Behar, BeHar, Be-har, or B'har (—Hebrew for "on the mount," the fifth word, and the first distinctive word, in the parashah) is the 32nd weekly Torah portion (, parashah) in the annual Jewish cycle of Torah reading and the ninth in the Book of Leviticus. The parashah tells the laws of the Sabbatical year (, Shmita) and limits on debt servitude. The parashah constitutes Leviticus 25:1–26:2. It is the shortest of the weekly Torah portions in the Book of Leviticus (although not the shortest in the Torah). It is made up of 2,817 Hebrew letters, 737 Hebrew words, 57 verses, and 99 lines in a Torah Scroll (, Sefer Torah).
Jews generally read it in May. The lunisolar Hebrew calendar contains up to 55 weeks, the exact number varying between 50 in common years and 54 or 55 in leap years. In leap years (for example, 2024 and 2027), parashah Behar is read separately. In common years (for example, 2025 and 2026), parashah Behar is combined with the next parashah, Bechukotai, to help achieve the needed number of weekly readings.
In years when the first day of Passover falls on a Sabbath (as it does in 2022), Jews in Israel and Reform Jews read the parashah following Passover one week before Conservative and Orthodox Jews in the Diaspora. In such years, Jews in Israel and Reform Jews celebrate Passover for seven days and thus read the next parashah (in 2018, Shemini) on the Sabbath one week after the first day of Passover, while Conservative and Orthodox Jews in the Diaspora celebrate Passover for eight days and read the next parashah (in 2018, Shemini) one week later. In some such years (for example, 2018), the two calendars realign when Conservative and Orthodox Jews in the Diaspora read Behar together with Bechukotai while Jews in Israel and Reform Jews read them separately.
Readings
In traditional Sabbath Torah reading, the parashah is divided into seven readings, or , aliyot.
First reading—Leviticus 25:1–13
In the first reading, on Mount Sinai, God told Moses to tell the Israelites the law of the Sabbatical year for the land. The people could work the fields for six years, but in the seventh year, the land was to have a Sabbath of complete rest during which the people were not to sow their fields, prune their vineyards, or reap the aftergrowth. They could, however, eat whatever the land produced on its own. The people were further to hallow the 50th year, the Jubilee year, and to proclaim release for all with a blast on the horn. Each Israelite was to return to his family and his ancestral land holding.
Second reading—Leviticus 25:14–18
In the second reading, in selling or buying property, the people were to charge only for the remaining number of crop years until the jubilee, when the land would be returned to its ancestral holder.
Third reading—Leviticus 25:19–24
In the third reading, God promised to bless the people in the sixth year, so that the land would yield a crop sufficient for three years. God prohibited selling the land beyond reclaim, for God owned the land, and the people were but strangers living with God.
Fourth reading—Leviticus 25:25–28
In the fourth reading, if one fell into straits and had to sell land, his nearest relative was to redeem what was sold. If one had no one to redeem, but prospered and acquired enough wealth, he could refund the pro rata share of the sales price for the remaining years until the jubilee, and return to his holding.
Fifth reading—Leviticus 25:29–38
In the fifth reading, if one sold a house in a walled city, one could redeem it for a year, and thereafter the house would pass to the purchaser beyond reclaim and not be released in the jubilee. But houses in villages without encircling walls were treated as open country subject to redemption and release through the jubilee. Levites were to have a permanent right of redemption for houses and property in the cities of the Levites. The unenclosed land about their cities could not be sold. If a kinsman fell into straits and came under one's authority by virtue of his debts, one was to let him live by one's side as a kinsman and not exact from him interest. Israelites were not to lend money to countrymen at interest.