After saying chatsi kaddish we realised we were one down from a minyan, thanks to several holidays and sicknesses. Which made us appreciate that we have been able to take a minyan for granted so far!Fortunately we have it on the good word of Rabbi Halafta of Kefar Hanania that although “when ten sit together and occupy themselves with Torah, the Shechinah abides among them”, the same still true of five (or nine), “As it is said: “This band of His He has established on earth” (Amos 9:6).” So Newcastle Alternative Minyan became Newcastle Alternative Band (album forthcoming?).
In our Torah study, we learned that any king we choose to set over ourselves must under no circumstances start amassing excessive silver, gold, horses, or wives. We were slightly confused by this, as we’ve been told that prayers for the Windsors are an essential part of our tradition. At last count, Charles has amassed around 100 horses, and plenty of gold and silver, though he is doing better than Solomon on the wife front. Fortunately the parsha makes no mention of diamonds, so at least the Koh-i-noor Diamond which the East India Company ransomed from a kidnapped 10 year old boy is fit for a kosher king.
Speaking of rightful owners, this parsha reminds us once again that the Land of Israel is a divine loan, not a right. And according to these terms, once again, the state of Israel is not paying rent. Of particular concern in this parsha is the perversion of justice and the burning down of orchards. So, even if we did accept for the sake of argument that Theodore Herzl was actually a moustachioed Eliyahu HaNavi, our religious obligation to the state is less than zero. What was it our prophets and judges did, the other times Jews settled in the land of Israel only to behave unjustly?
This portion, like many others, contains an odd mixture of brutality and care. We baulk at the idea of stoning someone for worshipping the moon, but in a society where our prisons are overflowing with people who did not commit violent crimes, the expectation for the whole community to participate in justice feels like a powerful contrast to putting people away, out of sight, out of mind. Rabbi Eleazar Ben Azariah said that if the Sanhedrin put one person to death every seventy years, it would have been tyrannical. Perhaps if we were expected to directly participate in this “justice” we would, also, be reluctant to hand it out.
Likewise, we understand “an eye for an eye, a life for a life” not as a call for revenge butchery, but as an assertion that each life is worth the same. In Israel’s brutal accounting, so far, one Israeli life is worth around forty Palestinians.
Think about a room full of forty people. Think about how hard it would be to hear yourself if they were all speaking. Think about how much food they would need. Imagine introducing yourself to them all. Remembering all their names.
Every murdered Palestinian is worth exactly what any life is worth which is, according to the Talmud, a whole universe.
Oh Rascal Children of Gaza
Oh rascal children of Gaza,
You who constantly disturbed me
with your screams under my window,
You who filled every morning
with rush and chaos,
You who broke my vase
and stole the lonely flower on my balcony.
Come back –
And scream as you want,
And break all the vases,
Steal all the flowers,
Come back,
Just come back…
(Khaled Jouma, 2024)
צדק צדק
We tend to, perhaps somewhat smugly, compare our צדקה (tzedakah) to the Christian charity (from the Latin caritas, meaning affection). Charity is doing nice things that make us feel nice, when we feel like it; צדקה is an obligation to fix whatever is wrong, no matter what we feel about it.
We do, also, have a closer equivalent to charity in our tradition. Maimonides distinguished חסד (chessed) from צדקה as an overflowing of goodness without obligation. So perhaps the reason Torah focuses so much on צדק is because we need more convincing.
Ibn Ezra explained that “Justice, justice” is repeated in this parsha because it is addressed to both parties. Whether they personally stand to lose or gain, every party should pursue the just outcome. Time after time, as long as they live. “Pursue equally your own justice and the justice of others: you will thrive when you pursue justice even against yourself.” חסד is performed in safety, but the pursuit of צדק may bring a risk upon yourself. But you still do it, Yisra’el, because you want to live in a just land.
From the place where we are right
flowers will never grow
in the spring.
The place where we are right
is hard and trampled
like a yard.
But doubts and loves
dig up the world
like a mole, a plow.
And a whisper will be heard in the place
where the ruined
house once stood.
(Yehuda Amichai, 1965)
צדקה is still a feeling. It’s just a different feeling than affectionate benevolence. The Arabic cognate root ص د ق also creates meanings related to truth, sincerity, and treating someone as a friend. צדק is to recognise the ragged truth of another’s humanity, and to act accordingly. If charity is a magnanimous person choosing to celebrate their own good fortune by sharing it around, צדק is a sincere recognition of our own vulnerability. We understand that only a roll of the dice left us with food to spare while others go hungry. When we are interested in what is right (צדק), not just what feels mutually good, we are compelled to enact צדקה.
Just as we perform kiddush levana because the injustice Hashem did to the moon during creation, we perform צדקה because of creation’s injustice to others. It is our Jewish belief that humans are owed dignity and safety just by existing. If the material means to provide these currently rest in other hands, that is not just the way things are. It is a debt that Hashem expects us to pay.
We believe that the people of Palestine are owed, at the very least, their lives.
Parshat Shoftim says that the debt of a life can never be repaid.
תרדף
רדף – (“pursue”) is used in the sense of pursuing a fleeing thief. Justice is not our natural companion on the road. If we don’t hunt it, relentlessly, in every situation, it will escape. It is not enough to leisurely walk the path where we once caught it before. Or as Martin Buber said: “I do not accept any absolute formulas for living. No preconceived code can see ahead to everything that can happen in a man’s life. As we live, we grow and our beliefs change. They must change. We should stake our whole existence on our willingness to explore and experience.”
According to Midrash Tanchuma, even Hashem is sometimes wrong about how justice should be done. Moshe went against Hashem’s instructions three times, and Hashem stood corrected. Once was when he broke the tablets, but the other times he disagreed in favour of leniency. Exodus 34:7 states that Hashem ‘visits the iniquity of fathers upon their children’, but Moshe tells the people in Deuteronomy 24:10 that ‘Fathers will not be put to death for children [and children will not be put to death for father’s]’. Later, in II Kings 14:6, the Blessed Holy One agreed with Moshe: ‘But he did not put to death the children of the assassins, in accordance with what is written in the Book of the Torah of Moshe’. The other disagreement is when Moshe sends messengers to Og when he is instructed to attack it. And by today’s parsha, Hashem has come around to this too, and has Moshe instruct the Israelites to offer peace before attacking.
Avraham also had to argue back, reminding Hashem of the promise not to bring another flood, and pleading on behalf of Sodom and Gomorrah.
The Talmud makes this point dozens of times, especially in the famous Oven of Akhnai episode. And in Rosh Hashanah 21b, the Rabbis agree that witnesses of the new moon bringing their news to Jerusalem is so important that they should enthusiastically desecrate Shabbat. But although the importance of Shabbat is overridden, they still refuse to relax any of the stringent expectations for kosher witnesses. So the central obligation of this portion – to pursue what is right, no matter what – takes precedence above all else.
And if we want to catch it, we need to run.
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