Walk the Marathon

Our worth as humans and as individuals is inherent in our existence, despite society's attempt to tie our value to success, celebrity, ability to produce, and money. The Sh'mita year, during which the land lies fallow and debts are released, reminds us that we can and should take time to take it easy.

Yom Kippur Morning Sermon 5782

In 1980, former Olympic distance runner Jeff Galloway entered the Houston marathon. In the eight years since his Olympic run, he had been running slower and slower, and with more frequent injuries. He had revamped some of his training methods, but was still struggling. Then, eight weeks before the Houston marathon, he strained his hamstring. It still wasn’t fully healed by the time the marathon arrived, but he wanted to run the race. So he decided on a strategy to allow him to run without re-injuring his hamstring: every time he reached a mile marker, he would walk for one minute.

At mile one, it seemed ridiculous to move to the side of the road and start walking—everyone was just getting started! At miles two, three, and four, it wasn’t much better. “Embarrassing” is the word Galloway used. But he kept at it, running to a mile marker and then walking for a minute. By the second half of the marathon, he was still feeling relatively fresh while his competitors were starting to tire. Mentally, too, it was easier for him to focus on pushing through to the next mile when he could walk again, rather than thinking about how much further he had to go. And then, surprisingly, by Mile 26, he was near the front of the pack, running faster than he had ever run before and running faster than almost every single other runner on the course. He even passed competitors while running uphill!

When he crossed the finish line, he was in 3rd place and had set a personal record of 2 hours, 16 minutes, and 35 seconds. (For comparison, the marathon winner in this year’s Olympics finished in 2 hours, 8 minutes, and 38 seconds. One of the three Americans in the Olympics finished just a few seconds faster than Galloway’s Houston time and another took almost two minutes longer.) By interspersing long runs with regular periods of walking and giving his body a chance to rest before it got tired, Galloway found success where previously he’d only found disappointment and frustration.

Now I am NOT a runner. I like to say that I only run when something is chasing me. But I’ve been intrigued by the idea that you might actually run faster during a long run when you periodically stop running. Sure, the runner isn’t stopping completely—Galloway is clear that the walk break still has purposeful strides—but slowing down before the body gets tired allows it to work more effectively and efficiently during the run.

While that might be a newish idea in running, Jewish tradition has long understood that regular periods of rest are essential for sustaining...well, everything.

First there’s Shabbat. The Torah says in multiple places that even God needed to rest after doing the work of Creation.1, 2, 3 Our tradition recognizes that a weekly break from our normal busy-ness is not just good, it’s divine. We need that time to slow down, to give our minds and bodies a chance to unwind and refresh, before we return to our regular state of activity. And Shabbat is for everyone in our households—even animals are supposed to get Shabbat as a day off from work. Without regular rest from the daily grind, we get cranky and irritable, we lose our creativity and interest, and we start to burn-out. Slowing our pace for one day a week restores us.

But the Torah also recognizes that a weekly break only helps so much and is actually rather limited in scope. Remember, everything requires rest, not just people and their animals. So the Torah also commands us to give the land a Shabbat. Every seventh year, the land is supposed to lie fallow—nothing gets plowed, nothing gets planted, and nothing gets harvested. The land just gets to be. During this sabbatical year (in Hebrew it’s called “Sh’nat Sh’mita - the year of release”), people have to rely on what they’ve stored in previous years, or they can gather whatever happens to grow naturally in a fallow field or on trees and bushes—but only enough for themselves and their family for that day. Even if plenty of produce grows naturally on a person’s land, they don’t get to claim it; the produce of the Sh’mita year is considered ownerless.

We humans are reflections of the Divine, a status gifted to us by God.

Actually, that’s not quite true. The produce that grows on its own is not ownerless. It’s God’s. The Sh’mita year, with its laws and expectations, reminds us that, despite our inclination to lay claim to land, people, animals, and objects, everything really belongs to God. We humans are reflections of the Divine, a status gifted to us by God. “What is humanity that You have been mindful of us,” the Psalmist says, “[What are we] mortals that You have taken note of us? You have made us little less than divine, and adorned us with glory and majesty. You have made us master over Your handiwork, laying the world at our feet,” (Psalm 8:5-7). The land and all it produces belong to God, the plants and animals belong to God, and we belong to God. The laws of the Sh’mita year shatter the illusion of our dominance over the world. Instead we acknowledge that all we have is God’s.

In that same vein, the Sh’mita year serves as a reset for the economy. At the beginning of the year, creditors are required to forgive the outstanding balance on the debts they hold. Additionally, indentured servants—people who are so impoverished that they can’t afford to live unless they serve as little more than slaves—are released from their terms of servitude. For the folks who find themselves getting deeper and deeper into debt every time they try to get out of it, the Sh’mita year gives them a new chance to start from zero, to build up rather than just trying to dig out. But Sh’mita doesn’t just give them a break from the rat race that they are losing, it also affirms that they are people of value.

Too often we determine people’s value, their status in society by their work, how much money they have or make, their level of educational attainment, or their pedigree. But while those criteria may be important to other people, they matter little to God. Instead, in God’s metaphorical eyes, the very fact of our existence makes us worthy and valuable. We have infinite worth just because we exist.

We have infinite worth just because we exist.

We forget that too easily. We get caught up in our work and in the demands of life. We get caught up in the mistakes and failures, in the slights and offenses. We get caught up in the milestones and celebrations, the small wins and the big successes. We get caught up in a society that determines our value by what someone is willing to pay us and how easy it is to get someone else to replace us. And we get caught up in a society that constantly tells us that others are better and that, if we work hard enough, maybe we’ll be almost as good.

The Sh’mita year comes to flip all of that on its head. Each of us has infinite value. Each of us is a gift of God. Each of us deserves to have our basic needs—food, shelter, clothing, and rest—met. Each of us is worthy of care, kindness, and love. Each of us.

Our parashah this morning also reminds us that each of us is part of a covenant with God. "You stand here this day, all of you, before Adonai your God—your tribal heads, your elders and your officials, all the men of Israel, your children, your wives, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to waterdrawer—to enter into the covenant that Adonai your God is making with you today. This covenant is not just with those that are here today but also those that are not here today." Each of us, regardless of who we are or our status in the community, is part of this covenant with God, a covenant that is based on a commitment to justice, to caring for one another, and to noticing and honoring the sacred in our world. And God promises us blessing in return.

We are each part of this covenantal relationship but how many of us really pay attention to what we're asked and expected to do? How many of us really honor the inherent value in each person? How many of us really honor the inherent value within ourselves? How many of us work to protect and care for our Earth? Most of us do all of this to some extent, but we get caught up in life and in a society based on different priorities. And unless we slow down the pace of our lives, we are unlikely to even notice how we've strayed from the covenant we make each year.

In theory, the penitential period from Elul through Simchat Torah gives us that chance to reflect. But, let's be honest, we're still so busy from day to day, we're still so caught up in the pace of life, that it's hard to take a full accounting. Even sitting here or on Zoom today can only do so much when everything around us is still pushing relentlessly forward. We barely have the capacity to think about our recent mistakes and failures, let alone consider how well we upheld our covenantal relationship with God and, by extension, ourselves, other people, and the land. And then we go right back to our normal life and little has changed. After all, changing our behaviors, our way of thinking, our way of living takes time and practice, and a quick return to normalcy doesn't give us that chance.

The Sh'mita year, on the other hand, gives us a full year to experience a different way of living and being. It slows us down, helps us be more present in our own lives, and shifts the way we interact with the people and world around us. We can't help but be changed when the whole system around us has changed.

You might have thought that the year that just ended, a year of COVID and quarantine, was a Sh'mita year. It was a year that forced us to change how we live, how we connect, and how we work. It even included financial support from the government, a moratorium on evictions, and other efforts that shifted the normal state of the economy.

But I know from conversations with many of you that this past year has not really been a year of release, a year of rest. Instead it has been a year and a half of challenge and learning and struggle and growth. It's like we've been running a marathon—even for those of us who didn't take up running as a way to get exercise while gyms were closed. And we had hoped that this summer would be the end of it and we could go back to normal.

But now, with the Delta variant sweeping through the country, normal isn't really possible. As Pastor Jenny Smith describes it:

Instead of collapsing at the finish line in a heap.

Instead of drinking water.

Instead of resting our aching bodies.

Something else happened.

An official-looking race organizer slapped another number on our back and pushed us toward another starting line that mysteriously appeared.

Problem is, our bodies are still recovering from the first marathon.

Maybe the answer is to stop running the second race.

What if we walked our second marathon?

Side by side. No racing.

No competing with anything or anyone.

Resting when it's time to rest.

Saying yes to a new idea when it glistens with possibility.

Saying no when something feels too heavy.

Asking new questions in places we assumed the old answer.

Giving others permission to rest because we choose rest.

Questioning the speed at which we live and move….

Maybe this is how we disrupt the deeply engrained oppressive realities of our world.

We choose to walk.

Together.

That sounds more like Sh'mita, a time of rest and release. And this year, 5782, is in fact a Sh'mita year. It's a year when the plowing, planting, and harvesting stop. It's a year when the competition and ambition take a break. It's a year when we remember the infinite value of each person and honor it, when we recognize the gift of the earth and care for it, when we hear our bodies', minds', and spirits' cry for rest and listen to it.

So take the walk break. Slow down, move off to the side, take the time to be present rather than pushing incessantly forward. Notice the people around you---how can you support each other during this second marathon? Notice the world around you—how does it care for you and how can you care for it? Notice yourself—what of you needs rest, release, time to recover?

With life the way it is, society the way it is—even in Biblical times—there will be another marathon to run. But maybe, just maybe, this Sh'mita year, this walk break, will give us the time to heal and the tools to move forward in a more sustainable way. Join me in walking into this new year together.