Rabbi Ovadiah Sforno, the medieval Italian commentator, remarks that the good life consists of having plenty of resources available: natural resources like water, staple crops like wheat and barley, and a few treats like oil and date honey. More surprisingly, Sforno explains that “food without stint” means “a land full of treasures” (Isaiah 2:7) which he understands to mean a place with plenty of money.

Is Sforno suggesting we Jews are all about the money? No. He means something different.

Sforno argues that a shortage of money is worse than a shortage of goods. He refers to a discussion in the Talmud, where the rabbis consider when and why Jewish communities might institute public fasts, a collective call for help in response to hardship. In the hierarchy of hard times, drought is bad, say the sages, but famine is worse (Ta’anit 19).

Drought means there has been less rain than usual. This results in less produce and so prices go up. The resulting hardship is due to natural seasonal variation.

Famine is a far more serious, says Sforno. It consists of there being food available, but people not having the money to buy it.

This is not natural variation, it’s a structural problem.

The golden rule of the market is supply and demand. People need things and they generally have something to offer in return. They produce what they are good at and purchase what they need. Money keep things moving.

A society where people labour yet lack money is rotten. The word for “stint” in the verse “where you may eat food without stint” is miskenut, which means poverty or scarcity. Miskenut is also related to danger (sakanah) and knife (sakin.) Nowadays we talk about economic precarity.

The good life, says Sforno, is marked by both abundant natural resources and a flowing economic system, where people are not living in miskenut, but have earned money and are able to use it to purchase what they need.