Does the Abib barley have to be from the Land of Israel or can we use barley in other lands as indicators of the New Year?
According to the Torah only the barley in the Land of Israel is relevant for the Biblical year, as we read in Lev 23,10: “When you come to the land which I give you and harvest ITS harvest, and you will bring the sheaf of the beginning of your harvest to the priest.” We see here that it must be the barley in the Land of Israel (“the land which I give you”), which is harvest-ready by the Sunday which falls out during Passover. If there is no barley ready for harvest in the Promised Land by this time then that month is by definition not the “Month of the Abib”. Back To Top During the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness (a desert), Israel kept a careful record of the months and years and also brought the Passover sacrifice (Nu 9) in the desert. Obviously, they could not have consulted the barley in the Canaan. Doesn’t this prove the year is not dependent on ripening barley? Technically there would have been no problem in sending messengers to the Land of Canaan (a 1 or 2 day journey f
