Munsee Lenape land

native-land.ca

The stolen land of the Tsalagi, Yuchi, and Catawba people

hi from Tkaronto/toronto on Anishnaabe, Wendat, Seneca, Petun, and most recently the Mississauga of the Credit land

For those of you who joined late - some housekeeping items!

Anika (she/her) calling in from Hochunk lands or Southern Wisconsin 🙂

Hi I’m jona joining from ancestral land of the duwamish, also known as Seattle, WA

Grateful for SJ and Risa!

Jo (she/her) stewarding Pocumtuc land, Connnecticut River Valley of Massachusetts. Grateful for this conversation. Thank you!

Siknikt district of Mikmawki homeland, also known as New Brunswick, Canada. I am grateful for neighbours who help plow out my house after a big storm!

grateful for giving community-held processes / emergence

Scott in West Haven Vermont by New York border

Ariel from Abenaki/Pennacook land. Grateful for this opportunity to learn and reflect.

grateful for central heating!

Hi I'm Tome from Calusa Land, also known as Pine Island Florida, I'm grateful for your warm welcoming to this space!

Kingston, ON, Haudenosaunee - grateful for this sunny day!

Grateful for medicine that grows from the land

Hello! Ilana here! Calling from Narragansett land in southern “Rhode Island”. Grateful this gathering and excited to learn new perspectives!

Izzy (they/she) calling in from sissipahaw, shakori, lumbi, occoneechee territory in Saxapahaw nc

Rita from Hochunk lands in south central WI; grateful for all the good energy for justice

Sarah or Soup, they/them, living on Doeg land (Alexandria, VA)

Calling in from Corchaug land, grateful for community!

Hello from Bitterroot Salish (Selis), Pend d’Oreille (Qlispe), Nez Perce (Nimiipuu), Coeur d’Alene (Skitswish), and Kootenai (Ktunaxa) land in MontanaGrateful for this space!

grateful that SJ shares her vision and passion with me/us.

Grateful for folks who are tackling questions I haven’t known how to ask

Rebecca (she/her) calling in from ancestral land of Saura, Catawba, Lumbee, Cherokee, and many others. Grateful to finally be in a JFN space, after admiring from afar ever since it got started!

Hiya! Homelands of anishnaabe people grateful for yarn!

Nipmuc and Pocumtuc - Northampton MA, which was also known as Nonotuc. Grateful for sun in the cold

Nipmuc

Gwyneth (they/she) on cherokee land aka north carolina - grateful to be able to do something with my hands while I listen (mending)

(don't know where the word giving came from lol meant to say "grateful for community-held processes / emergence)

Hello from Lenapehoeking! Simone (they/any) I’m feeling so grateful for snow and how it transforms a landscape!

For those of you joining late, here are some of the housekeeping items we went over at the beginning of the session!

- Please update your display name to: [Name] - [preferred pronouns]- All participants have been placed on mute. Please do not unmute unless prompted by the presenters.- This session is being recorded.- Live captioning is offered during this session. Click Live Transcript from the menu and select ‘Show Subtitles’ or ‘View Full Transcript’ depending on your preferences.- Send me a direct chat if you need any technical assistance or have accessibility needs to share.- If you have any questions about the conference in general, please send an email to conference@jewishfarmernetwork.org.

Amein

grateful that SJ shares their vision and passion with me/us.

Thank you that was a beautiful introduction of the cycles, never thought about it in this way

is yovel a shmita year or is it right after a shmita year?

Shavuot (revelation at Sinai) is the 50th day after 49 days between Passover (liberation) and Shavuot (revelation)

both are scary in letting go of control--how will our basic needs be met? how can we live through such big changes? so practicing at different scales is useful/reassuring/inspiring

it seems like a lot of the rules are similar to shmita - so that's two years of no planting? that sounds tough

does the cycle start again after the 50th year ie in the 51st year or is the next count of 7 starting in the 50th year?

It feels like a compounding of rest. Shabbat is day of rest, Shmita is a larger rest, with Yovel being the largest part of release

@Justin oh wow! Nice echo there

both require material prep in terms of food and resources

When is the next yovel year?

what happens in a time of drought and food scarcity during the yovel year?

It kinda makes sense that it's not the same year, actually. Shmita is a lot about ceasing and letting go, but this description of Yovel actually sounds very active - more like Year 1 energy.

I wonder how long life expectancy was when this was practiced -- ie how many people experienced Yovel, or more than one Yovel

Are the rules for yovel similar to shmita with regards to eating preserved food?

I’m definitely curious about the connection between yovel and debt forgiveness

Yes, Sarah, that's a good question, I imagine it represented a full generation.

I’m also interested in the connection between yovel and prison abolition

Shmita and Yovel both bespeak such a deeply connected community. Hard to imagine at the scale it’s meant to apply to—The Jewish people in Israel

maybe because of the attonement of debt?

to make sure we took care of unfinished business (spiritually, etc)

Because there’s so much internal work already during the high holy days?

maybe you can quickly plant a bunch of fall crops during the 10 days

Yom yippur is a lot about release too?

You can’t go hope until after you have atoned…

*home

attonement of debt- forgiveness to people and that kin of releaase

there might be some physical transition work you want to do before returning land

forgiveness to slaves that are being freed?

How often were people indentured because of a crime they committed?

Are slaves also freed during yovel?

So their children are not also slaves?

Limited to give hope

Feeling confused by the concept of “allowed” to be an indentured servant

I meant let's abolish indentured servitude in the first place, but maybe something about going home to be an elder in their community

That everyone has a real hope for freedom

Because they are no longer fit to perform the task of labour?

i mean*

this prevents intergenerational slavery

Would this apply to non-jewish servants?

Isn't there a circumstance where slaves did not get to leave with children and wife. We lead it yesterday but I can't remember.

we read

I think if the owner gives them a wife

ok

if a servant gives birth to a child from a spouse given by the owner then the children belong to the owner

That’s during Shmita it was in this past week’s Torah portion—wife and kids don’t automatically get to go with

That's it

Preventing intergenerationally gathered wealth

And troubling

It makes me think about contemporary debts that are passed on to children

I’m wondering wha the “original” land or standard is that people “return” to. and what would that mean today, after so much diasporism

Were there other hierarchical relationships besides indentured servants? Were there often non-indentured servants? I wonder if this could be a general effort to get people to give up any kind of power they have over other people

@anika, that makes me think of why returning every generation is part of this system

@Simone there were also slaves but I'm not clear on all the distinctions between them

@Anika it would be each tribe and I think even each family/parcel

The Torah acknowledges that the Israelites were not the first people in the land

I think probably regular breaking of the idea of property and ownership

It is the responsibility of the settlers of the land to “provide for the redemption

coming in as a guest

An acknowledgement that land ownership is necessary for commerce but that people don’t really own land

very much relates to Land Back to Indigenous people on Turtle Island

Honoring the hosts of the land by supporting with land rematriation and using processes of Teshuvah to repair for harms of settler colonialism

@jessica yes, that is true and also here I think "settler" here doesn't mean in a colonial sense or in relation to other people, it means directly in relation to the land itself and to god. like I don't think the text is saying that there's a group of people who *aren't* settlers

concentration of control over land is temporary

@Judy yes!

this prevents leveraging land as a resource to generate wealth

In relation to land we’re only ger, the identity that we’re always reminded to appreciate; it’s not the most powerful

ger=stranger, immigrant

A reminder that we belong to the land, the land does not belong to us. Our own origin story does not have us has indigenous to any specific geographic place - we are always strangers.

@Justin you can generate wealth with it but not indefinitely

@Gwyneth I guess, but I think the concept of indigeneity is anachronistic to the text (at least when reading literally)

but I see what you're saying I think

I can’t help but think about climate change here

Seems like soil depletion

What is the role of non-Jews in this system? Do they also have land holdings that they regain with every yovel, or only Jews?

and also flooding of contaminated waters leading to forced rest

*Israelites

@Sarah/Soup in ancient Israelite/Judean economy it would have been very unlikely to generate substantial wealth for inheritance from land in 50 years or less. As a land-based economy, yovel prevents the land being used as a resource in the acquisition of lands to be inherited by another tribe

ahh

How do the laws of gerim connect to yovel?

The thread of the punishments has a very specific progression: (1) “you will sow your seed for emptiness, for your enemies will eat it” [v.16]; (2) “you will completely use your strength for emptiness, and your land will not give her produce and the tree of the land will not give his fruit” [v.20]; (3) ”I will send out against you the animal of the field / chayat hasadeh and she will make you childless and cut off your animals and diminish you” [; (4) “you will be gathered (i.e., like a harvest) into your cities . . . and I will break the staff of bread against you . . . you will eat, and you will not be satisfied” [v.26]; (5) “you will eat the flesh of your sons and your daughters’ flesh you will eat” [v.29]; (6) “you will be lost in the nations and the land of your enemies will eat you” [v.38].

reset, renewal, redistribution - a sort of “leveling the playing field”

the re-shuffle of people and communities and who is neighbors with who must do something healthy

I’m surprised by the requirement to go back to your tribes land. It actually seems quite demanding if you’ve found a home somewhere else. But maybe requiring a connection to your history even if it might be unpleasant. I’m wondering how this relates to marriages between different tribes

Who for? Yovel for the wider region, if not the world!

a humbling of the people and a reminder that gd’s first convenient is with the land itself

is it must return, or allowed to return?

On the other hand, I wonder if it would be traumatic to be uprooted from land you've called home and communities you're part of. I wonder how people processed that or made that transition smoother.

I go back and forth about the emancipatory nature of Yovel—like is it challenging a system of wealth accumulation or stabilizing it by intervening every once in awhile to suppress less predictable resistance?

Yovel was also a chance to integrate people who had joined the Israelites and distribute lands to their families when they didn’t have any before Yovel. So like a rebirth of the nation

Wonderful to hear Rev Pesachyah quoted

@simone I think for marriages it goes by the husband

During the week we prepare for Shabbat, similarly when we know yovel is coming, the nation must prepare for it?

i think SJ answered my question with the point about deciding to be part of a new people

@rebecca great point

If you knew you would have to start over at least once in your career, how would that change the way you go aboutt building a business or choosing a career path? How would that change one’s business values?

@Ben if it was close to Yovel, I imagine it would be a sort of temporiness and liminality

If you knew you'd be uprooted in 20 years, or five, or three, how would that impact your desire to set down roots?

I heard (I believe from R’Jessica Rosenberg) that yovel / jubilee can be called for at any time, that feels like an important teaching. Could you all speak to that vs the 50 year frequency?

Although, I mean, it just reverts ownership so you could probably go back to where you'd been living in some way, either by buying land again or just living there or something?

is there evidence that yovel (and shmitah) were ever fully practiced?

Why did they not start counting until the 14th year, why not the first year?

kind of like how farming projects in the diaspora are counting shmita?

So you only observe yovel when traveling back to your ancestral lands is not a far travel for anyone?

How come not just counting every 50 years from creation?

it hasn't been counted by those who 'count' ie the rabbinate / jewish 'authorities' but we can take it upon ourselves to count it?

@rita bc it's dependent upon the people residing in the land

On indigneity and the Israelite claim of conquest, see: https://www.tikkun.org/the-third-promise/

Thanks @David!

Oh, yes. Thanks, Justin. Do we have an Biblically-identified exact date for when began residing in the land?

@david lol I was gonna share that same link! a good read, lots to think about there

What is the ask/invitation of us as individuals, as a Jewish community, as Jews living on stolen land in the Diaspora?

@Rita, yes. it was on the slide with the info from Rambam

How might yoval challenge traditional land ownership/transfer models (i.e. the colonial family farm)? How might yoval invite a kind of land recommoning?

the difference between “scarity” and the “feeling of scarcity”

We were wondering how far people probably moved back to their lands -- were most people something like one town over, or were there a lot of people with significant distances (ie galil to Negev)?

we talked a bit about what scale this would be possible on / limited by

questioning current economic systems

Reparations seem to be essential — there is no justice unless we start out with an equal distribution of land.

^this was a big theme for us as well

“Smite teaches us resilience to famine while Yovel teaches us resilience to expulsion”

connecting the land back movement to Yovel/shmita

What if the original allotment of land was unequal? Would that mean a reset to inequality every 50 years?

Land back for us too

Listening/surrendering to the asks and demands of First Nations people on Turtle Island

Getting creative and uncomfortable within the systems we live under - land trusts, etc

We also talked about making liberation a more common frequent practice

Teshuvah steps toward guarantee of non-repeat

@Sarah/soup — each novel was a chance to redo the distribution to make it more equal (that’s what I meant about integrating outsiders into the tribes where they resided by giving them land) — I just learned about this last week.

Each Yovel (novel was spell checked)

@david oh, amazing!

Radical diásporism and questions about home on a land with a people - wondering about practicing these traditions on other peoples ancestral homelands

@david S how?! Would love to learn more about that

how connected/in loving relationship could we be with land with repeated cycles upon cycles upon cycles of greeting land of your ancestor’s origin over and over - what would it even feel like to not have the disconnect we have now

I will see if I can find the source and post in chat now. But not sure we know much about the how.

Opened

Inspired

questions

Potential

connected

Curious

contemplative

jackROCKS

Thinking

grief

depth

Toe-in

Teshuvah

bewildered

Creative

trauma-aware

I had never heard that pieceof history that SJ just shared before, is there an article to learn more about it?

Here is the link to the source sheet! https://drive.google.com/file/d/1SKMEr5JSswki0NI5FMuI_R01ZQxaBN9d/view

My last name means crooked - as in a crooked back or a meander in a stream. I wonder how the meaning could change with that

Alhambra Decree

Wow.

that hits hard

:(

Israel/Palestine land claims and more generally conflicting land claims

im thinking about how, if you have the choice of moving to your ancestral land or join the nation of the land you've been dwelling on, that diaspora is inherently a temporary thing....so different from my experience (and most of ours)

that anecdote SJ just shared shows how connected these different timelines of colonialism are

And here’s some more resources from this session: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1bJ_D-umzzwciO9c98J-37tk3uHTkxLDG?usp=sharing

There’s Nothing So Whole As a Broken Heart

thanks y’all <3

Thank you!

thinking about our responsibilities in working towards liberation for Palestinians

Re what Jack said, I definitely have a hard time with knowing what that ancestral land even is

Thanks all

thank you so much SJ, Risa, Ben & Iris!

Kol Hakavod Risa and SJ

also- what does return to ancestral land mean when we've returned to ancestral land in the form of colonization