page_title: Shevi'it (tractate)
section_title: Historical context
hierarchical_section_title: Shevi'it (tractate) / Historical context
caption_attribution_description: Field in Israel left Barren on shmita year. Near Rosh Haayin
context_page_description: Shevi'it is the fifth tractate of Seder Zeraim of the Mishnah, dealing with the laws of leaving the fields of the Land of Israel to lie fallow every seventh year; the laws concerning which produce may, or may not be eaten during the Sabbatical year; and the cancellation of debts and the rabbinical ordinance established to allow a creditor to reclaim a debt after the Sabbatical year.
  The laws are derived from the Torah in Exodus 23:10-11, Leviticus 25:1-7 and Leviticus 25:20-22, and Deuteronomy 15:1-9.
  This tractate comprises ten chapters in the Mishna and eight in the Tosefta and has thirty-one folio pages of Gemara in the Jerusalem Talmud. Like most tractates in the order of Zeraim, there is no Babylonian Talmud for this tractate.
  The Jewish religious laws detailed in this tractate continue to apply in modern Israel, where the Sabbatical year, known as shmita, is still observed.
context_section_description: The Tosefta describes how the produce of the Sabbatical year was stored in communal granaries, from which it was divided every Friday on the eve of the weekly Sabbath among all the families according to their need.
  According to the Roman-Jewish historian, Josephus, the Greek ruler Alexander the Great and the Roman emperor Julius Caesar both cancelled the usual taxes from the Jews in the Land of Israel during the Sabbatical year out of consideration for the agricultural inactivity and associated lack of income. Other Greek and Roman rulers of the Land of Israel were not as accommodating and the tractate therefore addresses these circumstances of hardship due to the demands of the ruling powers.
  Many of the mishnayot discuss agricultural methods for field crops and fruit trees. Hence this tractate is an important source for understanding agriculture and horticulture in ancient Israel.
caption: Field left uncultivated in observance of the Sabbatical year, modern Israel, as prescribed in tractate Shevi'it
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot A710 IS", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2007:09:30 13:37:08", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "196", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "180", "Thumbnail YResolution": "180", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "5108", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4184", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/800", "EXIF FNumber": "4", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2007:09:30 13:37:08", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2007:09:30 13:37:08", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "5", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "309/32", "EXIF ApertureValue": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "95/32", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "29/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2048", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1536", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "2048", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "1536", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "3080", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "81920/9", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "1536000/169", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}