Harvesting Blessings of Abundance
In our kitchen we try to observe the FIFO rule: first in, first out. The vegetables I purchased last week are cooked and eaten before those I bought this week. Sometimes however, especially after a trip to the farmer’s market, I am tempted to eat the fresh produce I recently purchased. They look (and taste!) so much better than those stored in my refrigerator. Then, inevitably, I end up throwing out last week’s wilted lettuce.
The Torah offers a litany of rewards to those who observe its commandments—many of which are connected to enjoying bountiful harvests. The Torah proclaims, “You shall eat old produce.” (Leviticus 26) This appears to contradict my penchant for eating freshly picked fruits and vegetables. One time I was wandering through an orange grove in the land of Israel, and I picked a clementine from a tree. I have never tasted anything so delicious and so sweet. I picked another, and another, from some more trees. Who wants to eat old fruit?
The blessing baffles me. The Torah continues, “You shall clear out the old produce to make room for the new.” I am even more confused. Does the Torah want us to be wasteful with our food and discard old produce?
Throughout the generations, rabbis debated the meaning of the Torah’s blessing. They suggest it points to the notion that there will be an abundance of food. Produce will be so plentiful that we will not be able to eat all of it. It will overflow our food stores. The land will quite literally produce a bounty of blessings. These will be evident in the very crops we harvest. Blessings are tied to the land. They are connected to the food we eat.
A modern-day commentator, Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz writes that the verse points to “a double blessing: first, there will be a surplus of food beyond present consumption which will be placed in storage; and second, the produce will improve with age.” Fruits and vegetables will behave like wine. They will miraculously taste better with age.
A fifteenth century commentator, Sforno, writes that last year’s harvest will provide enough food for this year. The Talmud adds that the land of Israel will be so blessed that it will grow ready-made rolls for breakfast. (Baba Batra 90b) Imagine buttery, flaky croissants growing on trees!
The Talmudic rabbis are getting carried away with their imaginations. Sforno returns us to the here and now. He comments that the harvest will be so bountiful that Israel will export some of its harvest to feed the needy people of other countries. He anticipates the worries people might express about exporting food and says there will be so much produce that people will not worry about their own needs.
They will be so sated that their hearts will naturally look outward and want to provide for others. I wonder if his intuition is correct. I know some people whose refrigerators and pantries are always overflowing with food. (My pantry has multiple bags of Tostitos. What might happen if one night I cannot find my favorite snack?)
Does an abundance of food make us more apt to share or less? Do we fixate on our favorite snacks, and delicacies, and begin to think that we cannot do without them? (I can also probably do without regular helpings of Manchego.) Does abundance confuse us into thinking that favorites are the same as sustenance?
Let us look outward! I can live without an endless supply of chips.
Blessings need not be tied to how much food we have. They are not connected to an abundance of crops but instead an abundance of feelings. It has much more to do with how full our hearts feel. And this is something we can fashion. I can begin filling my heart by sharing food with others, with opening our refrigerators and pantries to others.
Providing food for others is how we fashion feelings of abundance.
We need not wait for a mythic future filled with blessings. It is here and now. It is in our hands. It is in our hearts.