1. What constitutes an obstacle that endangers life? Would lack of access to medical care count? Lack of access to education?
2. In what ways can business practices count as obstacles? In what ways do they not?
1. What is the difference between a worker and a servant? Does this text understand there to be one?
2. How does this text deconstruct the relationship between an employer and employee?
3. What can we learn from this text about workers’ rights?
1. How does this text define a need? What does it mean to “lend the poor sufficient for whatever they need”?
2. How is “wealth” defined? According to the text, who defines need/wealth?
3. Do you agree with the Rambam that needs are subjective? What are the limits of this text?
1. שׁWhat are some of the many aspects of life that this verse may be referring to? What do you infer from it?
2. In what ways do children learn from their parents behaviors?
3. What path can we set for the future?
1) What does this text teach us about the way we are supposed to treat the poor?
2) What does one do when they want to be able to provide for those in need but do not have much too give?
How do you understand Shimon Bar Yochai's statement? What is our responsibility towards the earth if it is of equal importance to humans? What does that entail?
1. According to the Rambam, what is tzedakah?
2. Why is tzedakah necessary for the throne to be established and for Israel to be redeemed? What do these two events signify?
1. Who are the players in this text – seen and unseen?
2. What power dynamics are at play?
3. What social justice themes emerge from this text?
1. What goal does the tzedakah fund accomplish that individual donors could not do themselves?
2. This text does not call for a collection of donations, but rather for a group to collect mandated amounts. What is the significance of this detail?
3. What can we learn about tzedakah giving from this text - on local, national and international levels?
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Humanity's role is to tend the garden, not to possess it; to "guard it and keep it" (Genesis 2), not to exploit it; to pass it on as sacred trust, as it was given. Even though we are given the authority to have dominion over the earth and its creatures, we are never allowed to own it, just like we cant own the waters or the air. "The land cannot be sold in perpetuity" (Lev. 25:23). The land is the commons,and it belongs to everyone equally and jointly. In the biblical system, private property does not even exist because God owns the land and everything in it...The blessing of mastery over the earth calls us to exercise compassion and wisdom in our relationship with nature so that the creation will keep on creating for future generations. We use nature everyday in everything we do; nature provides our food, shelter, clothing, energy, electricity, coal, gas. "Mastering" nature involves determining how much land to us, which animals should be designated for human use, how to manage the development of civilization, and what should remain untouched.
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1. What are ways one can balance their right to own property and using ones own land to benefit the global world?
2. What are some Jewish laws regarding land that help us not too forget that we do not have complete control over our land?
1. What is the extent of this law - how do we gauge how much is enough?
2. What is the minimum amount we are to give?
When was the last time you checked the water quality in your community?
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| And one is obligated to prioritize feeding the hungry over clothing the naked, so the hungry won't die of starvation. |
וחייב להקדים להאכילֹ הרעב מלכסות הערום שלא ימות הרעב ברעב.
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Is this logical? Does it sound just?
1. What is the author's reasoning here for when to investigate requests for help?
2. What power dynamics are at play in this text?
3. What realities would exist to make the author write this? What realities exist today?
[From, The Jewish Climate Initiative, http://www.jewishclimateinitiative.org/ethics/consumption.php]
"Once, I taught this passage to an audience that included someone who actually knew something about growing wheat and barley. He pointed out that wheat requires a great deal more land, water and labour in order to grow the same amount of food. These extra inputs are certainly reflected in wheat's higher price, but the ba'al taschit that worries Rav Hisda may be the waste of unnecessary natural resources and not the waste of cash.
This alternative reading is particularly relevant today. Government subsidies for corn, and relatively cheap oil allow us to buy food that's cheap at the supermarket checkout, but very expensive in its use of resources.
If we go with this interpretation of Rav Hisda, then the contemporary parallels are potentially endless. Eating corn-fed beef (i.e. most beef today) that requires ten pounds of grain to produce one of beef, eating fruit that's come from half way across the world; buying Newfoundland rocket lettuce that consumes 128 calories of fossil fuel energy to yield 1 calorie of food energy etc.; It is estimated that food production and transportion in the US consumes more oil than all of the country's automobiles. Rav Hisda might view all of these choices, that consume far more energy than is needed to feed us, as ba'al taschit."
1. Beyond their similar sounds, what do these three traits have in common?
2. What judgment would you render about yourself, or your community, using these three measuring-sticks?
3. How is Rabbi Ilai's standard of 'recognizing' a person's character different from the ways we're used to judging people? What are the benefits of each?