By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal
SAN DIEGO — This week we begin our exploration of the Torah with a trivia question. For 613 Mitzvah points, which Jewish singer-songwriter helped pen the following opus to the virtues of hard work?
Money for Nothin’
Now look at them yo-yo’s, that’s the way you do it
You play the guitar on the MTV
That ain’t workin’, that’s the way you do it
Money for nothin’ and your chicks for free
We gotta install microwave ovens
Custom kitchen deliveries
We gotta move these refrigerators
We gotta move these color TV’s
The answer: Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits. (If you don’t know who Dire Straits is, ask a Baby Boomer.) Dire Straits decried the “easy life” of musicians, actors, and celebrities, especially when compared to hardworking daily laborers.
Now what has this to do with parashat B’har? Parashat B’har describes the shmitah or Sabbatical Year. “When you enter the land that I assign to you, the land shall observe a sabbath of the Lord. Six years you may sow your field and six years you may prune your vineyard and gather in the yield. But in the seventh year the land shall have a sabbath of complete rest, a sabbath of the Lord: you shall not sow your field of prune your vineyard…it shall be a year of complete rest for the land.”
Observing the shmitah year provided spiritual as well as ecological advantages. Ecologically, during the Sabbatical Year the land was allowed to lay fallow, thereby diminishing the possibility that continuous planting would rapidly deprive the earth of her nutrients. Spiritually, the shemitah year reminded the Israelites that the earth does not belong to them but to God. Every seven years the land must be returned to its rightful owner, the Source of All Creation.
The commentary Hadrash v’Ha-iyun adds an additional spiritual lesson that may be learned from the Sabbatical Year. Hadrash v’Ha-iyun first points out the obvious connection between the Sabbatical Year and the weekly Sabbath day. Just as the land is supposed to rest every seven years, so should human beings rest every seven days.
He then, however, takes the comparison a step further. Just as the Torah says: “Six years you may sow your field and six years you may prune your vineyard and gather in the yield,” he writes, “so should a human being work six days before resting on the seventh.
“Americans often complain about their work weeks. They long for more free time and longer vacations. They think they have it tough, but according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) www.oecd.org, Americans are far from the hardest working people in the world. The average American does paid and unpaid work (i.e., household chores) for about 8 ½ hours per day. Mexicans, on the other hand, average about 10 hours a day.
Interestingly enough, despite long work days and few vacation days, Mexican workers are generally very happy. According to the OECD report: “Mexicans report the third-highest positive psychological experiences (feeling rested, smiling, learning, and enjoyment) and lower than average negative experiences (pain, worry, stress, sadness, depression).” This seems to indicate a correlation between hard work and happiness.
Rabbis often emphasize the importance of observing the weekly Shabbat as a way of Jews achieving physical and spiritual healing and respite from the tensions and upheavals of the rest of the week. Hadrash v’Ha-iyun adds that in order to truly appreciate the beauty of Shabbat, it must be contrasted with a week filled with productive and meaningful labor.
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Rabbi Rosenthal is spiritual leader of Tifereth Israel Synagogue in San Diego. He may be contacted at leonard.rosenthal@sdjewishworld.com