Thursday, April 4, 2019 | 28th Adar II, 5779
Dear All,
I had asked Janna, Rebecca, and Shamu – leaders of our Adamah program – to write something for all of us, about the new land we have been able to buy[...]
by Alex Voynow, Jewish Farm School
Parshat Haazinu
[NOTE: Applications for the next JOFEE Fellowship cohort are open now through October 5! Apply today!]
In Ha’azinu, Moses sees the Israelites for who they are: humans, scarred by 40 years of impatient wandering and in[...]
by Jared Kaminsky, Shoresh
Parshat Shoftim
The parsha of the week is Shoftim, which means Judges. As Moses nears the end of his life, he wants to ensure there is a system of governance in society. Shoftim gives detailed ordinances on many topics[...]
by Brenden Jackson, Amir with Shalom Community Farm Houston
Parshat Eikev
In Parshat Eikev, Moses calls upon his people to reflect on their past in order to remember and obtain the future that was promised to them. As they prepare to enter[...]
by Henry Schmidt, Shalom Institute
Parshat Balak
I thought Balak was a story about a donkey.
That is to say, when I sat down to write this blog post, I expected to write about the talking donkey we’ll soon meet. Understandably, a talking[...]
by Eliezer Weinbach, Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center, Hazon
Parshat Korach
וַיֵּרְדוּ הֵם וְכָל-אֲשֶׁר לָהֶם, חַיִּים--שְׁאֹלָה
And they and all their belongings went down, alive, into Sheol
Numbers 16:33
I was traveling once, and my tour guide, a wizened Arab, asked me if I wanted[...]
by Nigel Savage
October 19, 2017 | 29 Tishrei 5778
Dear All,
This week is the start of the rest of our lives the first week after the end of the Jewish holidays, and my first week back at work after my sabbatical.[...]
by Jaclyn Kellner - Coastal Roots Farm; Encinitas, CA
“I’d like to go to the fields and glean among the ears of grain behind someone who may show me kindness.”
This statement, from Ruth to Naomi in the Book of Ruth, holds[...]
by Daniella Aboody, Wilderness Torah, Berkeley, CA
Parashat Chayyei Sarah
Editor’s Note: Welcome to D’varim HaMakom: The JOFEE Fellows Blog! Most weeks throughout the year, you’ll be hearing from the JOFEE Fellows: reflections on their experiences, successful programs they’ve planned and implemented,[...]
by Bailey Lininger, Tamarack Camps, Bloomfield Hills, MI
Parashat Noach
Editor’s Note: Welcome to D’varim HaMakom: The JOFEE Fellows Blog! Most weeks throughout the year, you’ll be hearing from the JOFEE Fellows: reflections on their experiences, successful programs they’ve planned and implemented,[...]
By Nati Passow
11 months ago, I posted a piece on the Jewish Farm School website about how we were choosing to embrace Shmita as an organization. You can read the entire piece here, but the final paragraph sums up the gist.
We[...]
By Amichai Lau-Lavie
A year ago I was laying in a hammock on a Brazilian beach, planning a year’s worth of Shmita study and action that will rebrand this ancient sustainability practice rooted in the Land of Israel for new digital[...]
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow
In the last several years, many societies and cultures have been stirred by the sense of a great planetary crisis caused by human action to overwork the earth -- – the burning of fossil fuels scorching our global ecosystem, the[...]
By Michael Bomze
On a weekly basis, I make hummus – very much at the mercy of area farmers, as I use fresh produce in each batch – and I donate all of the profits to Philadelphia urban farms. Admittedly, I do not think I[...]
By Rabbi Regina Sandler-Phillips
The words of the Shema call for love of God “with all your me’od.” Me’od ordinarily means very-much, and is generally translated in the Shema as strength, might, or power. But ancient rabbis understood this power quite specifically: “Love[...]
by Mirele Goldsmith
This article originally appeared on December 27, 2014 on the Shma website. Read the original article here.
Imagine that you’re a wealthy landowner in ancient Israel. You know the shmita (sabbatical) year is coming and what’s required: You must[...]
by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman
Rebbe Nachman of Bratzlav used to say:
"Friends do not despair!
When a difficult time has come upon us, joy must fill the air!
We must not lose our faith in living, we must not despair.
When a difficult time[...]
By Rabbi Rachel Barenblat
Note: This piece first appeared in the Shalom Center's Purim to Pesach campaign. To sign up to receive future mailings, visit the Shalom Center's site.
Our sages took some pains to ensure a Jewish calendar in which[...]
By Rabbi David Seidenberg
“May the Merciful One turn our hearts toward the land, so that we may dwell together with her in her Sabbath-resting, the whole year of the Shmita!” Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu el ha’aretz l’ma’an neishev yachad imah[...]
by Ari Hart
The beginning of 2015 is also the halfway point in the year of shmita, the once in seven years when the Bible commands that land be left fallow — a tradition that is followed today in a number[...]
By Amy Meltzer
I’m no farmer. The amount of produce harvested from everything I’ve ever planted would surely not top ten pounds. The impact of adapting the agricultural principles of shmita to my life in Northampton would be fairly insignificant. But[...]
By Deirdre Gabbay
As we move through liturgical time, we are called upon to embody the various mindsets that Torah wishes specifically to cultivate. During Pesach we meditate on the meaning of slavery and freedom, and in particular on freedom as[...]
by Akiva Gersh
It's fair to say that Shmita inspired me to become religious. After learning about it and other environmentally-related laws and values of the Torah towards the end of my college years, my perception of Judaism was radically and[...]
The digital countdown clock at Isabella Freedman now reads that we’re under 35 days until Shmita. It’s hard to imagine how quickly time has raced since the clock read nearly 400 days at the time we installed it. And yet[...]
It is 11:30 am, and I am sitting in a field in the middle of the Rocky Mountains surrounded by horses, trees, compost toilets, a bike blender and solar ovens. And Eli, who is dressed as a tree, sitting in[...]
Shalom! I’m Molly, a member of the program support staff for this tour, and I’m thrilled to be putting up the inaugural post for this blog.
Today marks the first day of orientation, where the educators will all meet for the[...]
Dear All,
Ahead of this shabbat's Torah portion of Behar Sinai (which begins with one of the explications of shmita in the Torah) I want to give you a flavor of some of what is happening in relation to shmita around[...]
Written by Charlene Seidle for a session at the recent Jewish Funders Network Conference
Posted on eJP on March 20, 2014
As funders, the onset of shmittah offers a good opportunity to test our assumptions and think about opportunities to support the[...]
by Yigal Deutscher
Commonly translated as the ‘Sabbatical Year,’ Shmita literally means ‘release.’ Many may recall the year of Shmita as a time when agricultural lands were collectively left fallow. Yet, the Shmita year had a depth that reached into every aspect of society[...]
by Yigal Deutscher
Jewish culture arose and took shape primarily as a land-based tradition, directly linked to a particular piece of land. Many of the laws, rituals, and beliefs of Jewish faith are directly connected to the seasons, plants, and harvest[...]
by Yigal Deutscher
Many of us, even if we are Jewishly knowledgeable, know less about Shmita than we do about other Jewish traditions. Today, Shmita does not define Jewishness like other popular rituals or time-based traditions, such as Shabbat, Yom Kippur,[...]
Cycles of time are central to Jewish life, and they are amongst the most significant of our contributions to the world around us. The modern weekend of western tradition is simply the extension of the Sabbath from one day to[...]
Dear Friends,
The story of Hazon is often a story about stories.
Next week, on Tuesday, April 1, at the Green Building in Brooklyn, we'll be telling the stories of four incredible inductees at our 3rd annual If Not Now Benefit, honoring[...]
Roseanne Barr invoked Jewish values to change lives at an innovative, enlightened, and provocative Purim retreat at Isabella Freedman this past weekend. In the last decade of the 20th century, Roseanne Barr brought the issues and concerns of working class[...]
While we have been working to raise Shmita awareness and organizing here in the states, there is much simultaneous work happening in Israel. Much of this is being organized by our partner, the Israel Shmita Project, which is hosted by[...]
Within the Shmita Project, we have been exploring many of the complex issues that Shmita touches upon on a societal level. Beyond the societal aspects, however, there is something very personal about the Shmita Year. Indeed, the most common understanding[...]
New from the SOVA blog by Rabbi Yedidya Sinclair
Original post can be found at http://sovaproject.org/2013/08/19/shmita-as-a-force-for-social-change/
In October 2007, at the outset of the last Shmita year, I was interviewed on NPR, New York, about the Shmita controversy then raging in Israel.[...]
by Yigal Deutscher
There is a saying by the Rabbis, ‘Those who prepare before Shabbat will eat on Shabbat; those who did not prepare before Shabbat, what will they have to eat on Shabbat? (Avoda Zara 3a).’ Well, in terms of[...]
New from the SOVA blog by Rabbi Natan Margalit of Organic Torah
Original post can be found at http://sovaproject.org/2013/08/05/shmita-the-rhythms-of-life/
What can we, in our present moment of great environmental, social and economic peril and also enormous and exciting potential, learn from the[...]
This post was written by Aharon Varady, of OpenSiddur.org, in honor of the ancient tradition of a Jewish New Year for Animals, which was counted on the new moon of Elul. As we are nearing Rosh Hashana 2013 (5774)- one[...]
