Parshat Behar explains the complex and
redemptive systems of shmita and of
the yovel. Every fifty years, land is
returned to its original owners, slaves are set free, and debts are annulled. The
system functions as an idyllic economic and spiritual reset, restoring the
economy and the land by reinforcing the Jewish people’s connection with Hashem.
The Torah explains the theological premise on which this system is based: “v’ha’aretz lo timacheir litzmitut ki li ha’aretz;
ki geirim toshavim imadi.” The
land shall not be sold in perpetuity, because the land is Mine—you are
strangers who reside with Me.[1]
Regardless of our economic concerns, the “bottom line” is clear—La’Hashem ha’aretz umlo’ah[2]— The world
and everything in it belong to God.
Radical as it might
seem, the complete overturn of the free economy was not without parallel in the
Ancient Near East. As Raymond Westbrook, a scholar of Near Eastern Studies at Johns Hopkins,
explains in his book Property and the
Family in Biblical Law, ancient Babylonian kings would issue misharum acts, likewise mandating the
cancellation of debts, the liberation of slaves, and the restoration
of land to its original owners.[3]
Westbrook explains that such ordinances often emerged out of desperation. Thus
the Babylonian kings attempted to "curb the worst effects of an economic
condition without approaching the underlying causes."[4]
The yovel, though similar in form to
the Babylonian misharum, insists on
an underlying moral framework: our responsibility to be fair stewards of
Hashem’s land and to the economic systems we derive from it. Misharum, Westbrook insists, has no structure
and no cyclical date for this economic ‘release.’ It is an “unpredictable and
irregular event… entirely dependent on the will of the king.” [5]
Far from the desperate despots who enacted misharum,
the yovel calls for a return to an
ideal, insisting on the ultimate order of the universe and our mandate to
maintain justice through our economic pursuits.
In explaining the
significance of this system, the Sefat Emet teaches that through shmita, and by extension yovel, the land is re-gifted to Israel.[6]
This system explains Yitzchak’s blessing to Yaakov in Bereshit 27:28. The Sefat Emet explains that the words “Vayiten l’cha Elohim,” (And God will give to you) are written in the future
tense to include not only Yaakov Avinu, but also to foreshadow the renewal,
re-gifting, and restoration described in our parsha.[7]
Rather
than a periodic aberration, the yovel
restores ideal economic and spiritual equilibrium to Eretz Yisrael. Comparing the yovel to misharum allows
us to better understand its timeless meaning: by undermining the normal functions
of the free market economy, the yovel
annuls human debts as a timely reminder of humanity’s indebtedness to Hashem.
[1]
Leviticus 25:23.
[2]
Psalms 24:1.
[3] Raymond Westbrook, "Jubilee Laws," in Property and the
Family in Biblical Law (Sheffield, Eng.: JSOT
Press, 1991), 49.
[4] ibid, 47.
[5] ibid, 48.
[6] "Be-Har," in The Language of Truth: The Torah
Commentary of the Sefat Emet, Rabbi Yehudah Leib Alter of Ger, trans. Arthur Green
(Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1998), 204.
[7] ibid.
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