Detailed
Description |
|
On the relaxation of the prohibitions against working the land during the shemittah (Sabbatical) year by R. Joshua Heschel Margolis. The title page states “the voice of the turtledove (Kol ha-Tor) is heard in our land” (Song of Songs 2:12). To clarify and make clear the question of horticulture and vinery on the holy land in the forthcoming shemittah year. There is a half-title page and a brief preface from R. Margolis, and then the text, which is in a single column in rabbinic type. The text concludes on p. 28. The following page begins with a brief paragraph by R. Margolis in which he states so that the page should not remain blank he brings the words of R. Joseph Steinhardt (1720-76) of Fuerth on Tosafot.
Shemittah, according to the Bible, occurs during the last year of a seven year cycle. During that year all land has to be fallow and debts remitted (Ex. 23:10–11; Lev. 25:1–7, 18–22; Deut. 15:1–11). For centuries, shemittah remained a theoretical problem, discussed solely by talmudic scholars. However, with the dawn of modern Zionism and the subsequent settlement of Erez Israel, it became a practical problem for the settlers. Before the shemittah of 1889, the leading rabbis of the generation debated whether it was permissible to enact a formal sale of all the Jewish-owned fields and vineyards to non-Jews in order to permit the working of the land during the Sabbatical Year. This highly controversial issue is addresses by Kol ha-Tor.
|
