Parashat Behar: Our Symbiotic Relationship

On Mount Sinai, the Lord spoke to Moshe, “Speak to the Israelites.  Say: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the Lord.  For six years you may plant your fields, prune your vineyards and harvest their crops.  But the seventh year shall be to the land a Sabbath of complete rest, a Sabbath to the Lord.  You shall not sow your fields or prune your vineyards; you shall not harvest what grows of itself or gather the grapes of your unpruned vine; it is a year of rest for the land. 

My mother’s maternal side lived in Kraków and, like most Jews, knew very little about farming.  My great-grandfather, Kalman Bienenzucht (the German term for beekeeping) was a wine merchant who travelled from the suburb of Podgórze to Germany to sell wine to monasteries. Farming was strictly out of bounds. Incidentally, Podgórze would later be the location of the Ghetto which was established on 3^rd March 1941and from which the Jews were later deported to several concentration camps including Auschwitz. Nearly every member of his family was murdered although he survived and died of natural causes hiding in Spa, eastern Belgium in 1942.

Few Jews in Poland (unlike their counterparts in Russia) were farmers.  Reading this week’s Parasha, I wonder if they could have countenanced the notion that ‘shmitta’, a set of laws that had been (understandably) neglected for nearly two millennia, would re-enter into our vocabulary as a going concern less than a century later?

He died six decades after the Rabbis in pre-State Palestine re-introduced the concept and six decades after Jews started returning to our ancient homeland in their droves.

Shmitta was now relevant once again but it had to be interpreted in an era that was markedly different to the last time it had been enacted.  When the Jews started returning and working the land, establishing kibbutzim and moshavim (settlements), it was practically impossible to observe the laws of shmitta, granted that they would have had to cease production on the land for a year.  Hence, they cleverly reused an idea that we’ve just employed over Pesach.

In the same way that we sell our chametz to Gentiles to obviate owning it and transgressing another Torah command, they introduced the concept of ‘heter mechira’ which means a ‘sale permit’.  The Jews could sell their land to the non-Jewish inhabitants for a small amount and then employ Gentiles to work that land during the shmitta year.  The farms would be operational and the shmitta produce would be available to all.  This is the model that has been used since (as you may recall last year throughout the latest shmitta).

The laws of shmitta in this week’s Parasha underscore the symbiotic relationship between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel.  Hashem tells us that when we observe the laws of shmitta, we will receive a bumper crop in the sixth year of the cycle which will provide enough food to last for three years.  He reminds us that the land is His and we are ‘merely migrants’.  As long as we keep the rules, we deserve to inhabit the land.

The Tanach (Chronicles II, 36 21) quotes Jeremiah who prophesised that the initial exile following the destruction of the first Beit Hamikdash lasted for 70 years…

…in fulfilment of the word of the L-RD spoken by Jeremiah, until the land paid back its sabbaths; as long as it lay desolate it kept sabbath, till seventy years were completed. 

The Jews had neglected to observe ten cycles of shmitta and as a result, they were exiled for that precise amount of time.

Throughout the time that we were exiled from the land it regressed.  We only need to look at the help provided by Sir Moses Montefiore to assist the beleaguered Jewish community to see how difficult the situation was.  Without Jewish presence, the land withered and slid into obscurity.  Once our nation returned and reinstated our ancient laws, the agricultural miracle that is the State of Israel came into being.  For Israel to bloom, it must be inhabited by Jews.  For our nation to thrive and survive, we need to inhabit our ancient homeland.

One of the tragedies emanating from the massacres of 7th October, in addition to the murder and abduction of so many people, was the devastation inflicted on the kibbutzim and the flora and fauna therein.  Not to be beaten, Jews from both within and outside Israel came forward to provide invaluable assistance in terms of helping with the harvest, picking fruit and doing everything they could to assist in the vital agricultural work that had been impacted as there are many farms that are struggling to survive.

It could take years to fully recover from the damage that has been done but the Jewish people have a long history of clinging tenaciously to our homeland.

The laws of shmitta are inexorably linked to the idea of freedom.  Working the land for six years allows it to be ‘free’ on the seventh in the same way that we are blessed to have Shabbat as our day of ‘freedom’ from work.

It is not a coincidence that the shmitta year also enabled Jewish slaves to be free and upon the completion of the forty-nine-year cycle, in the fiftieth, Jubilee year, all land and property returned to its original owner.  The Jubilee year can only be celebrated when all twelve tribes return to the Land of Israel.

Nearly a hundred years after the death of my great-grandfather, ancient laws that he might have considered to be obsolete are very much part of our lives.

We can only hope and pray that soon the whole world will come to recognise that our symbiotic relationship with the Land of Israel was not predicated on a UN vote in November 1947.  It can be found throughout the Torah and particularly in this week’s Parasha.

May we merit the coming of Moshiach and the return of our brothers and sisters from the four corners of the world, Amen!

Shavuah Tov.

Parashat Kedoshim: The Letters That Define Us.

Dalet (ד), Kuf (ק), and Shin (ש) are three letters of the alef-bet that pronounced individually have no symbolic meaning (although as we know, the letter Shin represents G-d’s name through its use on religious items such as Mezuzot and Tefillin).

Join them together and they form one of the most important shorashim/roots in the Hebrew language.  A word, that is so integral to our faith that without it, the religion that we practice would be completely unrecognisable.

That root is the word קָדַשׁ (Kodash).

One of the names we call Gd is Hakadosh Baruch-Hu, the Holy One, Blessed be He.

We have just celebrated the festival of Pesach and the Seder begins with Kadesh.     Imagine observing Shabbat without making Kiddush or enjoying a Kiddush after shul?  How would a mourner be able to honour their departed relative without reciting Kaddish (and we know how upset we feel when we are unable to form a minyan)?  Our Torah Scrolls are stored in the Aron Kodesh.  That minyan enables us to recite the Kedusha prayer in the repetition of the Amidot that are recited throughout the entire week at Shacharit, Mincha and when applicable, Musaph.

Our Temple was known as the Beit Hamikdash and the Kodesh Hakodashim or Holy of Holies was where the Ark of the Covenant was stored (in the First Temple).  It was accessed by the Kohen Gadol/High Priest on the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur.

Anything that was consecrated for use in the Temple such as animals for offerings of monetary donations towards the treasury to pay for the building’s upkeep were considered to be Hekdesh.  Since Talmudic Times, we have continued this concept to cover mitzvot such as giving Tzedaka, in terms of not misusing funds that were consecrated towards providing monetary relief to the poor members of our communities.

You may have seen the acronym קק  (or KK) as part of the name of a Synagogue. This stands for Kahal Kodesh which means a ‘Holy Community’.

These are a few examples of how the shoresh of the word ‘k-d-sh  ק־ד־שׁ’ is embedded within the DNA of Judaism.

But what does the word ‘kodesh’ mean and what does it represent?

On a simple/peshat level, Kodesh means holy or sacred.

I found a lovely definition of the word on https://www.balashon.com/2022/04/kodesh-and-kadosh.html

The author writes…

…that the root קדש has two primary connotations.

1) ‘to be holy’, in the sense of ‘lofty, exalted’, even ‘perfect’, and perhaps closer to divine.  This is captured well by the English word ‘holy’ (and the related ‘hallow’) which derives from an earlier root meaning ‘whole, uninjured’ (and is ultimately cognate with ‘whole’ as well.)

2) ‘to set apart, separate.’  Perhaps this meaning could better be expressed with the adjective ‘sacred,’ and the verb ‘sanctify’, both of which derive from roots indicating separation or consecration.

When we sanctify something, we give it a separate Halachic status.  On Shabbat, we do this by blessing the day when make the bracha of ‘mekadesh HaShabbat – He who sanctifies the Sabbath’ through the blessing over the wine or grape juice.

Kedushah or holiness is therefore a state which separates a person or item from other people or objects.  You may be surprised to hear that one of the Biblical words to describe a harlot is Kedesha (see Bereishit 38:21, with regard to Judah’s description of his unrecognizable daughter-in-law, Tamar).  This is because she is woman who separates herself from the rest of a moral driven society.

Our national connection with this idea of Kedusha (as representing separation and holiness) finds its origins in Gd’s instruction to our ancestors at the foot of Mount Sinai.

As we were about to receive the Torah, He told us (Shemot 19) that if we faithfully heeded His voice and kept His covenant, we would be His treasure among all the peoples…Mamlechet Cohanim – a kingdom of priests and Goy Kadosh – a holy nation.

At Sinai, holiness, sacredness and therefore separation were branded into our national consciousness.  To be Gd’s nation, to represent His presence on earth, to teach His Torah - which He gave to us – to the rest of the world, meant having to be different from others. 
Not better but different.

This week’s Parasha begins with G-d’s instruction to Moshe:

“Speak to all the community of Israel.  Say…Kedoshim Tihiyu, ki kadosh Ani Hashem Elokeichem – Be holy, for I am holy, I The Lord your Gd.”

Parashat Kedoshim provides detailed instructions on what holiness entails.  How, we as a nation must prioritise a different set of laws and moral standards that were vastly dissimilar to those kept and practiced by the other nations who surrounded us, both near and far.  If we followed Gd’s commands, we would reap the rewards of His beneficence.

On the flip side, we discovered that we also suffered as a result of the inevitable hate directed at us from those who saw us as different.  Those who did not respect or value the tight-knitted and caring societies that we established.  Those who resented the righteousness we espoused and the strong moral compass that underpinned the way we behaved.

Throughout the centuries that followed, we paid the price for being Kedoshim – holy, and the term itself came to represent those of our nation who were killed ‘al Kiddush Hashem’ – sanctifying Gd’s name.

Last Monday, we remembered the six million Kedoshim - the holy martyrs of the Shoah.  Tomorrow night, we will mark the commencement of Yom Hazikaron which recalls many other Kedoshim.  The holy souls who have been killed protecting and living in Medinat Yisrael including those who were martyred on 7^th October and ever since.

Being separate may encourage us to live by a different set of moral rules.  It also requires us to pay a bloody price in terms of the suffering we have been subjected to and continue to endure from those whose despise us – precisely because we are Kadosh.

In just over two weeks, I will be completing the eleven months of reciting Kaddish in memory of my father.  For those of us who have gone through the mourning process, we know how lonely it feels to sometimes find yourself being the only one to recite the prayer.

Many people don’t like to draw attention to themselves in shul.  They are happy to sit at the back and blend in with others.  They come to shul, talk a little, pray, speak to their friends, enjoy the kiddush and return home.  Reciting Kaddish removes their anonymity and instantly, every ear in the building is focused on listening to them.

Stephnie and I recently spent Pesach at the new BNJC hub in Hove.  As you may be aware, it is also the new home of the Brighton and Hove Hebrew Congregation (BHHC).  Throughout the Chag, I was one of two or three people saying Kaddish.  Despite my having recited this prayer probably close to two thousand times over the last ten months, I felt very conscious whenever it was time to recite this (despite knowing how important it is in helping my dear father’s soul reach its heavenly destination).

On the last day of Yom Tov, something extraordinary took place.  At the end of Yizkor, every single person in the room recited Kaddish alongside me.  For the first time, we were united in this incredible, holy prayer.  It was the very epitome of what it meant to be part of Goy Kadosh – a holy, sacred nation.  I was so moved that it almost took my breath away.

Three letters that may seem to be insignificant, underpin who we are.  Irrespective of how connected or disconnected some of our brethren may be, I would wager that it is a minority of Jews who don’t know what a Kiddush is.  It is a handful who wouldn’t appreciate or be moved by hearing someone recite Kaddish and it is even fewer who wouldn’t know what we place inside an Aron Kodesh (even if they don’t know its Hebrew name).

Each of us has a Kedushah gene in our Jewish DNA regardless of whether we can understand or explain why we are different and what makes us so.  That it takes antisemitism to wake this up in some is desperately sad but at the same time, it reminds us of who we are and where we originate.

Kaf, Dalet and Shin form the single word which defines us, for we are Gd’s Holy nation.

Along with the Angels, we praise Gd as being Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh - Holy, Holy, Holy.

May He sanctify us and bring us to the eternal redemption with the coming of Moshiach.

Amen and Shavuah Tov.