The Ultimate Paradox

The ultimate challenge is to fuse heightened spirituality with everyday life. BECHUKOSAI BECHUKOSAI

Who is the Creator?

In this week’s parsha the Torah discusses the obligation to desist from agricultural work during the seventh year.

The theme of this prohibition has been compared by the Torah to the theme of the Shabbos, the seventh day of the week, when we are commanded to desist from all work. By refraining from work, we recognize G-d’s sovereignty over His world and that it is not we who create, but G-d. During the week G-d asks us to be His partner in creation. He does not want us to think that it is our independent power that creates, but G-d’s energy that is infuses within us. How does one realize this? By desisting from work every Shabbos and by desisting from agricultural work every Seventh year.

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A question can be raised. If we learn this lesson every week, by refraining from 39 categories of creative labor — including all agricultural work — why do we need another reminder that occurs only once in seven years and is restricted to the agricultural labors? What lesson can be imparted from the Sabbatical year that the Sabbatical day does not convey?

Upon deeper reflection one can find at least two advantages to the Sabbatical year over the weekly Sabbath.

Incredulous!

First, despite the fact that one does not work on Shabbos, it is not a miracle that we could have food and all of our other needs provided for. As our Sages put it:

One who toils on the eve of Shabbos will eat on the Shabbos.

By contrast, the Torah itself expresses incredulity about how people will find food in the post Sabbatical year, because we are not allowed to sow and gather the produce during the seventh year. In the Torah’s own words:

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If you shall ask, “What shall we eat?” I will command My blessing…”

The Torah itself declares that it is a miraculous process that is at work during the Sabbatical year. From this vantage point, the Sabbatical year exposed a Jew to a more pronounced sense of G-dly involvement in their lives than the weekly Shabbos.

The Additional Challenge of The Sabbatical Year

Second, and paradoxically, when a Jew rests on the Shabbos, it is a radical detachment from the physical world. Not only can we not sow, plow, reap etc., but all creative labors are forbidden.

During the Sabbatical year, however, there was no restriction on all other forms of work outside of agriculture. One could still be physically creative and involved and yet be exposed to a dramatic expression of G-dly energy.

This, then is the powerful message conveyed by the Sabbatical year that even the Shabbos did not convey. To be holy on the Shabbos is BECHUKOSAI relatively easy, because one must divorce himself from all forms of work. In that state, it is easy to concentrate on the spiritual aspects of life and to dedicate the Shabbos to G-d.

During the Sabbatical year, where everything was normal — except for agricultural activity — one required a much greater effort to be involved in the ordinary workings of weekday life and yet experience a special relationship with G-d, one that transcended the Shabbos relationship.

If one of the main challenges of life is the need to deal with its paradoxes, Judaism is the ultimate challenge because it is one big paradox. We are required to live in a material world and yet have a relationship with G-d. And there is no time when this paradox is more pronounced than during the Sabbatical year.

Precursor of Messianic Age

This synthesis characterized by the Sabbatical year is even more expressive of the life we will experience in the Messianic Era. On the one BECHUKOSAI hand, we will still have a physical world and all forms of work will be permitted, yet, it has been characterized as a Shabbos existence, because we will all be able to experience the ultimate G-dly involvement in our lives, even as we remain physical human beings engaged in physical pursuits.

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From the book Light from the Future: Parshas Behar-Bechukosai by Rabbi Heschel Greenberg, published by the Jewish Discovery Center.