DO NOT MALTREAT ONE ANOTHER, BUT FEAR YOUR GOD;

FOR I THE LORD AM YOUR GOD

YOU SHALL OBSERVE MY LAWS AND FAITHFULLY KEEP MY RULES,

SO THAT YOU MAY LIVE UPON THE LAND IN SECURITY.

(Vayikra 25: 17-18)

 

"Do Not Maltreat... That You May Live Upon The Land In Security"

DWELLING IN THE LAND IN SECURITY IS DEPENDENT UPON THE EXISTENCE OF AN ENLIGHTENED SOCIETY.

Rebbi prepared a feast for his disciples. He served them both soft tongues and hard tongues. They began to select the soft tongues, rejecting the hard ones. He said to them: My sons, so should your tongues be soft one with the other. Thus did Moshe admonish Israel "Do not maltreat one another."

"Do not maltreat" - Scripture refers to verbal maltreatment. ... For example, one should not say to a baal teshuva, a penitent, "Remember your earlier behavior", and one should not say to a convert, "Remember your ancestors' behavior". If a sojourner comes to study Torah, one should not say to him "Shall a mouth which consumes carcasses and animals torn to pieces and abominations and crawling things come to learn Torah which emanated from the mouth of the Shechina?" If one is in agony, or he is burying his progeny, say not to him - as did Job's friends say to him - "Is not your piety your confidence, your integrity your hope? Think now, what innocent man ever perished?" If donkey drivers ask one to sell them grain, he shall not tell them "Go to so-and-so" - knowing that so-and-so has never sold grain. Rabbi Yehudah says: One should not haggle over price when he has no money, for this a matter known to the heart only, of which it is written "Fear your God."

 (Yalkut Shimoni, Behar, 247: 661)

 

"Do not maltreat one another" - This is an admonishment against wrongdoing by means of words; one should not taunt his fellow, nor - for the sake of personal advantage - give another inappropriate counsel. And should you ask: Who can tell if one's intentions were not honorable? Therefore it says, "Fear your God" - He who knows all thoughts knows. Matters known to the heart only, known only to one who thinks about them in his heart, regarding him it says, "Fear your God."

 (Rashi, Vayikra 25:17)

 

 

FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS

Binyamin Hollander

          

In Philadelphia a couple of months ago, I was taken by my host to the famous Liberty Bell. In 1776, and for years afterwards, the bell was rung to commemorate American independence. The guide, explaining the Liberty Bell to visitors, asked rhetorically: "Why do two million people a year - of all religions, of all nationalities, of all colors - come to look at a bell which, aside from its well-know crack, has deteriorated to the point of being unusable?" "The answer," he asserted, as he pointed to the words engraved on the Liberty Bell, "is contained in that great verse from the Bible, "Proclaim liberty throughout the land to all the inhabitants thereof"! (Vayikra 25:10).

My thoughts turned, ruefully, to the children of Jerusalem - West and East - who play in Gan Pa'amon Ha-dror (known to them simply as Gan Ha-pa'amon), unaware that the bell in their playground is a replica of the historic Liberty Bell and oblivious to the revolutionary message it bears above their heads. There is no explanatory sign next to the bell, no reference to the fount of democracy in Philadelphia, not even the Hebrew original of the Biblical verse whose English translation is engraved on the bell.

True, a knowledgeable Israeli might belittle the famed association between that verse in Leviticus and American independence. Since in its original context, the verse refers to the release of Hebrew slaves at the time of the Jubilee year and the return of ancestral property, its relevance to the American situation could be questioned. More-over, the Jubilee year itself has not been implemented for well over two millennia, since its implementation requires that all the tribes be settled in the Land.

To be sure, one can occasionally find traditional commentaries supportive of a broader meaning for our celebrated verse. Commenting on the subsequent phrase in 25:10 - "it shall be the Jubilee/Yovel for you" - Sforno explicates these words as referring to national independence. And Rabbi Elie Munk, pointing out the double meaning of "ha-aretz" - Eretz Yisrael and the whole earth - suggests that peace and liberty in Israel are intrinsically tied to freedom in the world.

Nevertheless, the irony stands. Leviticus 25:10 still reverberates with an ever-relevant message to Americans and their visitors, whereas here in Eretz Yisrael itself, it isn't heard. In the United States, where a "wall of separation" of religion and state has long been established, the Bible is frequently cited for guidance and inspiration in public life (recall recent examples at the time of the loss of the Columbia spaceship and in connection with the war in Iraq). Whereas in Israel, though the Tanakh was once the proud possession and national spiritual guide of the generation returning to Zion, today its study and application is largely restricted to the religious sector.

Another example: American citizens annually celebrate the holiday of Thanksgiving, whose inspiration was the Biblical harvest festival of Sukkoth, but whose eternal nondenominational message has spoken to all Americans since. In contrast, here in the Holy Land, civil religion is undeveloped, and shared Biblical values - already incorporated into the global humanist ethos - are not elaborated in a way which could inspire Israelis of all sectors in a spirit of national community.

Our parasha is pregnant with untapped inspiration of this sort. An example: "...the Land is Mine, you are but sojourners resident with Me." (25:23) How this great idea humbles us, reminding us how partial and fleeting are the separate narratives, myths, and histories we so aggressively fight over.

Why not, during the week when this portion is read, establish a national "Shavua Ha-Aretz" in which all citizens and groups can affirm the love of the land, commitment to its ecological preservation ("the seventh year shall be a complete rest for the land" [25:4]), and willingness to work together to bring to fruition its potential.

Along with the physical rejuvenation of the land meriting new meaning and inclusivity, the theme of economic and social justice, so central to our parasha, deserves similar treatment. The Torah ensured "constitutional safeguards" for freedom and economic opportunity in ancient Israelite society: Shemittah and Yovel - and interest-free loans (25:37) and tzedaka in response to "You shall not allow your brother to be impoverished" (25:35). It is difficult to reconcile that heritage with the social inequality and huge economic gaps between citizens in 21st-century Israel.

The JNF was established over 100 years ago to maintain the land according to the spirit of our parasha ("The land shall not be sold in perpetuity..." (25:23); its successor, the government of Israel, surely needs new energies and reforms other than Thatcher-like privatization to do so. Also, the religious sector could be more active in advocating and building toward a more equal and just distribution of land and wealth for the land and its inhabitants. Study-institutes could focus on providing Torah-inspired economic and social policy suitable for the modern state. What more urgent time to work for the economic and social security of "then you shall dwell securely on the land" (25:l8,19) than in this period of economic distress when there are so many impoverished brothers - and citizens ("One manner of law shall you have, as well for the stranger as for the native-born shall it be, for I God am your Lord" [24:22]) - who need to be "strengthened" (25:35)? What more appropriate time than ours, when material excess has grown so inordinately in some circles, to be reminded of the necessity of acknowledging our dependence, our obligation to share, our need for quality time to recover human relationship and our bond with our Creator, Creation, and the Blueprint of Creation?

Indeed, our parasha has not received the national attention that it warrants. How many people outside the religious community know, much less have internalized, the laws of Behar - which the text so pointedly describes as being given to us on Har Sinai, which form the "summit" of the holiness laws in Leviticus, and neglect of which is regarded as a prime cause for Exile (26:43)?

More, the laws of Behar represent the culmination of the Shabbat and festival laws of last week's parasha, the sacred sequence of seven in the days, weeks, and months of the Emor year coming to full realization in the sevens of years of our parasha. Indeed, the Shabbat, so central an institution in Judaism, is itself incomplete with the "seventh year Shabbat Shabbaton" (25:4) of the Shemittah year (called so in Deut 15:1ff) and the end of "seven cycles of Shabbat years, seven years seven times" (25:8) of the Yovel-Jubilee year. Note the verbal links of Shabbat with the Shemittah and the Yovel ("Shabbat Lashem" (25:2,4), "Shabbat Shabbaton (25:4), "You shall sanctify" (25:10) - and the ideational: abstention from work and domination, expression of the Divinely-bestowed dignity and equality of man.

Just as Shabbat is both a remembrance of Creation ("zicharon l'maasei vereshit") and a reminder of the Exodus ("zecher l'yetziat Mitzrayim"), so Shemittah and Yovel seek to restore the original harmony of God's world and redeem the individual from being a slave to human and material forces. These remarkable institutions seek to curb the human urge to dominate nature and other human beings, and to refocus the individual to dwell in a world of human solicitude and devotion to Torah and Creation. Concluding our parasha is the reminder of our ultimate status: "For unto Me are the children of Israel servants, they are My servants whom I brought out from the land of Egypt. I God am your Lord" (25:55) - and our ultimate purpose: "My Sabbaths you shall keep and My Sanctuary you shall venerate" (26:2).

God's sanctuary will be found in the ever-expanding holiness when we live Shabbat as a sanctuary in time, Shemittah as a sanctuary in place, and Yovel as a sanctuary in human society (cf. Rabbi A. J. Heschel).

In light of its paramount importance, it is not surprising that Yovel is part of the heightened spiritual sensitivities of the High Holydays. The changeover to the Yovel year begins at Rosh Hashanah and it is sanctified with the blowing of the shofar on the Day of Atonement (25:9). Rabbi S.R. Hirsch teaches that just as Yom Kippur is the day of moral rebirth for the individual, Yovel is a Yom Kippur for the nation, with the awesome responsibility placed on society to restore and regenerate its social and political morality. In a similar vein, Rabbi A. I. Kook in his "Shabbat Ha-aretz" elaborates on the responsibility of the nation that dwells in Zion, urging that the spirit of repentance and forgiveness that pervades the individual on Yom Kippur should also move the nation to soul-searching and repentance in order to rectify the distortions of its past.

The association of Yovel with Yom Kippur is also made by Rashi (on 25:10), who comments that the name "Yovel" for the fiftieth year derives from the "yovel" - another word for the shofar/ram's horn - sounded on Yom Kippur (and calling to mind the shofar sounded on Har Sinai). Our tekiah gedola at the culmination of Yom Kippur echoes the shofar's sanctification of the Yovel, while the Haftara's prophetic plea to "let the oppressed go free" and "give bread to the hungry" (Is58:6-7) echoes its content. Indeed, through the Yom Kippur liturgy, we pray for the realization of the Yovel ideal of joining "joy in Your land" ("simcha b'arzecha") with "coming together as one society to do Your will with a full heart" ("v'yeasu kulam agudah achat la'asot ritzoncha b'levav shalem"). May we, as God's partners, be worthy of bringing that ideal closer to reality.

(Rabbi Binyamin Hollander came on Aliya over 30 years ago, and teaches Torah in Yerushalayim and other places in Israel and abroad).

"For The Land Is Mine"

Do not resent these laws [of Shemittah and Yovel], the land not being really the property of any man.                                                        (Rashi, Vayikra 25:23).

 

An admonishment against permanent transfer of ownership [of land] in Eretz Yisrael, as it says: "And the Land shall not be sold into perpetuity."

(Sefer HaMitzvot of Rambam, Negative Mitzvah 227)

 

One reason for the mitzvah [not to effect changes in the designation of plots in the Levites' settlements and of their fields]: The towns of the Levites were set aside for the needs of all the tribes, because it was the tribe chosen for the service of God, and all their dealings were with wisdom, in that they were not bothered with agriculture as were the other tribes of Israel, and regarding them it is said : "They shall teach Your laws to Yaakov, and Your instructions to Israel." And because wisdom resided with them, all of Israel constantly had dealings with them. This, in addition to their towns also serving as cities of refuge for the [inadvertent] murderer, and therefore the eyes of all Israel are upon their towns, for who can foretell what tomorrow will bring. There it was reasonable that that these refuges be located in towns where equality reigns; town which, being in the public eye, should be paragons of beauty and pleasantness; they are a source of pride for all Israel, and therefore the prohibition against effecting changes in them, for the Master of Wisdom established them, and perfected them, and set their boundaries, and He saw that thus it was good...

 (Sefer HaChinuch, Negative Mitzvoth 343)

 

For the Shemittah year also generates congregation and peace, by the land not being sowed and not caused to sprout, and the poor of the nation eat with him, for he may not hold the crops during the seventh year as a home-owner, and this, without doubt, produces peace, for all arguments which result from "Mine is mine" - "this one saying it is all mine" - all this does not exist during the seventh year, for although not all are equally commanded to "get up and do!" - all are equally ordered to "stay put and don't do!" - and this is indeed the matter of peace.

(Kli Yakar, Devarim 31:12)

 

What is Lag BaOmer? Cessation of the Plague or Cease Fire and Sobering Up From the Illusion of Messianism and Intoxication With Power?

They said: Rabbi Akiva had twelve thousand pairs of disciples, from Gevat to Antipatress, and all died in a single period, because they did not behave respectfully one to the other, and the world was desolate until Rabbi Akiva came to our teachers in the South, and he taught Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Yehudah and rabbi Yossi and Rabbi Shim'on and Rabbi El'azar ben Shamua, and they were the ones who preserved Torah at that time. It has been states in a Barayta: All died between Pesach and Atseret [Shavuot]. Rabbi Hamma bar Abba, or it may have been Rabbi Hiyya bar Avin: All died the same terrible death. Which was it? Said Rabbi Nachman: Askera [a respiratory ailment - probably asthma].

(Bavli, Yevamot, 62b)

 

... The Gaonim had a tradition that on the 33^rd day of the Omer the dying ceased, and therefore it is customary not to practice self-denial.

 (Rabbi Menachem HaMeiri, Beit HaBechira on Yevamot 62b)

 

From the words of the Gemarrah it appears that Rabbi Akiva's many disciples all perished in the plague, but Rav Sherira Gaon, in his historic epistle, explains that their deaths were due to governmental decree or war. From this account, it would seem that the reference is to the Bar Kochba rebellion, which Rabbi Akiva enthusiastically supported. It can be assumed that Rabbi Akiva's disciples were numbered among Bar Kochba's troops, and with the cruel suppression of the rebellion, marked by much bloodshed, they too were killed.

                            (From Rabbi Steinzaltz's commentary on the narrative in Yevamoth 62b)

 

Said Rabbi Yochanan: Rebbi used to expound (on Bemidbar 24:17) "A star rises from Yaakov" - read not "a star" ('kochav'), but "a pretender" (‘kozev'). Rabbi Akiva, upon seeing Bar Koziba ["Son of the Lie"] said: "This is the Anointed King - the Messiah". Said to him Rabbi Yochanan ben Torta: "Akiva, grass will grow from your cheeks and still the Messiah will not have come!"

 (Eicha Rabba, Parasha 2, on verse 2 "The Lord has laid waste")

 

 

 

 

 

Editorial Board: Pinchas Leiser (Editor), Miriam Fine (Coordinator), Itzhak Frankenthal and Dr. Menachem Klein

Translation: Kadish Goldberg

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