In the windless cold of the last sabbath of this sabbath year, I could stand still, careful not to nudge myself out of a threadbare pocket of warmth, all the while feeling the comfort eek out of my knobby, uninsulated edges. Or, which feels the wiser path, I can stomp the letter of the law down with the reckless disregard of my feet, and let spirit run through my veins in active rest and blessed vitality.
I trudge down wooded paths leaving a year’s worth of disappointment behind for the length of my walk, forced to look forward, at least to my next step and then the next after. No need to dwell on exile when you’ve got the good of the land to consider, for there is where my good lies, buried in gardens to which I’ve yet to fulfill my responsibility. Who tends to plants these days? In frozen ground, no less?
In the beginning there was sabbath, which was codified as law. Oh what a hopeful rule, a commitment to promise. Why would we neglect what makes our people so royally distinguished from our top-heavy, monarched neighbors? Who would not gladly reach up to pick the ripened fruit placed benevolently on the vine that shades our happy state? What backward people we’ve always been.
If you could flip the coin to take the curse on the other side, why would you take the chance? And still we chanced it, and received our deserts, some wicked jubilee where debts are consolidated further and drying, ancestral lands are claimed from beneath the begging knees of the downtrodden. We were told one thing leads to the other millennia ago; don’t let’s feign ignorance when it is unveiled again.
I know, O Lord, that your rules are righteous, and that in faithfulness you afflict. In faithfulness, I suffer, unable or unwilling to faithfully obey, but let the judgment quickly pass to the promise you made to your servant. I hope, in happy spite of despair. This sabbath year is passing with the judgement it holds in tow for those who will not learn from a father’s correction. Let us stay awake and sober to see what good the next might hold.