blogs/rabbi-huberman

It was sweltering summer afternoon that day in 2017, as our Israeli tour bus parked along the edges of a farmer’s field.

As was the case in each of our congregational tours to Israel, we parked at the edge of a farmer’s field. We were handed gloves and a bucket, and released into the field with a single mission.

To help feed those in need.

Each of us likes to picture Israel as a glowing and successful nation where residents live in an idyllic setting, free from persecution, emboldened by a sense of purpose — participating in the growth of this miraculous country.

But many are left behind, and their images don’t generally appear in travel brochures.

An estimated 246,000 residents each week — from a variety of backgrounds — are food insecure, and they rely of organizations such as Lecket Israel to help sustain them.

That is where, in some small way, we come in.

On that day, as has been our custom, we walked off our bus, dropped to our knees, and began picking tomatoes. It was tiring. It was exhausting. But in many ways, it was more rewarding than any other activity of the tour.

As we toiled with other volunteer groups, our driver, Ami, watched us from the bus. 

I can still hear his voice.

“I can’t stand it,” I heard him say as he jumped off the bus. He grabbed a bucket and immediately began digging his fingers into Israel’s holy soil.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

And he replied, “I am an Israeli, brought up on a moshav, (a farming settlement). I may need my rest after driving you all day, but what I need more is to touch the land.

“It is who I am.”

Other tour groups near us watched in amazement, as our driver began setting a pace for each of us to follow. “How come our bus driver isn’t doing that?” someone asked.

To which Ami replied, “Once you are raised with this holy earth under your fingers, it calls you back again and again.”

I thought about our Israeli bus driver this week, as I bridged last week’s Torah portion, Emor, with this week’s parashah, B’har-B’chukotai, which outlines a number of commandments relating to the land.

What has always resonated with me, is the Torah’s respect for the land. It regards it as living. It breaths. It sustains us.

The parashah begins with a commandment that brings the land to life. It commands us to provide the earth with its own Sabbath every seven years.

“In the seventh year, the land shall have a Sabbath of complete rest…It shall be year of complete rest for the land.” (Leviticus 25:5-6)

Does this make good agricultural sense? Yes, of course. A year of rest provides the soil with an opportunity to regenerate — to recoup its nutrients.  It also reminds the Jewish people never to take the land — and by extension, our air and water — for granted.

In many ways, this is an environmental message from the Torah, significantly ahead of its time.

The Torah has an additional message about the land. “It is not yours.” We are blessed with a miraculous process that combines seeds with soil and rain, to produce nourishment for the earth’s inhabitants.

God put this process in motion. And we are blessed.

It is why the Torah commands twice in the Book of Leviticus, that we set aside the edges of our field for the stranger and for the needy.

That mitzvah is performed each time we visit Israel.

And in so doing, we join Lecket Israel’s effort to collect annually 40.1 million tons of food from farmers’ fields and packing houses, along with 2.4 cooked meals from catering halls, hotels, hi-tech company cafeterias, events, Israel Defense Forces and Israel police bases.

This food is distributed to Israelis of all religions and backgrounds through homeless shelters, soup kitchens, elderly centers, battered women’s centers, community help organizations and schools for at-risk youth.

What an effort. What a commandment. What a commitment.

While the Torah believes that there will always be rich and poor among us, it has no tolerance for extreme hunger or homelessness.

The Torah portion also provides us with what many interpret as a threat to the Jewish people — as individuals and as a nation. It states that if we follow the laws of the Torah, the land will be good to us. And if we disobey, the earth will dry up and close its hand.

The middle paragraph of the Shema prayer underscores this concept.

But perhaps there is another way of looking at this choice.

For if we continue to overtax the earth, the air and water — if we continue to allow humanity to cook the environment — the land will turn its back on us.

As the Kabbalistic tradition teaches, six civilizations preceded this earth. This is the last one we get.

There has always been a profound connection between the land of Israel and the Jewish people. And this not only relates to the State of Israel, but also to the sacredness of the land itself.

It is why, perhaps, the Torah personifies the earth by telling us it needs a rest. Like a parent who supports and nourishes its children, the land should be used as a safeguard to feed the hungry.

That is why, when CTI returns to Israel in 2022, we will again include a trip to a farmer’s field to complete the mitzvah outlined by the Torah.

The land is very much alive. For as a First Nations’ chief once reminded me, “We do not inherit the land from our elders — rather we borrow it from our children.”

As I reflect upon this week’s Torah portion — as our congregation both locally and within the land of Israel continues to support those who are food insecure — we are called upon to be grateful to God for the earth that sustains us, while ensuring that under our watch, we provide food and support to those in need.

This time of Covid has only exacerbated that imperative — both with the United States and beyond.

The Torah provides a blueprint for us to not only protect the earth, but also to give it life, so it may in turn provide us with life.

On that day, our bus driver punctuated the holy connection between the Jewish people and the land.

The Torah reminds us in Genesis 2:15 that it is humanity’s duty to “till it and watch over it.”

Each of us needs to play a part in protecting the earth, through the things we do and must stop doing.

For as the Torah reminds us, the earth upon which we dwell is alive.

And it can only take so much.

Shabbat shalom, v’kol tuv.

Rabbi Irwin Huberman

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