Sabbatical Year in Modern Israel

If modern Jewish approaches to the observance of the “sabbatical year” are of interest to you, today’s article in Arutz-7 is worth reading.  Instead of giving the land a rest, a lot of work is done to figure out how to obey the letter of the law, but not its spirit.

Leviticus 25:1-7 (NIV) ” The LORD said to Moses on Mount Sinai, “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When you enter the land I am going to give you, the land itself must observe a sabbath to the LORD. For six years sow your fields, and for six years prune your vineyards and gather their crops. But in the seventh year the land is to have a sabbath of rest, a sabbath to the LORD. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards. Do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land is to have a year of rest. Whatever the land yields during the sabbath year will be food for you—for yourself, your manservant and maidservant, and the hired worker and temporary resident who live among you, as well as for your livestock and the wild animals in your land. Whatever the land produces may be eaten.”

And the first few paragraphs from the article:

The upcoming Shemittah year – in which Biblical law mandates that the Land of Israel lie fallow and its Jewish-grown fruits, of special Shemittah sanctity, be free for all to eat – presents major challenges for Israel’s economy.

Slamming down the brakes on Israel’s agricultural enterprise for an entire year is all but impossible, for several reasons. Chief among them is the fact that many Israeli farmers are not religiously observant and have little interest in adhering to the Shemittah laws. In addition, dropping out of the export markets for a year causes not only short-term difficulties, but losses in future years as well; for once a market is lost, it is very hard to regain.

This issue has occupied leading rabbis and agriculturalists ever since the modern national revival of the Jewish People in the Land of Israel began a century and a half ago. Two approaches have traditionally been implemented. One is the Heter Mechirah, which is a temporary sale of the land to non-Jews, thus exempting it from the Shemittah laws. This approach was generally accepted only by the religious-Zionist public, while the non-religious farmers went along with it as well. It was meant only as a temporary measure, but has become institutionalized, to the dismany of many.

Here’s a good word:

Hebrews 4:9-11 (NIV) “There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.”