Creating Order Among Disorder- Shoftim 5784

Parshat Shoftim teaches us initially how the judicial system is to be set up for the Israelites once they enter the promised land. The people are to appoint judges and officials to adjudicate the legal claims of the Israelites, which they are to do with the strictest impartiality. As we read in our first aliyah this morning, chapter 16 verse 19 tells us three rules about how this is to be done: 

לֹא־תַטֶּ֣ה מִשְׁפָּ֔ט לֹ֥א תַכִּ֖יר פָּנִ֑ים וְלֹא־תִקַּ֣ח שֹׁ֔חַד כִּ֣י הַשֹּׁ֗חַד יְעַוֵּר֙ עֵינֵ֣י חֲכָמִ֔ים וִֽיסַלֵּ֖ף דִּבְרֵ֥י צַדִּיקִֽם׃

“You shall not judge unfairly; you shall show no partiality; you shall not take bribes, for bribes blind the eyes of the discerning and upset the plea of the just.”

All of this is to ensure, similarly to other mitzvot named in Deuteronomy, that “you may thrive and occupy the land that the LORD your G-d is giving you”.

At the very end of the parsha however, at the start of chapter 21 of Deuteronomy, we learn of a strange ritual that the Israelites are to perform in the future related to ideas of justice and culpability- the ritual of the eglah arufah, the heifer whose neck is broken. If it is discovered that someone has been slain and their body is lying out in the open, and it cannot be ascertained who the perpetrator is, then the elders of the town are to go to where the body lays and measure the distances from there to the closest towns. The elders of the nearest town are to take a heifer which has never been worked and bring it down to a wadi, where its neck will be broken to serve as expiation. The Levites step forward while the elders of the nearest town symbolically wash their hands over the heifer, and then declare: “Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it done. Absolve, O LORD, Your people Israel whom You redeemed, and do not let guilt for the blood of the innocent remain among Your people Israel.”

By virtue of this ritual, the whole people will be absolved of bloodguilt. Bloodshed must always have a reckoning, and in the absence of a known perpetrator, the heifer serves as a substitute. As the parsha teaches in 19:21:

וְלֹ֥א תָח֖וֹס עֵינֶ֑ךָ נֶ֣פֶשׁ בְּנֶ֗פֶשׁ עַ֤יִן בְּעַ֙יִן֙ שֵׁ֣ן בְּשֵׁ֔ן יָ֥ד בְּיָ֖ד רֶ֥גֶל בְּרָֽגֶל׃   

“Nor must you show pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.”

While this ritual may seem quite strange and perhaps cruel to us, it is in line with other rituals described in the Torah. In parshat Hukkat, for example, we learn of the ritual of the red heifer, which is done in order to purify someone who has come in contact with the dead. Additionally, when we consider that we are now in the month of Elul and the lead-up to the high holidays, the similarities between the ritual of the eglah arufah and those of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur become apparent.

On Rosh Hashanah we stand in judgment for our behavior and actions over the past year. A treasured Rosh Hashanah ritual is that of tashlikh, or symbolically letting go of our sins by casting bread, oats, or birdseed over a moving body of water. By setting the location of the eglah arufah ritual in a wadi, which is a moving body of water during the rainy season, the notion of seeking atonement along a riverbank has its origins already in the Torah.

Rabbi David Silverberg writes in his paper concerning Maimonides and the ritual of the eglah arufah: “When we visit the riverbank on Rosh Hashanah in an attempt to repent and rid ourselves of our sins, we perhaps reenact the egla arufa ceremony during which the kohanim beg [G-d] to forgive the crime committed near its borders. Every community assembles by the river to acknowledge the wrongs committed in the town during the previous year, and to beseech G-d to grant all the residents forgiveness, as though the sins are cast into the river and swept away by its powerful current.” Just as tashlikh absolves us of our individual sins, so to the eglah arufah ritual cleanses us of any communal wrongdoing for shedding blood.

Turning to Yom Kippur, the priest is instructed in Leviticus chapter 16 to set aside two goats: one marked “For the LORD” and the other marked “For Azazel”. The goat marked for Azazel becomes the scapegoat, which symbolically bears all of the sins of the people and is cast out into the wilderness (or in later interpretations, thrown off a cliff). Here, too, our sins are transferred from our own selves to a substitute, which will suffer the consequences of our iniquities. Similarly, the ritual of kaparot is still done in some communities with a live chicken, which is then slaughtered with its meat distributed to the poor, as a way of transferring our bad deeds to another.

All of these rituals, I believe, seek to create order out of disorder. It’s hard to imagine, as our parsha describes, something as jarring and disorderly as finding a corpse out in the open. The entire community is shaken to its core, and furthermore, the blame can’t be assigned to anyone in particular. As a result, the eglah arufah ritual accomplishes the twofold task of absolving the community as a whole from the guilt associated with shedding blood, and also serves as a sort of community stabilizer that attempts to recapture the status quo. 

This past week, I’ll say personally, was one of the harder ones for me over the past year. After hearing of the news of the murdered hostages after Shabbat a week ago, I felt dazed, sad, and angry. As I wrote in my email message to our community, the loss of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, zichrono l’vracha, was especially painful to me. While the facts are known and blame for his murder can be attributed squarely and entirely on Hamas, we are still reeling as a community. I needed my own stability amidst instability, my own reassurance that life can go on as it should.

I’ll admit that I’m still not quite there- not 100% back to normal. And truth be told, I don’t know if I’ll ever be. But my own rituals that bring me a sense of normalcy- my morning davening, my daily walk, my nightly cup of tea- have all served to remind me that some things are familiar, and bring order to my life when it feels like there is so much disorder. The ceremony of the eglah arufah, I imagine, must have given individual Israelites a sense that a great wrong had been rectified, or at least dealt with in an acceptable way. Providing an island of tranquility in the midst of an ocean of chaos is of the utmost importance.

As we approach the high holidays and begin the process of looking back on our thoughts, words and actions over the past year, it’s important to realize that this past year was unique and difficult in so many ways. When we are able to create a semblance of order amidst so much disorder, we are able to, however slowly, begin to recapture control along with a sense of the familiar. The familiar melodies and rituals of the high holiday season are created, in part, to do just that. May we continue to regain a sense of ourselves, a sense of justice, and a sense of the familiar and comforting in the days ahead.