Parashat HaShavua

Shabbat Shalom

 Parsha Behar - The Great Reboot by Dan Cohen

It seems like I have democracy and governance in my brain. Last week and this week, I’ve read the parsha through the lens of how we join together as people to form a society.

Our expectations of each other in a functioning democracy are unclear these days. In the U.S. and Israel, our leaders too often prioritize self-interest over national interest. Participants often overprioritize their interests above their fellow men. Yet the notion of the Yovel year, the Jubilee Year, allows us to think, examine, and reset our relationship with each other and our chosen leaders.

The parshiot give us some guidance. In Chapter 25, Verse 9, we read, “You shall proclaim [with] the shofar blasts, in the seventh month, on the tenth of the month; on the Day of Atonement, you shall sound the shofar throughout your land.”

Rav Hirsch makes the following point.  Yom Kippur is a day of moral rebirth. Yovel, the Jubilee Year, is for social rebirth. 

In the Jubilee year, slaves are officially free on Rosh Hashanah, but they are not released until Yom Kippur. When the shofar sounds on Yom Kippur, the gift of liberation is official.

Why the delay?  Enslaved people were supposed to celebrate and enjoy the period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, who were no longer subservient but still in their master's home. They eat and drink with their masters with crowns on their heads, he adds. Only when the shofar sounds can they go free

This is a reminder that resetting social expectations takes work and the agreement of all parties. Imagine the mindset of an enslaver serving food and drink to his former slave. This is a great model for adjusting our assumptions to welcome others as partners in forming a viable and resilient nation.

In the following verse, Chapter 25, Verse 10, we read, “And you shall sanctify the fiftieth year, and proclaim freedom [for slaves] throughout the land for all who live on it. It shall be a Jubilee for you, and you shall return, each man to his property, and you shall return, each man to his family.”

Hirsch focuses on the word Dror, which many translate as freedom. Looking at the word’s origins, he identifies various meanings. One emphasizes the purity of the material that goes into making something. Another is a bird that cannot be tamed and retains its freedom. That bird follows its most natural tendencies.

He then explains that we can learn from the Torah's use of the word Dror that “persons and property revert to where they naturally belong—a man to his family, and property reverts by right to its original ownership.”

Yovel restores the legal dignity of a person, which he says is the precise definition of freedom (or I also read: liberty)

Much later in his analysis, Hirsch concludes that the Yovel year, signified by the shofar on Yom Kippur of the Jubilee Year, brings about the nation's social and political rebirth. It has a healing and therapeutic effect on both internal and external affairs. 

He says it is a gift from Hashem. Hashem's grace restores our social and political freedom. Once applied, Israel can be a shining example to the nations and encourage them to learn Gd's ways. This is the only path to ensuring justice, freedom, and everlasting peace on earth. 

This is a tall order for each of you as participants in a thriving and tumultuous democracy.  In Israel, social and political inequality is rampant. Economic and religious disparities divide one from another. Society seems hell-bent on finding ways to divide us rather than unite us.

Into this mix, you will emerge as adults. Hirsch shows us two lessons that can guide you.

We must remember that all of us, slave and master, rich and poor, man or woman, are made in Gd's image and deserve all the rights that go with that.  We must also remember that the goal is to help each other realize the full extent of our liberty derived from our most natural state and make space to ensure others can fulfill theirs. When we can be fully ourselves, we are free to serve Hashem to the best of our abilities.