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The answer comes down to how we envision the perfect world. "I suspect that any person of faith dreams of a street of perfection running through a neighborhood of perpetual bliss, in a land of plenty and a world of peace." But our American dream is punctured again and again by realities of homelessness, hunger, and war. "Despite our accomplishments we're nowhere near to ending hunger, heartache, disease, or the dirty soil and polluted waters of our nation or our planet."

What can tradition offer in response to these challenges? "Biblical humanism," a derivative of Martin Buber's philosophy. "Our Bible practically opens with a foretaste of utopia" -- Shabbat. After six days of labor, we do as God did, and cease work for a day, we and our entire households, including those who work for us and even the beasts that serve us. "We meditate on God's labor, and on ours; how we work, and still can refresh ourselves." And we recall the Exodus from Egypt and flight to freedom in the freedom we savor one day of each week.

But the Bible doesn't stop there; it moves us from one day in seven, to one year in seven. "Every seventh year the land lies fallow...We don't plant, and we don't harvest. The hungry and poor, the widow and orphan come to the field to gather what grows there on its own. Indentured servants go free." And then there's the Yovel, the Jubilee, in the 50th year: all land returns to its original owner. This is the Biblical utopian vision, the Torah's dream of a perfect society. "The rich and poor are spared the drudgery of work. Indentured servants go free. Nature regenerates the land. What you own comes back to you. All in a cycle of social, economic, political, ecological harmony in the ultimate theological order. Like God, we are spared the worry and exertion of order. Like God, we see every human being as equal and free."

Found at the Velveteen Rabbi.