Let Us Bless the Land

The Zionist philosopher A.D Gordon writes:

At times you imagine that you, too, are taking root in the soil that you are digging; like all that is growing around, you are nurtured by the light of the sun’s rays with food from heaven. You feel that you, too, live a life in common with the tiniest blade of grass, with each flower, each tree; that you live deeply in the heart of nature, rising up from all and growing straight up into the expanse of the world.

Gordon believed that the Jewish spirit is renewed by working the land, and in particular the land of Israel. Likewise, each of us must find a way to reclaim the earth as our own, to regain a sacred connection to the land. Doing so can renew our spirit.

Too often we think of nature’s power and majesty when confronted by a hurricane, earthquake or tornado. Instead, we should recognize its majesty and proclaim it each and every day.

We can live deeply in the heart of nature!

This week we read about the sanctity of the land of Israel. So revered is this land that it, and it alone, is granted a sabbatical year. “When you enter the land that I assign to you, the land shall observe a sabbath of the Lord.” (Leviticus 25)

The purpose of this sabbatical year, a year in which the land lies fallow, is twofold. On the one hand it is a reminder that only God truly owns land. The land is lent to us by God. On the other hand, the sabbatical year teaches us that all of God’s creations, must rest. Menuchah, Shabbat rest, is a universal right. It is not just a Jewish obligation. It is instead a right that every living being must enjoy. The land too is a living and breathing creation.

Let us rekindle a reverence for the land and nature. The everyday majesty of the earth is too often missed by us. We revere nature’s awesome power, most especially when it is manifest in storms, rather than its everyday holiness.

You, too, live in common with the tiniest blade of grass!

The Native American poet, Joy Harjo writes:

Bless the destruction of this land, for new shoots will rise up from
fire, floods, earthquakes and fierce winds to make new this land
We are land on turtle’s back—when the weight of greed overturns
  us, who will recall the upright song of this land
Bless the creation of new land, for out of chaos we will be
compelled to remember to bless this land
The smallest one remembered, the most humble one, the one
whose voice you’d have to lean in a thousand years to hear—we
  will begin there
Bless us, these lands, said the rememberer. These lands aren’t our
lands. These lands aren’t your lands. We are this land.
And the blessing began a graceful moving through the grasses
of time, from the beginning, to the circling around place of time,
always moving, always (Joy Harjo, “Bless This Land”)

We must (re)learn how to bless the land and its everyday holiness.