Limmud Bay Area Experience 2015

Explore together, through a close reading of primary texts, the mitzvah of allowing the agricultural lands to lay fallow every seventh year of the Sabbatical cycle. Focusing on both the what’s and why’s of this particular mitzvah, we will ask some of the following questions: What was the intent of Shemitah to begin with? Where, and to whom, does it apply? How does it relate to broader Jewish philosophical concerns, like social justice and a relationship with Hashem? And how is it practiced in modern day Israel?