{"id":51349,"date":"2019-03-13T21:42:25","date_gmt":"2019-03-13T19:42:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=51349"},"modified":"2022-10-04T15:31:36","modified_gmt":"2022-10-04T12:31:36","slug":"how-to-fare-well-and-live-long-together","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/how-to-fare-well-and-live-long-together\/","title":{"rendered":"How To Fare Well And Live Long – Together"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[820,401,360,531],"acf":{"old_id":"51349","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":34011,"related_cahpter":"175","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"The secret? Preserve the fruitfulness","content":"

The promise is a nice one: “That you may fare well and live long.” This is the reward promised for sending away a mother bird before taking her eggs or fledglings (22:6-7). But why should fulfilling this commandment result in such a reward? That’s not a modern question, as demonstrated by a Talmudic legend.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Talmud, in Tractate Kiddushin, describes how Elisha Ben Abuya, the famous rabbi-turned-heretic, might have lost his faith. A father instructs his son to gather some eggs from a nest, but to be careful to first let the mother bird go. Performing his father’s request, the boy should be rewarded with length of days, yet he falls from the tree and dies.<\/span><\/p>\n

Elisha, suggests the Talmud, watched this, presuming that the Biblical promise referred to the life of the individual performing the commandments – and concluded that the promise was false, that there was neither Judge nor justice in the world. Others, including his grandson, Rabbi Ya’akov ben Korshai, take the opposite approach: rewards and punishments are all in the next life. So either tangible rewards, here and now (for the individual), or ultimate satisfaction (again, for the individual) in the hereafter.<\/span><\/p>\n

A similar assumption underlies many commentators’ views of the purpose of driving off the mother bird. Maimonides says the commandment spares the mother the pain of seeing her offspring taken. Others, like Nahmanides, claim that the commandment is focused rather on the individual person: it teaches humane, compassionate behavior.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet why limit the discussion to the individual? Both of these commandments are in fact prescriptions for sustaining human society and its place in the natural world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Contemporary farmer-philosopher Wendell Berry observes: “This [precept] obviously is a perfect paradigm of ecological and agricultural discipline… The inflexible rule is that the source must be preserved. You may take the young, but you must save the breeding stock.” In short, by all means eat of the fruit, but take care not to destroy the fruitfulness.<\/span><\/p>\n

As long ago as the fifteenth century, commentator Don Isaac Abrabanel stated: “The Torah’s intention is to prevent the possibility of untimely destruction and rather to encourage Creation to exist as fully as possible.” Therefore, “In order that you may fare well and live long” means that “it shall be good for humankind when Creation is perpetuated so that we will be able to partake of it again in the future… since if we are destined to live for many years on this earth, we are reliant upon Creation perpetuating itself.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Environmentalists call this <\/span>sustainability<\/span><\/em>: creating a society that sustains itself, physically, over time (“length of days”), by not reaching, or breaching, the natural limits of the earth, and nourishes its members spiritually (“fare well”). We are far from this ideal: for too long we have enjoyed the fruit, and paid no heed to preserving the fruitfulness.<\/span><\/p>\n

The promise, then is not about the life of a single person, nor a pie-in-the-sky promise for the afterlife, but society and a world sustained for us and our children after us.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":51350,"id":51350,"title":"dt22-nest","filename":"dt22-nest.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/how-to-fare-well-and-live-long-together\/dt22-nest\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"dt22-nest","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":51349,"date":"2019-03-13 19:42:10","modified":"2021-03-24 17:26:42","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1920,"height":1280,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest-1024x683.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":683,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1024,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1280,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest-1200x800.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":800,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt22-nest-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"How To Fare Well And Live Long - Together","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"The secret? 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