. She holds a Master of Theological Studies from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary and completed one year of rabbinical study with the ALEPH Rabbinic Ordination program. She is currently working on a M.S. in Sustainability Studies at Texas State University. In this issue, she hopes exploring the vision and challenges of shmita practice will inspire readers to work toward creating more just and sustainable communities.
