Leaving the Corners of our Fields

Mishnah Peah, which a friend of mine and I have been studying weekly, begins with a passage that is familiar to many Jews, but which, like many Jewish texts, is deeper and more complex than might seem apparent on the surface. "These are the things without measure: the peah, the bikkurim, and the re'ayon." The re'ayon is the obligation to appear at the Temple in Jerusalem at each of the three major Jewish festivals; the bikkurim refers to the biblical obligation to bring the first fruits of one's harvest to the Temple on Shavuot; and the peah (after which this section of the mishnah is named) refers to the obligation to leave the corners of one's fields for the poor.

I always thought when I read this text that "these are the things without measure," it meant, "these are things that you have to do endlessly," as in, "you can never do enough of these; you can never say, 'been there, done that.'" That would make sense to those of us who aren't farmers anymore-- who have to understand these texts metaphorically if we're going to truly live them, truly attempt to live out these mitzvot even though we don't live on farms. We'd need to say to ourselves, "you can never do enough for the poor. There's no upper limit to what we have to do to help our fellow human beings."

But the second mishnah which immediately follows this text turns what I thought I understood on its head. "Your peah should be no less than 1/60th, even though they say there is no measure."

If you were actually a farmer; if your food came not from A & P or Kroger or Shop Rite but from the sweat of your brow and the soil of your backyard, you'd need to know not what's the maximum I can do, but rather, what's the minimum I have to do to fulfill my obligation while still maintaining my ability to feed my family, and possibly sell the rest at market.

It's the ultimate "world as it is, world as it should be" paradox. In the world as it should be, we'd all be generous. We'd all give alot to be willing to help each other. If we were actually farmers, we'd each leave large corners of our fields for the poor. And if we weren't actually farmers, we'd write big checks to charities and give massive amounts of food to the poor and spend a large amount of our time battling the root causes of hunger in the first place. Perhaps you know some people who do act this way- who constantly see it in their self-interest to help others.

But in the world as it is, most people don't automatically act this way. We tend to give little, see little value or priority in helping others, tend not to see our self-interest as mixed in with the interests of others. We tend to need to know what the minimum is we must do, what the minimum is that we must give, the minimum price we must pay that society might continue and that we might be allowed to go on our merry way. I don't believe that we're fundamentally selfish-- just that neither are we naturally selfless, either. And the rabbis of the mishnah, now 1800 years ago, knew this, too.

If we are farmers, we want to know, "what is the minimum I need to leave in my field so that I can do my share (but not automatically do more than that)?" If we are not farmers, the question might be essentially the same, as a starting place, in the world as it is: "what is the minimum I must carve out of what I have to share with those who have less (even if I'm not inclined to do more)?"

While we're working for the world as it should be, the rabbis were wise IMHO to get into the nitty gritty of the world as it is. Maybe they figured that if they gave us the minimums, we'd work towards giving more?

I wonder how we might leave the corners of our "fields" today?

Socked in with snow, dreaming of Tu B'Shevat

It's the biggest winter storm in recent memory on the East Coast... we're good and socked in with snow, which leaves me plenty of time to think about all the things I've left undone, like pay any attention to how much I love to write, and how little chance I take to do so...

This spot has been filled with so much promise, but like seeds in winter, the work of writing a blog needs love and dedication, and I've been exceedingly remiss. But with an exciting summer plan ahead of me, sooner than I think, I thought I'd give another go at reflecting on food and spirituality, and the connections between them. So here goes, with no promises...

My friend Ellen agitated me immensely and helpfully by challenging me to read "Eating Animals" by Jonathan Safran Foer. Strange-- as I heard about the book, listened to interviews with Foer, and began asking friends and colleagues about it, the reaction I had was the same as the reaction I got from most of my friends-- "I am afraid to read this book."

"What are you afraid of?" I asked myself and others. It seems we were all afraid of the same thing-- afraid of confronting what we intuitively know-- that something is profoundly wrong with our food industry.

I had read Michael Pollan's work religiously-- Omnivore's Dilemma, Botany of Desire, In Defense of Food. I had thought a great deal, preached a great deal, about the complexities and conspiracies of our food intake.

But nothing shocked my system like Foer's book. While Pollan takes a moderate view-- "Eat Food, Not Too Much, Mostly Plants," Foer's basic case is, once you really KNOW what's going on, how can you eat industrial fish, poultry, pork, or beef? Where Pollan encourages us to do the best we can, encouraging industry to change by way of our pocketbooks, Foer wants us to drop off the grid of meat eating altogether, because the whole system is so vile and cruel and unhealthy.

I have to say that as I went through all of the examples of farmers who are trying, to some extent, to do the right thing, as I followed Foer's systematic rejection of best practices and best efforts, I couldn't help but think that, had Foer written a book called "Eating Plants," he'd likely be equally unsatisfied with most every organic farming effort in this country.

But the long and short of it is that, since reading Foer's book, I am deeply agitated. I've eaten tuna salad, but no other animal protein. I'm actually revolted by the thought of eating meat right now. And, like Foer's dabbling with vegetarianism over the years, I am struggling with the question, "what's next?" Now that I KNOW, will I simply let time pass, agitation ease, and then go back to the way I was before? I don't want to. Now that I will never be able to say that I am ignorant of the travesty that is the industrial meat industry in this country, I can't go back to blissful ignorance. I can't go back; I just don't yet know what's in front of me.

And I'm hungry to know.