Shmita is about letting the land rest, the release of debt, and jubilee. Deidre Gabbay from Shmita Project Northwest challenges us to think deeply through the question, “What would a Shmita year look like today”?

Shmita Project Northwest

Shmita is deeply concerned about social justice. Shmita isn’t just about letting the land rest, it’s about the release of debt, and jubilee. Deidre from Shmita Project Northwest challenges us to think about, “what a Shmita year look like today?”

We need a Shmita year. Deirdre Gabbay, ___, ____, shares not only an explanation of what her group is doing, but her inspirations and the many relevant ways that a Shmita year is at least a good template for how we address today’s numerous social crises. 

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. Together with her husband she is raising a family on Queen Anne. She blogs at shmitainseattle.com, where all of her divrei Torah (sermons) can be found.

400

All of these calamities show the potential for disconinute 

445

On the positive side it really taught us the discontinuity 

As scary as it was it was also encouraging. And now all of us, across the planet, have this muscle memory — that things can jump out of their ruts. MORE HERE

545

This Covid year gives us a hint of what a Shmita year could be. And the Torah teaches us that 

700

What if we were to embrace this, what would a Shmita year look like? 

One of the strengths of a Faith-based point of view is that there’s a vocabulary for a sense of commanded-ness. 

So how do we summon this sense of commanded-ness? 

The maximalist vision that i have is that someday the whole world will recognize the need for the land to rest for a whole year and that they will rest alongside of it in some meaningful way. 

 It’s the earth, it’s the land that’s commanded to rest and to observe a Sabbath of complete rest for the Lord. It’s about a relationship that we’re not even really a part of. This is part of the way the world works. It’s part of an operating manual, between God and the land. 

What if ordinarily people were to take a year off from their lives… The Shmita would open this up, for ordinary people to think about how to bring this into our culture… I think the Shmita raises the possibility of thinking about this, outside of a global pandemic. 

Shmita is deeply concerned about social justice. Shimta isn’t just about letting the land rest, it’s about the release of debt, and jubilee.  

Audio processing and improving by Jeffrey JJ Jo Jo Get Back! Get Back! Alfonoso Haley.