sabbatical year

n.

1. A leave of absence, often with pay, usually granted every seventh year, as to a college professor, for travel, research, or rest.
2. often Sabbatical year A year during which land remained fallow, observed every seven years by the ancient Jews.

(Heb. shemittah). Seventh year of rest for the land. The Bible proclaims every seventh year "a sabbath of the Lord" (Lev. 25:1-7, 18-22) during which the soil of the Land of Israel must rest and lie fallow. The farmer is forbidden to plant, sow, or plow, but has to rely on the bounty of God to provide him with a threefold harvest in the sixth year to tide him over until the harvest of the eighth year becomes available (Lev. 25:22). The harvest of the seventh year is to be regarded as the common property of all---rich and poor, stranger and slave. When all had had their fill, the remainder was to be left for the domestic and wild animals (Lev. 25:4). All debts were canceled in that year, the creditor being admonished not to dun the debtor or harbor the unworthy thought of not lending him money because the Sabbatical year was pending (Deut. 15:1-11). As explained by Rabbi A.I. Kook, like the Sabbath itself the Sabbatical year represents a respite from mundane toil, from buying and selling, with everything tainted with commerce, when both land and people can spiritually recuperate---"a foretaste of a utopian world where inequalities are erased" (Shabbat ha-Aretz, p. 8).

The Sabbatical year was originally part of a 50-year cycle (Lev. 25:8-17). The climax of this sevenfold-seven cycle was the 50th or Jubilee year when all land was returned to its ancestral owners and Hebrew slaves who had chosen to remain in service after the biblical six-year maximum were released (Ex. 21:1-6). The Bible ordained exile as the punishment for neglect of the Sabbatical year; indeed, the Babylonian Exile was described as extending the "threescore and ten years until the land had paid back its Sabbaths" (II Chr. 36:21). The jubilee years, however, lapsed with the return of the exiles from Babylonia and the rebuilding of the Temple, as it was regarded as binding only as long as the majority of the Jewish people were settled in Erets Israel and the tribal allocation of land was still in force. Nevertheless, the returning exiles solemnly undertook to "forgo the seventh year crop and the exaction of every debt" (Neh. 10:32). The Mishnah tractate Shevi'It reflects the attempts to institutionalize the observance of the Sabbatical year and apply it meticulously to the agriculture of the time. Alexander the Great and subsequent benevolent rulers are recorded as having waived the royal tax during this year. Hillel circumvented the problem of the reluctance to lend money as the Sabbatical year approached by instituting the Prosbul. After the destruction of the Temple, rabbinic authorities waived the Sabbatical year observance when dire punishment awaited those who refused to pay the tax imposed by hostile rulers during these years.

It was only with modern Zionist agricultural settlement beginning in the late 19th century that the practical observance of the Sabbatical year once again became relevant. The religious Zionist Mizrachi movement committed itself to the fictional hetter sale to a non-Jew during the Sabbatical year to allow cultivation to continue "so as not to endanger the whole Zionist enterprise." However, the hetter was bitterly opposed by other rabbinical authorities, especially among the non-Zionists. In the State of Israel, the Ministry of Religious Affairs has been invested with the authority to execute the ritual sale of all state lands to non-Jews during these years. Modern agricultural techniques such as hydroponics, pre-Sabbatical sowing, and multiple-harvesting varieties of crops have been resorted to in order to avoid violating the basic biblical prohibitions. Official planting ceremonies do not take place during the Sabbatical year (the last Sabbatical year was in 2000/01). Harvesting and marketing operations of seventh-year produce is done in the name of the Israeli ecclesiastical court and the religious kibbutz movement allocates a percentage of its Sabbatical year produce to welfare causes in order to fulfill the spirit of the biblical ordinance.

The Sabbatical years run from one Rosh Ha-Shanah to the next.

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One year in seven is marked by cessation of all work in field, orchard and vineyard. Just as the weekly Sabbath, the seventh day of the week, is to be observed by a cessation of all work including agricultural activity (Ex 34:21), so the recurrent seventh year is observed in a similar manner (Ex 23:10-11). Farm produce growing without tillage in the seventh year is to be freely available as food, not only to the owner and his family, but to the poor; anything not consumed is to be left for animals, both domestic and wild (Lev 25:6-7). This fallow year is called a "Sabbath to the Lord" (Lev 25:1-7, 18-22). The book of Deuteronomy (Deut 15:1-3:9) calls for the remission of all debts in the sabbatical year. The fact that the cancellation of debts appears only in this legislation may be attributed to the growth of commercial activity in the later biblical period. The linkage between the sabbatical year, the cancellation of debts and the suspension of all agricultural work, is clearly stated in Nehemiah 10:31.

The motif behind the legislation of the sabbatical year in both its aspects – permitting the land to lie fallow and the remission of debts – is explicitly social in nature: it provided free food for the poor, prevented the creation of a permanent debtor class and also permitted the land to rest undisturbed.

Seven such annual sabbatical cycles culminated with the year of the jubilee (Lev 27:16-25; Num 36:4). Like the sabbatical year, the jubilee year features elements known from the earlier Mesopotamian practice of periodic royal remission of debts and obligations, and the restoration of property to its lawful owner.

At the site of Porphyreon ("Castra") recent excavations uncovered an object inscribed "Shevi'ith" in square Hebrew characters which apparently refers to the Jewish Sabbatical year.

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The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: a sabbatical leave lasting one year

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