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TORAH SPARKS

Parashat Shoftim

Aug 14, 2021, 6 Elul 5781

Torah: Deuteronomy 16:18-21:9; Triennial 18:6-19:13

Haftarah: Isaiah 51:12-52:12

 

 

 

The King and I

Ilana Kurshan

 

Parashat Shoftim describes the various leaders who will govern Jewish society once the Israelites enter the Promised Land: judges, magistrates, prophets, priests, and, surprisingly, a king. This is the first time the Torah makes any mention of an Israelite king, and the Torah s description suggests that it is an unusual institution one that is more about the limits of power than about its centralization. The king may not amass too much wealth, he may not have too many wives (which was a way of forging diplomatic alliances), nor may he have too many horses (which were used in battle). Indeed, amidst all the laws about what the king may not do, the Torah makes only one stipulation about what the king must do and it is this stipulation that captures the attention of the ancient rabbis, who show how the king can serve as a model for us all.

 

Unlike the command to appoint judges and magistrates in the opening verse of our parashah, the Torah does not command that a king be appointed, but merely grants dispensation to do so: If, after you have entered the land that the Lord your God has assigned to you, and taken possession of it and settled in it, you decide, I will set a king over me, as do all the nations about me, you shall be free to set a king over yourself (Deuteronomy 17:14-15). These verses imply that the king may not be appointed immediately, but only after the people first enter and settle the land ensuring that the king will not be able to take credit for the conquest or present himself as the founder of the nation. The Torah suggests that the reason the people might want a king is because all the other nations around them have kings as well. In general, as the book of Deuteronomy repeatedly emphasizes, the Israelites are not supposed to imitate the practices of the other nations. But God is prepared to allow the people to have a king, so long as his sovereignty remains limited.

 

In addition to the limitations on the king s wives, wealth, and weapons of war, which serve to curtail his diplomatic and military powers, the king s power is also limited by the Torah s sole stipulation about what the king must do. The Torah s only positive commandment pertaining to the king is that he must write the text of the Torah for himself: When he is seated on his royal throne, he shall write for himself a copy of this teaching on a scroll before the Levitical priests (17:18). The king must copy the Torah for himself in a ceremony that takes place in the presence of the Levites and priests an injunction that implies a separation of powers: the king is not a religious leader, but is accountable to the religious leadership of the Levites and priests, as well as to God s Torah. Once the king copies the Torah, it becomes part of his personal property, as the next verse suggests: Let it remain with him and let him read in it all his life, so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God, to observe faithfully every word of this teaching (17:19). The king must never issue a single proclamation or pass a single law without his own copy of the Torah at his side, in the hope that all his royal acts will be guided and informed by Torah.

 

The ancient rabbis pick up on the unusual language used to describe the scroll that the king must copy and carry. The Torah refers to this teaching as Mishneh Torah. This phrase, which implies a sort of second Torah, is generally used to refer to the book of Deuteronomy, which consists of Moshe s summary of the preceding biblical books. But the midrashic rabbis argue that, in fact, the king is supposed to copy the entire Torah, citing the second half of this verse, in which the king must observe every word of this teaching (Sifrei Deuteronomy 160). Why then does the Torah refer to it as Mishneh Torah ? The term mishneh is related to the Hebrew word for two (sheni), but it is also related to the Hebrew word for change (shinui), which explains the continuation of this midrash: If so, why is it called mishneh Torah ? Because in the future it will change. The king is bound by Torah, but the Torah he is bound by is characterized by the potential to evolve and, in so doing, to remain ever relevant.

 

The Talmud (Sanhedrin 21b) offers a different explanation for the Torah s use of the term Mishneh Torah to refer to the entire Torah which the king must copy. According to the Talmudic rabbis, the term mishneh suggests that the king had to copy two Torah scrolls one that he takes with him wherever he goes, and one that rests in his treasury. The portable Torah scroll is described in the Talmud as a sort of amulet that the king would hang on his arm like a smartphone playing podcasts of Torah classes, perhaps. The other Torah stays in the king s treasury for safekeeping, like an heirloom Bible. Except that neither scroll can really be an heirloom because, as the Talmud teaches, the king may not use the same Torah scroll as his ancestors, but must write his own.

 

At this point the Talmudic sage Rava interjects that it is not just the king who must write his own Torah, but every single person: Even if a person s ancestors left him a Torah scroll, it is a mitzvah to write a scroll of one s own. Every person has to find a way to rewrite Torah for himself or herself. We can learn from the teachings of our ancestors, and their teachings should guide our own religious practice; but ultimately every person s encounter with Torah is different, because the text unfolds in dialogue with our lives. In this sense Torah is ever evolving. Like the king, we are to carry Torah around us wherever we go, interpreting it against the backdrop of our own experiences and thus keeping God s teachings alive and vibrant within us.


 

Justice, Justice You Shall Pursue

Vered Hollander-Goldfarb

 

There are many issues in this short section; we will focus on tzedek tzedek tirdof justice, justice you shall pursue.

 

Text: Devarim 16:18-20

18Judges and officers you shall put for you in all your gates 19You shall not skew judgment ; you shall not take a bribe  20 Justice, justice you shall pursue; that you may live, and inherit the land which the LORD your God gives you.

 

      Who is the text addressing in its command tzedek tzedek tirdof ? There are several possible answers to this question. Try to think what the pursuit of justice would mean to each one, and what might deter that person from doing so.

      What is the reason for keeping this mitzvah according to the continuation of the verse? How will keeping it advance that result?

      Justice Ruth Bader-Ginsburg had placed this phrase on her wall. How do you think that she would have suggested reading this verse? (Consider this question as you learn the rest.)

 

Commentary: Ibn Ezra Devarim 16:20

Justice, justice – Moshe speaks to the disputants. Moshe repeats the word justice to indicate that one should pursue justice whether one gains or loses. Or the word is repeated to indicate that one should pursue justice as long as one exists; or the word is repeated for emphasis.

 

      What are the 2 questions behind Ibn Ezra s answers?

      Which of these readings seems to be closest to the straight-forward meaning of the text? Would that reading be applicable only to the disputants?

 

Commentary: Ramban Devarim 16:20

The reason for the repetition [of the word "justice"] is to indicate that the judges should judge the people with righteous judgment, and you must also pursue justice constantly by going from your place to the place of the great Sages

 

      Who does Ramban consider the addressee of tzedek tzedek tirdof ?

      How is going to the place of a great sage help pursuit of justice?

 

Commentary: Seforno Devarim 16:20

When you will put for you judges, you who appoints the judges choose those who are the most righteous judging, even when they do not have all the other abilities that are appropriate for a judge such as perfection of property and body.

 

      How does Seforno understand pursuit of justice? Who is commanded here?

 

Commentary: R. David Zvi Hoffman Devarim 16:20

That you may live this is the purpose as explained in the (midrash) Sifrei: the appointment of proper judges is needed to keep Israel alive and settle them on their land. Justice is the pillar on which the state stands; without that it cannot exist.

 

      Why can the state not stand without justice? Who do you feel is the addressee if this is the purpose?

Strength and Shabbat
Bex Stern Rosenblatt

 

Much of this week s haftarah sounds familiar. We know it well from its use in Lecha Dodi during Kabbalat Shabbat. One of the most striking verses, Isaiah 52:1, begins:

 

Rouse yourself, rouse yourself,

Put on your strength, Zion,

Put on the garments of your glory, Jerusalem, holy city,

For no longer shall the uncircumcised and the unclean come into you

 

Lecha Dodi describes a world of lovers, of beloved ones greeting each other. Much of the language is sexual, drawn from Song of Songs. And just as in the interpretation of Song of Songs, the sexual imagery is used to help us to conceptualize the ineffable nature of the relationships between human and divine, mortal being and eternity, the nations and Israel. When we put this verse in that context, we get a much fuller story.

 

The story starts with the destruction of the Temple as told in the book of Lamentations, read on Tisha B Av. We read of the rape of personified Lady Jerusalem. For example, we read in Lamentations 1:10:

 

The adversary has spread his hand over all her precious things,

For she has seen nations coming into her sanctuary,

Those whom you commanded not to come into your community.

We read of Lady Jerusalem, naked, abused and rejected by God. We read of God s delight in causing Jerusalem pain. We read of those coming into her who should not come into her.

 

And after all of this horrible imagery, we enter the seven weeks of consolation. In this week, the fourth week, Jerusalem puts her clothes back on. No longer will the uncircumcised and the unclean come into her. Moreover, she puts on clothes of power, of strength and glory. After the abuse she has suffered, she reconstructs herself as someone to whom this cannot happen again.

 

But Jerusalem does not reject her sexuality. The verse begins rouse yourself. Literally, it means to wake up. However, the verb is used repeatedly in the Song of Songs to speak of arousing love erotically. And when we read this verse in Lecha Dodi, we are reading it in conversation with Song of Songs. Jerusalem is called to awaken herself to the possibility of erotic love, from the vantage point of empowerment, even after all that she has gone through.

 

On Shabbat, we are reentering into this marriage with God. We are acknowledging all of the betrayal and all of the pain we have suffered, through the past week, and through the thousands of years of Jewish history, including the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. And then we choose to cloth ourselves in strength and glory. We choose, for twenty-five hours, to create a version of ourselves perfect enough to be in relationship with the divine, with eternity, with Israel.