Download the free “Haggadah of the Inner Seder” (18 pp.). PDF, RTF, and DOC versions, along with a brief guide to the haggadah’s features, can be found at: http://neohasid.org/zman/pesach/InnerSeder/.
You can also go to neohasid.org for Omer Counter apps, and for information about David Seidenberg’s new book, Kabbalah and Ecology: God’s Image in the More-Than-Human World, published by Cambridge University Press.

“May the merciful One turn our hearts toward the land,
so that we may dwell together with her in her sabbath-rest the whole year of Shmita.”

Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu el ha’aretz
l’ma’an neisheiv yachad imah b’shovtah, kol sh’nat hash’mitah!

הָרַחֲמָן הוּא יָשִיב לִבֵּינוּ אֶל הָאָרֶץ לְמַעַן נֵשֵב יָחַד עִמָהּ בְּשָׁבְתהּ, כָּל שְׁנַת הַשְׁמִיטָה

The words of this blessing were written by Rabbi David Seidenberg. Nili Simhai made it into a singable liturgy by setting the words to the “Sosne Nigun” by Jonah Adels, z”l. (Listen to the song at www.neohasid.org/resources/shmita-harachaman.)Harachaman blessings come after the main part of the blessing after the meals, and they ask for special blessings, including blessings related to Shabbat and holidays. Sing it at your Tu Bish’vat seder and at every meal this whole Shmita year!

Shmita means “release”, and the Shmita year is about release or liberation for the land, liberation between the people and the land, and liberation between people themselves. This Harachaman blessing references all three kinds of liberation, and it does that by using three different verbs that include the letters Shin ש and Bet ב. The first, yashiv, comes from the word “turn”, lashuv, לשוב, and it refers to our returning to a right relationship on a heart level with the Earth. The second, neishev, comes from “to settle” or “dwell”, lashevet, לשבת, as in shevet achim gam yachad — how good it is for brothers and sisters to dwell together, and it refers to liberation between individuals in the year of release, when debts are canceled and food is shared. The third, b’shovtah, comes from lishbot, לשבות, to rest, and it refers to the shabbat that the land itself enjoys in the Shmita year, as it says, “the land will enjoy her sabbaths”. This is the true nature of tikkun olam: tikkun, repair and restoration, on all these levels together. That is what must happen to fix the world.

You can download the PDF at neohasid.org/pdf/Shmita-Harachaman.pdf or get a PNG graphic of the blessing at neohasid.org/resources/shmita-harachaman/ (there are 8 Harachamans per page) to use at your Tu Bish’vat seder and for every meal during this Shmita year.

The words fit into the song like this:

Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu
el ha’aretz, el ha’aretz
Harachaman hu yashiv libeinu
el ha’aretz, el ha’aretz 

l’ma’an neisheiv yachad imah
imah b’shovtah
neisheiv yachad imah
imah b’shovtah

kol sh’nat hash’mitah
kol sh’nat hash’mitah
kol sh’nat hash’mitah
kol sh’nat hash’mitah

We lived with the wild animals once, rather than carving out separate spaces for us and our domesticated fellow travelers. According to the Torah, that is the real truth, and all the owning and property and buying and selling is an illusion. We can return to that truth during Shmita, when we get to root ourselves in a real way in the land – not by owning it by being with it. Not by fencing it but by taking down fences. Not by hoarding but by sharing everything, with all the creatures.

Here are the relevant verses about eating:

In the garden of Eden, “God said: Here, I have given to you all every plant seeding seed which is on the face of all the land and every tree which has in it tree-fruit seeding seed, for you all it will be for eating, and for every wild animal of the land and for every bird of the skies and for every crawler on the land in which there is a living soul (nefesh chayah), every green plant for eating. And it was so.” (Genesis 1:29–30)

In the story of the flood, “God said to Noah: …from all life from all flesh, two from all you will bring unto the ark to keep them alive with you, male and female they will be. From the bird by their species and from the animal by her species from every land crawler by their species, two from all you will bring unto you to make them live. And you, take for you from all the food which is eaten, and gather unto you, and it will be for you and for them for eating.” (Genesis 6:19–21)

And in the laws of the Shmita or Sabbatical year, it says, “YHVH/Adonai spoke unto Moshe in Mt. Sinai, saying: You all will come into the land which I am giving to you, and the land will rest, a Shabbat for YHVH/Adonai…And the shabbat-growth of the land will be for you all for eating: for you and for your male servant and for your female servant and for your hired worker and for your settler living-as-a-stranger with you; and for your animal and for the wild animal which is in your land, all of her produce will be to eat.” (Leviticus 25:6–7)

There is a debate among the the earlier rabbis, about whether the tree fruit in Eden was just for the human beings and the grass for the animals, or whether it was all for all of them. Nachmanides says that humans dined separately, but Rashi says that it truly was one family sharing one food supply. As for the ark, according to the midrash Noah had to create one great store of every kind of food, because each animal needed its own sustenance, and Noah and his family had to spend every hour of the day feeding the animals, since some ate at dawn and some during the day, some at dusk and some at night.

After the flood, in between the ark and Shmita, comes the tragedy of human history. The wars and usurpations, enslavements and empires, the amassing of gold and land by some and the impoverishment of others. And in between the two are also the tragedies of our relationship to the wild animals: not just using but abusing, extinguishing whole species, and losing touch with our own wild selves.

That’s reflected in the flood story: when Noah and family emerge from the ark, they are told that “a terror of you and a dread of you will be over every wild animal of the land and every bird of the skies, everything which crawls the ground and all the fish of the sea, into your hands they are given. All that crawls which lives, for you it will be for eating – like green plants I have given all to you all. Just don’t eat flesh with its soul, its blood.” (Genesis 9:2–3)

This is no blessing but a curse. And it is no dominion: according to one interpretation, the meaning of dominion in Eden was that when Adam would call to the animals, they would come to him. Now it would be the opposite – they will run away in terror. (“Rashi” on B’reishit Rabbah 34:12)

One question for us today, in this year of Shmita, is: how can we get ourselves back to the garden? Back before our fellowship with the animals was lost? That can’t mean turn the hands of the clock back on history. Shmita answers a slightly different question: how do we get back to the garden as grownups, after having eaten from the tree of knowing good and evil? It’s not about feigned or renewed innocence, but rather about knowing our power to destroy, and not exercising that power. It’s about finding fellowship with the land and the other animals. And above all, it is about finding rest – rest from ourselves, and rest with each other, with all the other ones that inhabit the land.

A midrash says that during the twelve months in the ark, Noah “did not taste the taste of sleep, not in the day and not in the night, for he was busy feeding the souls that were with him.” (Tanchuma Kadum Noach 2) Another midrash, says that when God was setting up the world, the earth heard God say, “It’s not good, the human being alone” and she realized this meant that human beings would begin to reproduce. Then the earth “trembled and quaked”, saying, “I do not have in me the strength to feed the flocks of humanity.” God promised the earth to feed humanity at night with sleep, and so share the burden with her. (Pirkei d’Rabi Eliezer ch. 12)

In our society, where almost everyone is racing to keep their jobs or make money or outcompete, we don’t really let ourselves sleep. As a society we never rest. We don’t get enough of this divine food. And it’s not because like Noah we are feeding all the creatures. But here’s what this midrash teaches us: a humanity that never rests is a humanity cut off from the unconscious, cut off from its divine sustenance, and it is a humanity that will destroy the earth.

It is time for us to rest, and to dream, as a whole society: Shmita.

It says in Proverbs 11:30, “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and one who acquires souls is wise.” These souls are the animals, the midrash teaches, and it was because Noah was capable of caring for them that he was worthy of being saved from the flood. (B’reishit Rabbah 30:6) Are we worthy?

It also says in Proverbs 12:10, “A righteous person knows the soul of his animal.” It is time to practice this righteousness. Not just with the other animals, but also with ourselves. How will we know the soul of this animal within us? How will we make peace within, with each other, and with the land? How will we dream our animal dreams again? That is the door Shmita opens for us. That is the ark Shmita builds for us. And I believe that is how we get back to the tree of life in the garden.

contributed by all the organizations and initiatives on “the Map” http://jewcology.org/map-of-initiatives/

Here’s a quick bit of Sukkot Torah to start us off: “The four species of the lulav represent the four types of ecosystems in the land of Israel: desert (date palm), hills (myrtle), river corridors (willow), and sh’feilah, the lowlands (etrog). Each species has to be fresh, with the very tips intact – they can’t be dried out, because they hold the water of last year’s rain. Together, they make a kind of map of last year’s rainfall, and together, we use them to pray for next year’s rains.” I hope everyone enjoys the wonderful array of activities and ideas we are generating. We are a strong and beautiful network. Please add more to this list if you like: write to rebduvid86@gmail.com and I’ll update this page. I will also be updating the format and fixing the fonts — I don’t have time Erev Yom Kippur to do more than simply share this content. Thank you to everyone who shared, and g’mar chatimah tovah! Rabbi David Seidenberg, neohasid.org

Resources

from Judith Belasco, Hazon

http://hazon.org/educational-resources/holidays/sukkot/ Hazon also has an incredible array of resources on Shmita linked at: http://hazon.org/shmita-project/educational-resources/resource-library/

from the Religious Action Center

“Eco-Friendly Sukkot”  http://resources.rj.org/Articles/index.cfm?id=1369

“Table Texts about Food Justice” http://rac.org/pdf/index.cfm?id=23602

from Max Arad and Rabbi Carol Levithan, The Rabbinical Assembly

“The Sukkah as Shelter: A Source Sheet” http://www.rabbinicalassembly.org/sites/default/files/public/jewish-law/holidays/sukkot/sukkah-as-shelter.pdf See also: http://www.rabbinicalassembly.org/jewish-law/holidays/sukkot

 from Jeffrey Cohan, Jewish Vegetarians of North America

“Sukkot, Simchat Torah, and Vegetarianism” http://www.jewishveg.com/schwartz/hlydysu.html

from Rabbi Katy Z. Allen, Ma’yan Tikvah

Ushpizin for an Ecological Sukkot by Laurie Levy https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BzF1ISt_50TyVG9lWE0zOXJpd1k/edit

from Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Shalom Center

14 articles on Sukkot at: https://theshalomcenter.org/treasury/114 including “Reb Zalman’s Prayers for the Earth on Hoshana Rabbah” and “Spread over all of us a Sukkah of shalom, salaam, paz, peace!”   from Rabbi David Seidenberg, neohasid.org “How-to Build a Sukkah For Under $40” http://www.neohasid.org/sukkot/a_simple_sukkah/ more links at: http://neohasid.org/zman/sukkot/ including “Eco-Torah for Sukkot”, “Hoshanot, the Original Jewish Earth Prayers”, and “Egalitarian Ushpizin with a Prayer for the Earth”

 from Canfei Nesharim via Rabbi Yonatan Neril

resources can be found at http://canfeinesharim.org/sukkot/ and on Jewcology http://jewcology.org/resources/sukkot-shemini-atzeret-resource-and-program-bank/

 also from Rabbi Yonatan Neril, for Jewish Ecoseminars

http://www.jewishecoseminars.com/let-the-land-rest-lessons-from-shemita-the-sabbatical-year/

 from Nati Passow, Jewish Farm School

Two resource sheets for Shmita to be posted on Jewcology – look for them on Monday before Sukkot

 from Anna Hanau, Grow and Behold Foods

Recipes (meat): http://growandbeholdblog.wordpress.com/tag/sukkot/

Events

We have three big regional festival events going on, Sukkahfest, Sukkot on the Farm, and Sukkahpalooza, and lots more local events:

 from Judith Belasco, Hazon/Isabella Freedman

Oct 8-Oct 12, Sukkahfest at Isabella Freedman Retreat Center http://hazon.org/calendar/sukkahfest-2014/

 from Pearlstone

Oct 8-Oct 12, Sukkahpalooza http://pearlstonecenter.org/signature-programs/sukkot/

 from Sarai Shapiro, Wilderness Torah

Oct 9-Oct 12, Sukkot on the Farm, Green Oak Creeks Farm, Pescadero CA http://www.wildernesstorah.org/programs/festivals/sukkot/   local events and projects:

from Hazzan Paul A. Buch, Temple Beth Israel, Pomona CA

Our synagogue will break ground during Sukkot on a 1/2 acre urban farm on our property, in cooperation with a local NGO. The farm will be fully managed by the NGO at no cost to us, and all workers are paid a living wage. The produce grown will be available for purchase to our congregation and sold at farmers markets in the area. A portion will be dedicated to those who are food insecure. Question for everyone: Do you know of any other synagogues who have dedicated their land in a similar way?  Please note this is not an urban garden, but a functioning not-for-profit commercial project.

from Becky O’Brien, Boulder Hazon

Oct 6, at 5:30 pm, family sukkot program, in partnership with the south Denver JCC Oct 12, at 4:00 and 7:00 pm, screenings of “Road to Eden”, co-sponsored with the Boulder JCC Oct 16, Sukkot Mishpacha, a program for young families at a local organic farm Rabbi Julian Sinclair stopped in Denver/Boulder on his recent book tour promoting Shabbat Ha’aretz; we hosted five programs with him earlier this month. We are leading a shmita hike for local staff of Jewish organizations to help them decompress from the hectic time of the high holidays. We expect that many shmita-related programs will arise throughout the year but we don’t yet know what they will be.

from Helen Bennet, Moishe Kavod House

Fri Oct 10, Shabbat in the sukkah Tues Oct 14, Sukkot Festival dinner, co-hosted with Ganei Beantown (Leora Mallach). Moishe Kavod is planning to run a series of learning and DIY sessions on shmita starting in November, with focuses on economic justice, food and ag system, and chesed/caring community principles.

 from Gail Wechsler, St. Louis Jewish Environmental Initiative (JEI)

Sun Oct 12, 4-6 PM, screening of the film “Fire Lines”, about joint Israeli and Palestinian fire fighting efforts during the Carmel fire of December 2010. The film includes environmental themes as part of the reason for the fire was overforestation of the affected area. The director, Avi Goldstein, will speak after the film.  In partnership with the Jewish Community Relations Council, Webster University and the JCC.

followed by:

Sun Oct 12, 6-7:30 PM, organic potluck Sukkot dinner. In partnership with the JCC and its Garden of Eden, a community garden that grows organic fruits and vegetables to benefit the clients of the nearby Harvey Kornblum Jewish Food Pantry. Both events at the Jewish Community Center Staenberg Arts & Education Building.

from Michael Rosenzweig, Boulder JCC

We have a great event each year called Sukkot Mishpacha, where we partner with a local farm so the children and families can learn about environmental issues, do fun arts and crafts projects, and pick their own gourds. http://www.boulderjcc.org/events/2249/2014/10/14/boulder-jcc-events-calendar/sukkot-mishpacha/ Note: I have not included narrative detail in general here, but I found Rhonda Ginsberg’s description so delightful to imagine and I just didn’t think I could condense it. So here is what she wrote to me, with some minor editing:

from Rhonda Ginsberg, teacher, Carmel Academy, Greenwich CT

For Sukkot we do a 4 year rotation focusing on different aspects of the holiday.  The first year of the cycle we invite the ushpizin and have the 7 species at a festive meal.  The second year we look at wind with kite flying as a major activity, the third at rain and water, and the last year at stars and shade. Each exploration is done both from the Judaics side with text study and from the science/experiential side. This year we are looking at water.  For the K to 3rd graders, teachers act out the story “Why Does it Rain on Sukkot”, MS. Frizzle (science teacher) comes to teach about rain & why it’s needed, then students rotate through stations that are led by 4th graders and teachers.  At the stations they investigate kosher tops for pipework sukkot, create rain sticks, have various water activities & races, sing songs & learn the dance “Mayyim”.  For the 5th to 8th graders, they start with an appropriate text study.  Then, the 6th through 8th graders become the instructors teaching the other grades about the aspect of water that they researched and created a project for.  6th graders look at the water cycle, which they present through posters, dioramas, etc.  They also perform a song and skit on the water cycle.  7th graders research water pollution – causes, effects, and possible solutions.  8th grade engineering students investigate flooding – causes, effects, how engineers have created solutions.  8th grade honors biology students investigate droughts, concentrating on trouble spots in the Western US, Israel & the Middle East, and Africa.  They also look at causes, effects, & possible solutions.  Then we have a Simchat Beit HaShoava – the biblical Water Libation ceremony which took place during Sukkot in Temple times, with students singing, dancing, juggling, filling pools with golden pitchers, etc.

Yet for many Jews, climate change is still not seen as a “Jewish issue”. Now, to me it seems obvious that the decimation of life on our planet is as fundamentally important to Jews and Judaism as any explicitly Jewish issue. And the possible extent of impoverishment, disaster, and famine that could be brought on by climate change must be a Jewish issue if justice is a Jewish issue, which it surely is. But in case that simple logic doesn’t work for you, let’s be absolutely clear about what the specific Jewish implications might be.

According to a Ben Gurion University study, if we enter an era of what scientists consider extreme climate change – meaning an increase in average global temperature of more than 2 degrees – the Negev desert will expand 200 km northward. That means the desert will stretch far beyond Beersheva, beyond Raanana and Haifa, all the way into Lebanon. Almost all of the sh’feilah – the agriculturally productive lowlands – could be gone. On top of that, Tel Aviv will be under water due to rising sea levels. If that’s not an existential threat to Israel than nothing is.

So if you’re a Zionist or you care about the Jewish people and you think that the issue of climate change is not as important as “energy independence”, you have your values upside down. If you think the natural gas boom caused by fracking is good for Israel, or tar sands oil is good for Israel, then your picture of the world is missing some essential facts. Protecting Israel doesn’t just mean getting off of Arab petroleum, it means getting off of all petroleum. If you’re not advocating for that, you might as well be calling for the destruction of the state.

This week we will be praying for another year of life. We will blow the shofar to recall God’s original act of creation, and to herald the yearly renewal of Creation. This week we will also be ushering in the next Sabbatical year, the Shmita, when debts are canceled, the land is released, and the power that comes from possessing the land is lifted. And yet we still live in a world where mountains, along with all their ecosystems, are torn off in order to tear out coal. We still live in a land where polluted water is not considered too high a price to pay in order to extract oil and gas that will pollute our atmosphere. Where the debt to nature we incur will be paid by future generations, or, to use the Torah’s expression, where “we eat the flesh of our sons and daughters”. (Lev. 26:29)

Let’s make this Rosh Hashanah, and this Shmita, the year when all of that changes. Let’s get our institutions and portfolios to divest from Big Oil. Let’s get our synagogues and communities to stand up for the Earth. Let’s repay our debt to the planet with blessings and gratitude and right actions. Let us listen to the wake up call of the shofar and respond: “Hayom harat olam!” – “today, a new world is conceived!”

Rabbi David Seidenberg is the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God’s Image in the More-Than-Human World, published by Cambridge University Press, and the creator and director of neohasid.org. An earlier version of this article appeared in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal.

Time: Wednesday, January 15, 2014 5:00PM

Tu Bishvat — the full moon of Shvat — the New Year for the Trees is Wednesday! It's the Kabbalistic celebration of the cosmic Tree of Life, and it's been the focal point of Jewish ecology since the 70's. There are beautiful rituals, and NeoHasid has tremendous resources you can use to celebrate, including 3 different haggadot, source sheets, and the original Tu Bishvat blessing. Go to: http://neohasid.org/resources/tu_bishvat/

Tu Bishvat is the time we pray for the fruit trees to have enough water, sunshine, and love to be able to produce for all of us (all the creatures, not just humans). And it's a time when we reflect on fixing the "sin of the human eating the fruit of the tree of knowing" — which essentially means reflecting on how much and how greedily we take, and how we might change that.

You can get all the resources you need to make a seder/ritual meal (except the fruit) on neohasid.org. You can also get a simple 1-page haggadah/guide on neohasid.org. Here's a list of ingredients for an easy seder: 3 kinds of nuts (like walnut, almond, coconut), 3 kinds of fruit with pits (like olives, dates, avocado), 3 kinds of fruit with edible skin (like apple, grapes, peach, orange, carob), two bottles of white grape juice and one of red. The guide online will tell you how to do it. There's a list below of all the other Tu Bishvat resources you'll find.

And here's a bit of Tu Bishvat Torah, paraphrased from Pirkei d'Rabi Eliezer ch.12. It's from my book on ecology and Kabbalah — which is almost almost completed.

******************

>When God created the first human being, Adam Harishon, and stood the creature up, it was magnificent like one of the ministering angels. God said: "If I let this one be the unique and only human in the world, then all the other creatures will see it and say, 'this one created us'. Therefore, 'it is not good for the adam to be alone'. (Gen 2:8) So God split the human into male and female.

>When the Earth heard that there would be human beings would multiply, she trembled and quaked. The Earth said: "I do not have in me the strength to feed the flocks of humanity." God said: "I will feed humanity at night with sleep, and so share the burden with you."

According to this midrash, humanity must bet fed by our sleep, by our resting, by our dreaming, by being connected to the realm of the unconscious, to the realm of the soul. If we are not fed in this way, we can (will?) overwhelm and destroy the Earth.

What about the way we live now makes it hard to connect to the unconscious? How can we strengthen our connection to it?

*******************

If you're in the Boulder CO area next week, I'll be leading a community-wide seder at Nevei Kodesh. And if you're in the Pioneer Valley of MA next Shabbat (Jan 17-18), I'll be leading Tu Bishvat learning at the Jewish Community of Amherst. And of you're in the Bay area, you can fond out about EcoJews of the Bay's seder at: https://www.facebook.com/events/601539973233485/

********************

Tu Bish'vat on neohasid.org:

Find ideas about leading the seder, commentary on the JNF, the prayer for the trees from the original seder, texts to learn and teach at your seder, and more.

"The works" for Tu Bishvat

Haggadot, brakhot, text study sheets, in one zip file. Direct download — 1 MB.

A simple Tu Bishvat Haggadah

An all-English simple haggadah for Tu Bishvat with intro.

A basic version of the well-known flowchart Haggadah

An haggadah all in English with a smidgeon of Kabbalah, accessible for beginners to Kabbalah or to Jewish practices.

One-page flowchart Haggadah plus more links

A flowchart haggadah on a single sheet, in three versions including. Plus some quick links to other resources.

The Ultimate Text Crunching Sheet for Tu Bish'vat

Study, for many days or for one seder, some of the great Jewish and Kabbalistic texts on fruit, trees and the earth.

Shirat ha'asavim ~ The Song of the Grasses

A rough recording of the well-known Naomi Shemer tune, in time for Tu Bish'vat.

How to make a Kabbalstic Tu Bishvat Seder

Instructions on how to run a seder, how to use the blessing from the first Tu Bishvat seder, and how to use the One-page Haggadah chart.

A Prayer for the Earth – Hebrew and English

Y'kum Purkan Lish'maya: A prayer for the earth, for use in your synagogue, minyan, or havurah; for Earth Day, Rainbow Day, Shabbat Noach, Shabbat Behar/Bechukotai, everyday.

Blessing from the first published Tu Bish'vat Seder

From the 16/17th century seder manual, P'ri Eitz Hadar, based on the Kabbalah of the four worlds. The original seder calls on us to bring blessing to all creation.

The Giving Tree: A Way to Honor Our Vision for Israel

Planting a tree for the future sounds like second nature, a wise investment for both Israel and the planet. But whether you think about doing this at Tu Bish'vat or during the Omer when it's really planting time, it's a little more complicated than donating to JNF…

Birkat Ha-ilanot

Once a year there is Jewish custom is to say a special blessing on flowering fruit trees. It happens in spring, especially during the Omer, but it's also a good teaching for Tu Bish'vat. You'll also find some other good tree texts here.

Longer meditations on Pri Etz Hadar

Imagine a Jewish practice which has the purpose of restoring all the species and creatures, and all the sparks they contain, to the fullness of blessing.

Tu Bish'vat wisdom

Three teachings about how holy eating brings blessing to all life and all creatures, submitted by Jacob Fine.

(from http://neohasid.org/zman/chanukah/ice_menorah/)

First, here's what's cool about an ice menorah: reflections in the ice; it floats – water is amazing and awesome; renewable resource – and if it's cold enough where you are, just freeze it outside; meditate on climate change and melting glaciers, and resolve to do something about it!

Here's how to do it:

1) Set candles in cardboard brace.

2) Fill loaf pan or any container part way and set brace over it — see diagram. Candles should be immersed half inch or more in water.

3) Shamash (not pictured) — fill dixie cup or any small cup or jar with a few inches of water and set shamash candle in that.

4) Freeze it all.

5) Remove ice with shamash, put it on top of ice in loaf pan. add another half inch or more of water to freeze the shamash to the rest of the menorah.

6) You can carve a little channel for melted water to flow away from the shamash

(idea and execution – Heidi Creamer; diagram and instructions – David Seidenberg; neohasid.org)

for pictures of a real ice menorah, before and after it's lit, go to http://neohasid.org/zman/chanukah/ice_menorah/

You'll notice while the menorah is burning that the melted ice warms up and creates its own channels (see pic above), sometimes making holes through the ice. Among other things, that's a great moment to talk about melting glaciers. Let us know what you do and how it goes!

You can design meditations on water, on climate change and glaciers, on renewable resources, on science, using this project. Send ideas to rebduvid8@gmail.com and I'll post them here.

I’ll explain below why the number 79,000 is wrong for ecological and sociological reasons. But we have to make two other huge assumptions to even imagine a Thanksgivukkah in 79,000 years. One is that Thanksgiving will exist 79,000 years from now. Given that the United States has only been around for 200-some odd years, and that the nation-state hasn’t even been around for a thousand years, that’s a pretty big stretch.

The other is that Torah, Chanukkah and the Jewish people will still exist as a culture in 79,000 years. I’d bet on the second assumption sooner than the first, since religions and cultures live a lot longer than nations: rabbinic Judaism is about two millennia old, and what is possibly the oldest living culture, the Australian aborigines, maybe on the order of 60,000 years old. But according to the traditional rabbinic understanding of Judaism, the Messiah should come long before that.

So where did people get the number 79,000 from? People assume the Gregorian and Jewish calendars will unfold mechanically for the length of human civilization, without adjustments. In that case, Chanukkah will wander forward with the Jewish calendar about 6 minutes a year, and won't come back round into fall/winter for 79,000 years.(1) But all we have to do to keep Chanukkah and the other holidays in sync with the seasons is to add one less leap month every 7,000 years or so.

We have to do it, because Pesach (Passover) needs to be in the northern hemisphere's spring, “when the crops are judged” (Rosh Hashanah 1:2). Chanukkah needs to span the darkest night, the new moon closest to winter solstice. And most of all, we need our calendar and societies to be in sync with Nature.

That shouldn’t be too hard. After all, we’ve only had a fixed calendar since the time of the astronomically-savvy Shmuel, since maybe the 3rd or 4th century. For most of our history, we arranged our calendar by watching the skies and the rhythm of the seasons.(2) We never even set when the next month started, until witnesses came to the Beit Din (court) to say they saw the crescent moon. It was so important to get this right that people were allowed to violate Shabbat in order to get there to testify!

In any case, if we can’t get back into harmony with those rhythms, you can bet in a few centuries there won’t be a Thanksgiving, or a Chanukkah, or even a Torah to teach us about Pesach.

So let’s focus on 2070 first. Not only will the two youngest generations be around for Thanksgivukkah 2, but we will probably have a pretty clear idea about something everyone is worried about now: how severe is climate change going to get? Will the next Thanksgivukkah take place in a world where billions of people living on the coasts are turned into refugees? Will there be enough food in 2070 for the 8 billion people who will be alive then, when the normal growing season, and the ecosystem, might be changing rapidly in many places?

These are just big questions now, but by Thanksgivukkah 2 we will have concrete answers. So here’s one more question, for those of us who will not be around for Thankgivukkah 2: what wish would you have for the generations that will be here, that will inherit this world we are co-creating?

Here’s a suggestion: take a moment during Thanksgiving, when family and friends are gathered, to share not just the material blessings of the feast, but blessings of a different sort, the kind of blessings for when we won’t see each other for a long time, blessings we might give the people we love before leaving this world. Blessings like this:

“May the next Thanksgivukkah be a time of health and abundance for all of you who will receive the world from our hands. May we together find away to make sure that there is health and wealth and beauty not just for our family, not just for the Jewish people and humanity, but for all living creatures who share this planet with us. May the One bless us with the power and wisdom to birth a society that shows love to the world around us, that lives with love towards all beings.”

Maybe you can add the priestly blessing that parents say to children on Friday night, or the prayer for Creation on neohasid.org (http://neohasid.org/stoptheflood/earthprayer). But remember, we who will ultimately pass this world on to our children will only get to wish this blessing once.

If we do it right, maybe we’ll have a slightly better chance of making it whole to Thanksgivukkah 2. Maybe even to that Thanksgivukkah beyond the horizon, in 79,000 years.

Rabbi David Seidenberg is the creator and director of neohasid.org. His book on ecology and Kabbalah will be published next year by Cambridge University Press. David teaches on Jewish thought, spirituality, and ecology throughout North America, in Israel, and in Europe. Neohasid.org is a member of the Green Hevra.

This article also appears on the Huffington Post at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rabbi-david-seidenberg/thanksgivukkah-2-coming-s_b_4325703.html

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1) The Jewish calendar is both lunar and solar. Since 12 lunar months makes about 354 days, an thirteenth month gets added every few years to keep the calendar in sync with the sun's cycle. In a 19-year cycle, 7 out of 19 years have an extra month ("Adar 2"). But when the cycle returns to its technical starting point after 19 years, it is actually about 123 minutes ahead of where it started in relation to the sun. So the calendar moves ahead of the actual cycle of the sun about one day in 220 years.

2) That’s how it once was with every measurement in Jewish law. For example, the time it takes to walk 1 mil (a little more than half a mile) is how long you have to finish baking matzah in order for it to be used on Passover (Pesachim 46a), and the time when Shabbat ends is when three stars come out. Nowadays, we define everything in Judaism by precise measurements: minutes and seconds, ounces and grams, etc. (even though there are multiple opinions about each of those precise measurements). But even the length of an hour changed from season to season in Talmudic times, and from day to night, and it still changes, for example, when determining the time to say the Sh'ma prayer.

3) Photo is of the Beit Ahavah solar ner tamid, along with menorah and Tree of Life (Northampton MA).

But this birthday is not just one of celebration. The line we add after "Hayom Harat Olam" is "Today the world stands in judgment."

These two motifs alone should give us pause today to consider what we are doing to the planet, to how we can restore the balance of the atmosphere, the balance of the waters and the air, of the forests and plains, the ocean and the continents.

"Today the world is born" — so says the liturgy according to most translations. But let's look more closely at the words "Hayom Harat Olam" to see what they can teach us.

"Harah" or "Harat" means pregnancy, conception or gestation. Not birth, but the process which leads up to birth. If we wanted to say "the birth of the world" we would say "leidat ha'olam". And "olam" can mean world, but if we wanted to say "the conception of the world," we would add the definite article and say "harat ha-olam." "Olam" by itself really means eternity, from the root that means "hidden," or more precisely, the infinite that is hidden, that is beyond our limited perception.

So "Harat Olam" means very literally, "pregnant with eternity", or "eternally pregnant." The day of Rosh Hashanah is pregnant with eternity.

What deeper evocation could one find of this wondrous and miraculous creation than "eternally pregnant," always bringing forth new lives, new creatures, even new species? Always dynamic, growing; balanced not like a pillar on its foundation, but like a gyroscope, turning and turning. What higher praise of the Creator? What greater potential in this moment, than for it to be "pregnant with insights, with hopes, that are as great as eternity"?

Jeremiah said, "Let my mother be my grave and her womb be pregnant eternally / v'rachmah harat olam." (20:17) This is the scriptural source of the expression "harat olam." On a very personal level, this verse is an expression of Jeremiah's profound grief. In Job, however, our planet is imagined as a womb, as in, "when the sea gushed forth from the womb." (38:8) Jeremiah's lament, applied to the Earth, becomes one of the truest and most loving sentences in the Tanakh. This Earth is a mother to us and it is our grave; it is eternally pregnant, and from our deaths will come new life and new lives.

When we hear the shofar and call out, "Hayom harat olam!" may we find hope, may we find courage, may we find blessing, in this moment on this planet filled with birth and death, pregnant with eternity.

"Hayom harat olam." "Today," the day of Rosh Hashanah, we birth new intentions and conceive new possibilities. Today is our day, today we are alive on this planet, as we say in the liturgy, "All of you alive today / Chayim kulchem hayom." Today our choices will gestate the future, for our children, and for the children of every species upon the Earth.

We pronounce blessings on ourselves at the end of the Rosh Hashanah service, blessing about "today." We shout and sing: "Hayom t'amtzeinu." "Today you will find courage." "Hayom t'varcheinu." "Today you will be blessed."

And the Psalms say: "Hayom im b'kolo tishma'u." "Today, if you will listen to the Voice." Let us listen to all the voices crying out, the voice of the Earth, and the voices of every creature, and hear in them the divine Voice.

On Rosh Hashanah, as we really listen to the shofar, may new feelings and intentions be birthed within us. Then we will know what it means when we receive the blessing, finally: "Hayom ticht'veinu l'chayim tovim." "Today you will be inscribed into life."

(Alcohol, used in many hand-sanitizers, and vinegar, are alternatives that can be used as bacteriacides but which can be processed by the ecosystem without a problem.)

All of this is done in the name of making money. We live in a foolish society where money matters more than life. We create needs that don't exist and meet them with products that kill.

And it happens in the name of ecology, and not just in the name of sanitizing our lives.

CFL's, compact flourescent bulbs, are supposed to be an important way to cut down on CO2 emissions. They help some, sure, but they are laced with mercury, and they use many times the energy of LED bulbs. And now that they are basically required, they are being manufactured in all kinds of shoddy ways that give us plenty of bulbs that last a lot shorter time than an incandescent bulb. So what we've done is create a huge new stream of mercury that is entering the environment.

It's also true that the extra power it takes to light an incandescent bulb means, in our filthy energy economy, that more coal is burned, which also releases mercury into the air. But if you break a CFL bulb, your releasing mercury in a gaseous form in an enclosed space–that's many many times the mercury exposure that you might get in almost any other context, in a form that is absorbed directly into your lungs.

That's assumining your energy comes from coal. If it comes from other sources (e.g. natural gas, and of course, renewables all the more so), then your bulb is one drop in a mighty stream of mercury being poured into the ecosystem that would never have been released except because of our laws that are pushing CFL's.

CFL's are supposed to be good things. I'm not even touching on fracking and GMO's and all the other great ideas that are putting us in a worse position than we have ever been for survival–even if we were to stop global climate disruption now, which we are not doing. Not a pretty picture.

What about nuclear power, btw–another idea that has arisen anew as an alternative to CO2 emissions and global climate disruption? Well, the lethal products of nuclear power will outlast our species and many many other species. Some of those radionuclides will persist to harm all forms of life for as long as they exist on this planet. We can't figure out how to stop global warming, but we are going to figure out how to sequester lethal radioactive waste for many many times longer than human civlization has existed? Not likely.

It's bad enough for us to create conditions on this planet that will harm the lifeforms that exist now–the Cenozoic patterns of life typified (in the human mind) by birds and mammals. Life can evolve to meet the new conditions created by global climate change. We may or may not be part of that life, but it will continue. Shall we now also create conditions that will harm all the lifeforms that don't yet exist?

We need to be thinking very long term. Not just seven generations, but beyond the life of our species, to the worlds that will unfold over millions of years and not just over millenia, if we want to act responsibly now.

Rabbi David has been researching Shmita since 1986 and teaching about Shmita since 1993. He is also the organizer of Rainbow Day (May 6-7 this year–see jewcology.com/resource/Rainbow-Day for details). David's writings about ecology include the following d'var Torah about Shmita for this year's Shabbat Behar campaign, hosted also at shmitaproject.org, where you can get lots more resources on Shmita. Read the d'var here, read it in the Huffington Post if you like, or download the pdf (link on right column).

Go to shmitaproject.com for more resources on Shmita and Shabbat Behar. Also, within the Shmita Project site, you can find core Shmita texts, core Shmita principles and core Shmita values/ethics. Go to jewcology.com for Rainbow Day resources.

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"Shmita: The Purpose of Sinai"

Rabbi David Seidenberg, neohasid.org

What does Shmita, the Sabbatical year, have to do with Mt. Sinai? מה עניין שמיטה אצל הר סיני

This question was famously asked by one of the oldest midrashim, Sifra (Behar 1) and it has been pondered over for centuries. The question arises from the way the portion about the Sabbatical year is introduced in the Torah: "YHVH spoke to Moshe in Mount Sinai saying: Speak to Israel’s children and say unto them: When you come to the land which I give you, the land will rest, a shabbat for YHVH…In the seventh year, it will be the Sabbath of sabbaths for the land, a Sabbath for YHVH." (Lev. 25:2-4) If all the commandments were given at Sinai, the midrash wonders, why is Mt. Sinai only mentioned here?

And the answer that we can give today is deceptively simple: the whole purpose of the covenant at Sinai is to create a society that observed Shmita. It is in a land where Shmita is observed that human beings will learn to respect the Earth herself, by remembering that none of us can own her. "For the land is mine," God declares, “and you are strangers and settlers with me.” (Lev. 25:23)

And if none of us can own the land, cannot sell it and buy it, then what we do own is ultimately not ours, then the difference between rich and poor is not "just the way things are," then a person cannot be owned and the difference between slave and master is not real and not loved by God. In the Sabbatical year debts are canceled, and the land is ownerless. In the seventh sabbatical year, the Jubilee, all slaves are freed (including those who did not exercise their right to go free after the sixth year of their own service) and every family returns to its achuzato, its original landholding, becoming equal to every other family.

Only in such a society, where "property" does not designate the right to use up what one owns, but rather a kind of fleeting relationship to what one cares for, can people learn the true meaning of justice. Only in such a society can people learn to share their wealth, nurture the poor alongside everyone else, relieve debts, end hunger, and respect the fundamental human right to be free. The Sabbatical year was the guarantor and the ultimate fulfillment of the justice that Torah teaches us to practice in everyday life, and it was a justice that embraced not just fellow human beings, but the land and all life. The Sabbatical year was the ultimate meaning of rest, which we practice every week in the observance of shabbat. It was the Sabbath of sabbaths, Shabbat shabbaton.

After telling us outright that Sinai is about Shmita, the Torah also gives us other pointers to Shmita’s ultimate significance. Failure to let the land rest is one of only two mitzvot that are described as being the cause of exile from the land (the other being idolatry), while the purpose of exile itself is described as a way to force human beings to let the Earth rest. If we do not observe Shmita, still "the land will enjoy her Sabbaths…All the days of her being emptied she will rest what she didn't rest during your Sabbaths, when you were dwelling on her." (Lev. 26:34) The Torah is clear: It is possible for us to have shabbat without giving the land rest, but doing shabbat just for ourselves, even just for God, is not enough. Exile happens because the land’s right to rest comes before our rest.

There’s another clue to the importance of Shmita, a more subtle one. During the Shmita year, we are commanded to let the wild animals eat freely from our fields. "The shabbat of the land (what the land grows while it is resting) will be for you for eating: for you and for your servants and hired-workers and for your settler living as a stranger with you, and for your beast, and for the wild animal which is in your land, all of her produce will be for eating." (Lev. 25:6-7) The rabbis further expanded the meaning of this law, so that everyone was required to leave any gates to their fields open, and one could not eat in one's house food that was not also growing in the fields—in other words, so that human beings and wild (and domestic) animals were eating the same food.

Think about the only other time when humans and all the animals ate alongside each other in peace according to the Torah. When, and where, did it happen? It was in the Garden of Eden, before so many tragedies befell humanity. Before the flood. Before the relationship between humans and animals was torn asunder; before humans exiled themselves from the Earth. After the flood, the animals live in mortal terror of human beings. After the flood, God makes a covenant—not with the human beings, but with all the animals—a covenant to not destroy the Earth because of humanity.

It is the Sinai covenant which is meant to bring back into harmony a world twisted by human greed and violence. It is the Sinai covenant that is meant to restore the fellowship of human and animal, and to reorder our values, so that the well-being of the land and the community of life takes precedence over our own perceived needs. This is what it means to "choose life so you may live, you and your seed after you." (Deut. 30:19) This is what it means to “increase your days and your children’s days on the ground for as long as the skies are over the land.” (Deut. 11:21)

In modern parlance we call it "sustainability," but that’s just today’s buzzword. It’s called Shmita in the holy tongue, "release"—releasing each other from debts, releasing the land from work, releasing ourselves from our illusions of selfhood into the freedom of living with others and living for the sake of all life.

How is it, then, that our generation is the one that can answer the question, "Mah inyan Shmita etzel Har Sinai? How does Shmita emanate from Mt. Sinai?" It is because it is only now, when we see that human beings can really "ruin My world" and that there may be "no one who will come after you to repair it," (Kohelet Rabbah 7:13) only now can we understand what Shmita means. Only now can we see that the meaning of Mt. Sinai is Shmita. May it be Hashem’s will that we are seeing this in time to fulfill the vision, to "proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all her inhabitants," (Lev. 25:10) to all those souls traveling together with us on this planet.

People have been using these resources for years; they are incredibly valuable, and you can mix and match what you need.

Included files:

1) A simple haggadah anyone can use.

2) The One-Page Kabbalistic Flowchart haggadah — in black and white and in color versions.

3) The blessing from the first published Tu Bishvat seder (P'ri Ets Hadar) — in doc and pdf formats.

4) Three pages of great texts for learning and discussion.

Get it, you won't regret it!

1) Learn and teach the rainbow blessing: "Barukh atah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha`olam ZOKHER ET HABRIT — Blessed be You, Hashem…who remembers the covenant!" And — you can remember that the first covenant in the Torah wasn't just for humanity. It was a convenant with all animals and with the land itself.

2) Say a prayer for the all living things. You can find a prayer based on the rainbow covenant and P'ri Eitz Hadar (the first Tu Bishvat seder) on jewcology.com/resource/Shabbat-Noach. (You'll also find other resources for Shabbat Noach.) The English text goes like this:

God full of compassion, remember Your covenant with all life, the
covenant of the waters of Noah. Spread a sukkah of compassion and
peace over all Life's species and over us. Surround all our relations
with Shekhinah's radiance; water them with Your river of delights in
all of their habitats. Then "the bow will appear in the cloud" joyful
and beautified with its colors, and the Tree of Life will return to
its original strength, so that we and our descendants may merit to
live many days on Earth, like the days of the Skies over the Land.
Blessed be the Life of the worlds!

3) Pick one other exercise or project from the Rainbow Day curriculum and do it /share it!

May we all be blessed to bring healing to the Earth and to all the species that share this planet with us.

Rabbi David Seidenberg
neohasid.org

Teach the Rainbow blessing

The Rainbow covenant in Genesis

Teach/learn a song to a verse from Hoshea about the future covenant with all life

A prayer for the Earth (Birkat Bereishit)

Study classical midrashim about Noah

Midrashim: interpretations of the rainbow sign: from Rabbis Arthur Waskow, Shlomo Riskin, Shimshon Rafael Hirsch, and Rav Avraham Yitzhak Kook

Learn about biodiversity

Pick a rainbow!

Study endangered species

Science, Art, and Culture

Council of All Beings

Hydrofracking

Climate change

Seed saving and Naamah, Noah’s wife

Read the children’s book The Story of Naamah

“L’Dor V’Dor” seed saving workshop

The Seven Noachide Laws and the seven colors of the rainbow

More study ideas:

Download any of the following for deeper study:

Neohasid.org’s one-page text study sheet from on midrash about Noah.

Canfei Nesharim’s study guide on “Countering Destruction: Lessons from Noach”.

Green Zionist Alliance’s guide on “Shabbat Noah: Global Climate-Healing Shabbat”.

Rabbi Everett Gendler’s brief essay on “The Sevenfold Rainbow Covenant” for study.

Or go to jewcology.com/resources/Rainbow-Day and get the ganze megillah (36 projects), which includes all of the Shabbat Noach resources along with lots of other stuff.

Rabbi David Seidenberg

neohasid.org

Rainbow Day, יום ברית הקשת

sunset May 30th through May 31st ~ make it beautiful!

Celebrate Rainbow Day!

We have prayers and liturgies, lesson plans about seed-saving, learning from Hoshea and Ezekiel, Kabbalah and midrash, and project ideas—36 in all—that you can use to celebrate Rainbow Day and to remember God’s covenant with all creation. Download "RainbowDay-ideas_texts_projects" version 3.2. New modules: poetry for kids, frogs, mikveh, tzedakah, dangers of triclosan, Samar desert. New docs: "Biodiversity and the Bible", "Covenant and Sentience ", and "Backyard Rainbow". There's also a table of contents that lists all the activities, along with the ages for each. You can ideas here too. Write to rebduvid86@gmail.com (also send kid's rainbow art so we can display it). Lastly, don't miss listening to the Brit/Hoshea song!

Go to jewcology.com/resource/Rainbow-Day to get all this and more!

Rabbi David Seidenberg

neohasid.org

For a few years now I've been dreaming of making Rainbow Day a reality in the Jewish world. Rabbi Arthur Waskow first came up with the idea of using the dates of the flood story in 1981. But now I think we (the Jewish world) are ready to make it happen. I've been collecting prayers and rituals, lesson plans about seed-saving and hydrofracking, learning from Hoshea and Ezekiel, from Kabbalah and midrash, and project ideas that you can use to celebrate Rainbow Day and to remember God’s covenant with all creation. Many of the environmental groups that contribute to jewcology are contributing to the Rainbow Day project as well.

All of the material will end up in one PDF that you can download by the end of this week. Write to rebduvid86@gmail.com to contribute or to receive notices whenever there's an update.

Here are the essential goals: 1) To get Rainbow Day on everyone's spiritual maps. 2) To teach that the first and paradigmatic covenant in the Torah is not just with human beings, but with all animals and with the land. 3) To make sure everyone knows that there is a delightful blessing to say whenever we see a rainbow!

Go to http://jewcology.com/resource/Rainbow-Day to find out more about Rainbow Day and to access what we've put together.

What is Rainbow Day?

On the 27th day of the second month, Noah, his family, and all the animals that were with them left the ark (Genesis 8). Exactly one lunar year and ten days before—one complete solar year—the flood began on the 17th of the second month, the day before Lag B’Omer. When Noah and his entourage went out from the ark, God made a covenant, with the people, with all the animals and with the land, that there would never be again be a flood of water to destroy life on Earth. Rainbow Day is always the 42nd day of the Omer, the day after Yom Yerushalayim. This year Rainbow Day follows Memorial Day.

Remember the Rainbow Covenant on Shabbat Noach, Shabbat Behar and Rainbow Day!

Celebrate Rainbow Day and the Rainbow Covenant with all life!

In the Rainbow Day curriculum, you’ll find Torah, prayers and liturgies, midrashim about rainbows, lesson plans about seed-saving, learning from Hoshea and Ezekiel, Kabbalah and midrash, and project ideas—40 in all—that you can use to celebrate the Rainbow covenant onShabbat Behar and on Rainbow Day (both fall on the same day this year outside of Israel, May 15-16, 2015), and on Shabbat Noach (Oct 16-17 in 2015), and every week. The Rainbow Covenant with all life is the first covenant of the Torah. (You can download in-depth study sheets on the connection between the Rainbow covenant and the Sinai/Shmitah covenant with the land that is found in that week’s parshah here. Go to the Shmita Project to learn more about Shmita.)

Download the Rainbow Day curriculum. It includes: Rainbow and Shmitah covenant Torah texts, poetry for kids, liturgy and midrash, frogs, mikveh, the dangers of triclosan (found in anti-bacterial soap), hydrofracking in Israel, and much more. A table of contents with a list of all 40 modules, along with the ages each is appropriate for, can be found below. Many individual modules have study sheets, articles, and lesson plans that you can download directly below. You can add your ideas to this curriculum too: write to R’ David Seidenberg of neohasid.org (rebduvid86 at gmail.com). Every year we add a link to one of the issues found in the curriculum here: Learn about fracking in Israel. New to this year’s download: all the url’s are live links that you can click. Lastly, don’t leave this page without listening to the Brit/Hoshea song — scroll to the very bottom and hit the play button!

What is Rainbow Day?

On the 27th day of the second month, Noah, his family, and all the animals that were with them left the ark (Genesis 8). Exactly one lunar year and ten days before—one complete solar year—the flood began on the 17th of the second month, the day before Lag B’Omer. When Noah, the animals and his family went out from the ark, God made a covenant, with all the animals and the people, that there would never be again be a flood of water to destroy life on Earth. Rainbow Day is always the 42nd day of the Omer, the day after Yom Yerushalayim. Other days connected the Rainbow Covenant include Shabbat Noach and Shabbat Behar.

Why is the Rainbow Covenant important?

The Rainbow Covenant is a time to celebrate the diversity of life on Earth, and to remember our role in God’s covenant with all Creation. It is a time to remember that the first covenant was not with human beings but with all living creatures. It is a chance to reflect on the deep spiritual and religious meaning of diversity, creation, and our role as part of creation and partners with God.

What is the message of the Rainbow Covenant?

The Torah teaches that God has promised never to flood the Earth again. But that doesn’t mean humanity can’t “flood the Earth” and harm life. We live in a time when many species have gone extinct or are threatened with extinction. Our civilization is using so much of the world’s land and resources that we don’t always leave room for the other creatures. And the climate is changing. As the African-American spiritual goes, “God gave Noah the Rainbow sign, no more water, the fire next time!” The story of Noah and the Flood teaches us that we have a responsibility to care for all creation and all creatures, and that caring for all species is a mark of righteousness.

What can you do to celebrate the Rainbow Covenant?

The resources here will include ideas for teachers and educators, for kids and adults, for rabbis and prayer leaders, gardeners and meditators, for Torah study, science study, and for action. Find a venue where you can make a difference and use one of these modules. We suggest that you leave a few moments after whatever activity you use for teaching the traditional blessing for seeing a rainbow:

Blessed be You YHVH, our God. . .who remembers the covenant.

Barukh atah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha`olam zokher et habrit.

You can use also these materials on Shabbat Noach, Shabbat Beh!r, or other days!

Download the Rainbow Day curriculum!

You can also incorporate ideas you’ll find here into the observance of Yom Yerushalayim, or as part of Lag B’Omer or for anytime of the Omer, etc. Or use them in religious schools in the week following Shabbat Behar or anytime. Whether you do something in a group, a synagogue, with friends or on your own, make Rainbow Day special.

Here is a prayer that you can use for Rainbow Day (longer version with vowels is found below, and this version with vowels is found in the curriculum as well):

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אל מלא רחמים God full of compassion,

זכור בריתך עמ כל החיים remember Your covenant with all life,

ברית מי נח the covenant of the waters of Noah.

ופרוש סכת רחמיםושלום Spread a Sukkah of compassion & peace

עלינו ועל כל מיני החייםover us, over all Life’s species.

הקיף כלם יוחסינו Surround all our relations

בזיו השכינה with Shekhinah’s radiance,

בנחל עדניך תשקם Water them with Your river of delights

בכל מושבותהם in all of their habitats.

ואז ישוב עץ החיים Then the Tree of Life will be restored

לאיתנו הראשון to its original strength,

ונראתה הקשת בענן and ‘the bow will appear in the cloud’

שש ומתפאר בגוונין joyful and beautified with its colors,

ותזכנו אנחנו וצאצינו so that we and our descendants may merit

לישב ימים רבים על האדמה to live many days on Earth,

כימי שמים על הארץ like days of the Skies over the Land.

More thoughts on the Rainbow Covenant:

According to Kabbalah, Rainbow Day is also the day of Malkhut in Yesod, a unity of masculine and feminine that represents a milestone on the way to the revelation of Shavuot. For us, it can represent a chance to commit ourselves to the rainbow covenant, to turn from actions that destroy the earth, to turn our lives away from unraveling earth’s climate and the web of life, from diminishing earth’s abundance.

The rainbow signified a new covenant between God and the land. It’s time for us to imagine a new covenant between humanity and the Earth, including the land and the seas, one that we start to live by as we change our lifestyles and habits. We can use the covenantal vision of the Shmitah year in Leviticus 25 to help guide our steps. And maybe next year it will be time to celebrate that new covenant.

Rainbow Day is pregnant with ritual possibilities related to the elements, to the midpoint between equinox and solstice, to the time between the fire of Lag B’Omer and the fire of Sinai, to global warming, to healing the waters, to the growing wheat crop in the land of Israel, and to all the meanings related to the journey from freedom to revelation. And rainbows are a symbol of diversity: the diversity of colors, of people, and of all life.

♦ Here are some of the organizations that have contributed resources (starred organizations are members of the Green Hevra):

neohasid.org* The Shalom Center* The Teva Learning Alliance* Jewish Farm School* Kayam Farm* Religious Action Center*Green Zionist Alliance*

Thanks also to: Isabella Freedman Retreat Center* Jewish Reconstructionist Movement* Eden Village Camp* Organic Torah Tikkun Schechter Day School Network EcoJews of the Bay Green Zionist Alliance* Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life* Jewish Greening Fellowship* Hazon* Urban Adamah* Wilderness Torah* Adamah*

The beautiful illustration below is “Noah & Naamah” ©1998 by Ilene Winn-Lederer; Prints may be ordered at: http://www.winnlederer.com/finearts/prints2/noah.html or via email to: ilene@winnlederer.com

♦ Jewish Lights is offering a 20% discount on the two versions of Sandy Eisenberg Sasso’s book about Naamah. Naamah, Noah’s Wife, ages 0-4 and Noah’s Wife: The Story of Naamah, ages 4 and up.

Download the Rainbow Day Curriculum!

⇒ Curriculum Table of Contents:Contents (version 4.2):

The Rainbow Blessing

1. Teach the Rainbow blessing and blessing for the trees

Texts from Tanakh

2. The Rainbow covenant in Genesis
3. A Tale of Two Covenants: Rainbow and Shmita
4. Hoshea 2:20 and the Messianic covenant

Songs:

5. A song for Hoshea 2:20

More Texts from Tanakh
6. Ezekiel, and a Kabbalistic interpretation of the rainbow

Midrashim: interpretations of the rainbow sign

7. Noah and environmental responsibility
8. Flood, Ark and Rainbow, R. Arthur Waskow (also for Lag B’Omer)
9. Human responsibility, R. Shlomo Riskin
10. The diversity and unity of all life, R. Shimshon Rafael Hirsch
11. On human moral development, R. Avraham Yitzhak Kook (link)

Biodiversity

12. Learn about biodiversity (link)
13. Pick a rainbow!
14. Study endangered species (focus on frogs)

Science, Culture and Art

15. How many colors are in a rainbow?
16. Do other animals see colors the way we do?
17. Colors and dyes
18. The science of rainbows
19. Art projects
20. Poetry!

Liturgues and Prayers

21. Rainbow prayer for creation, R. David Seidenberg
22. Between the Fires, R. Arthur Waskow
23. Council of All Beings (link)
24. A mikveh meditation, Carol Rose

Current Issues

25. Climate change
26. Keystone XL Pipeline
27. Hydrofracking
28. Fracking in Israel
29. Get active on the Farm Bill!
30. Don’t use triclosan!
31. Tzedakah and justice

Seed Saving, Harvests and Gardens

32. Seed saving and Naamah
33. Read Naamah: Noah’s Wife by Sandy Eisenberg Sasso
34. For the Omer: plant a “grainbow”!
35. Eli Rogosa’s story about finding an ancient wheat
36. “L’Dor V’Dor” seed saving workshops (link)
37. Plant a rainbow garden (link)
38. Count the omer! (link)

The Seven Noachide Laws

39. The seven colors of the rainbow and the seven laws
40. More study — articles by Rabbi Everett Gendler and Calvin DeWitt

The words from the song video are from Hoshea 2:20 (refresh the page if you can’t see it). They are about the messianic rainbow covenant that is yet to come:

V’kharati lahem brit bayom hahu im chayat hasadeh v’im of hashamayim v’remes ha’adamah v’keshet v’cherev umilchamah eshbor min ha’aretz v’hishkavtim lavetach

On that day, I will make a covenant for them with the beasts and the birds, with all creatures that walk on the Earth, that bow and sword and battle will disappear from the land, so that all may safely rest.

You can also hear another exquisite version of this song by Amen (Gaby Meyer and Amir Paiss) here!

Here's a special way to celebrate Tu Bishvat. Use this beautiful Tu Bishvat Haggadah–only one page long–to guide a seder that you create!

Bring stories, poems, songs, and teachings to fill the seder from your own experiences. Use the flowchart Tu Bishvat Haggadah from neohasid.org to structure your seder, from beginning to end, by following the order from the Kabbalah of what fruits to eat and what wine to drink. Or take teachings from any Haggadah, or from neohasid.org, and then arrange them using the flowchart. Or use the flowchart haggadah as a guide alongside any other Tu Bishvat haggadah.

The goal of the Tu Bishvat seder in Kabbalah is to use our meditation and eating of fruit to bring blessings to the Cosmic Tree–the tree of Life that sustains all living beings. It's a service to pray for the fruit trees, and to imagine a world restored to its original blessing. This flowchart haggadah will help you experience the Kabbalistic seder on all levels.

These haggadot have been downloaded and used many hundreds of times. Don't copy a 15-page haggadah; you can honor the trees by using less paper and copying just one page.

There are two versions: the haggadah in color teaches more about Kabbalah, while the haggadah in black and white includes discussion questions and a table of all the right brakhot-blessings for fruit, wine or juice, and smells. (There are four blessings for different types of smell in rabbinic Judaism.) Look at both haggadot and find out what fits your needs.

Download the four-page study guide on Eden, the flood, and the Shmitah cycle here. You'll find meticulous translations from Torah combined with commentary to help you discover connections between the tragic history of humanity before Abraham found in Genesis, and the Torah's ultimate plan to rectify that tragedy. These passages from Genesis, Exodus and Leviticus help answer the question of why we have a covenant–perhaps the most important answer one could give for our time, when life as we know it may be threatened by global climate disruption.

The fundamental understanding that these texts and study sheets drive at is this: the goal and purpose of the Torah covenant, for society as a whole, is that the Israelites will observe the Shmitah (Sabbatical) year, and that in doing so, they will repair the relationship with the Earth that was destroyed in the generations leading up to the flood. Essentially, the covenant with Abraham is meant to take one people and one land, and put them in a right relationship with each other, in order to create a model for how humanity should live. That model is found in the observance of Shmitah and the Jubilee.

The importance of Shmitah is emphasized by the fact that according to Leviticus 26, if God has to choose between taking care of the people and taking care of the land, God will choose the land over the people. The land is not ‘promised’ to the Israelites except conditionally, based on whether they respect the land’s rights and do justice for her and through her. This is why, according to the rabbis as well as the author of Chronicles, neglect of the Shmitah year leads to exile.

The Shmitah texts teach us not just about Biblical Israel, but also about resolving our environmental crisis now, and about creating peace in the holy land. Check out Leopold's "The Land Ethic" (on this site) to see how closely Shmitah corresponds to modern ecological ideas about how we need to live.

These study sheets are based on more than two decades of teaching all over the world, and discussions among hundreds of students, refined and with an introduction to make them usable by you. They highlight connections between the story of the garden of Eden and the observance of the Shmitah, and are supplemented by commentary that will help you make new connections. Prepare these texts in chevruta (paired study partners) or in a study group. (If you've finished working through the material, you can also use the abridged version called tamtzit3 found here to teach other people, but please study the long version with commentary first.)

Please let me know about your insights. Contact me at rebduvid86 at gmail.com, or through neohasid.org, where you can learn more ecoTorah and sign up for our list.

Rabbi David Seidenberg