[Avodah] shemitta

[Moshe Feldman]

I originally wrote:
>Rav Matanya Ben-Shachar (rav of Neve Daniel) pointed out that as shemitta
>nowadays is drabbanan, such a view avoids a drabbanan but . . .
>undermines the mitzva of yishuv haaretz (deoraisa according to Ramban), as
>Jewish farmers flounder financially and may abandon farming (and there is
>less and less farming in Israel today).

I then wrote:
> >> > And Rav Moshe Feinstein holds that according to the Rambam it's a
> >> >mitzvah kiyumis.
> >if it's a mitzvah kiyumis, it's a value
> >that we all share, just that some prefer doing other mitzvos (just as
> >some people are better suited to fulfilling certain mitzvos than
> >others).  But clearly it's an important value, as all sefer Devarim
> >talks about that.  If so, we should not do things which undermine the
> >ability of others to fulfill that mitzvah.

On 5/20/07, Samuel Svarc <ssvarc at yeshivanet.com> wrote:
> No one is undermining, they are simply not facilitating. And since according
> to R' Moshe it's a mitzvah kiyumis, I don't understand how one can require
> someone else to facilitate their own mitzvah kiyumis, as you are arguing.

Causing Jewish farmers to stop farming is not merely not facilitating
their mitzvah but undermining their kiyum ha'mitzva.

For example: if I don't help fund someone's aliyah, I am simply not
facilitating his kiyum ha'mitzva.  However, if someone is living in
Israel and I organize a boycott of his products so that he is forced
to leave Israel, that is undermining his mitzvah.

> >> >First, I noted that Rav Kook's understanding is the pashut pshat in
> >> >the Ramban.
> >>
> >> In R' Kook's opinion. The CI disagreed with this.
> >
> >In looking at the Ramban in shi'chi'chas ha'asin 3, it looks like it
> >could be read both ways.
>
> Are you now conceding that it's plausible that the CI held his version was
> pashut p'shat in the Ramban?

Yes.  After I looked inside (rather than on reporting on the reports
of others).  :-)

> > Interestingly, the way the Megillas Esther
> >quotes the Ramban, he adds language which makes it clear that it's a
> >mitzvah to eat.
>
> Since when can't the CI argue with Megillas Esther (we are referring to the
> commentary on the Ramban's critiques, not the sefer of K'suvim)?

Of course he can.  I'm just saying that this is not merely a machlokes
of Rav Kook (a tziyoni who many charedim are not go'res) and CI.  BTW,
according to the notes in the Frankel Sefer haMitzvos, the Rit Algazi
Hilchos Challah (end of siman 2) agrees with RK, and there is a long
discussion of this machlokes in Lechem Yehudah.

Kol tuv,
Moshe