Justice, Justice, you shall pursue, in this week's portion, Shoftim.

Dear Friends,

I'm away this weekend and will miss you at Torah Study, but here's some Torah-related food for thought.

Consider the texts first. After the study texts, I've offered a derasha (homily).

RJEB

Babylonian Talmud, Kiddushin 39b.

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Anyone who performs a single mitzvah receives good fortune.

Deuteronomy 22:6-7 (from this week's portion, Shoftim).

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If you come across a bird’s nest along the way, whether in any tree or on the ground, with fledglings or eggs and the mother bird hovering over the fledglings or eggs, you must not take the mother bird with her young. Instead, send away the mother bird, but take the young, so that it go well for you, and that your days are prolonged.

Milton Steinberg, As A Driven Leaf (1939), 248-249, based on B. Kiddushin 39b.

At the edge of a garden, down a long slope of lawn, a peasant and a boy circled about the foot of a lone tall tree.

“Get all the eggs, my son,” the man said in a voice that reached the rabbis but faintly. “Be careful to send the mother bird away.”

Nodding the boy set about climbing the tree.

One of the sages shook himself from his hypnotic trance. “That boy will live long,” he muttered whimsically. “For observe, in one act he is fulfilling two commandments, the reward of which is expressly stated as length of days. He is obeying his father, and it is written, ‘Honor thy father and thy mother that thy days may be prolonged upon the earth.’ He will send the mother bird away, thus conforming to the injunction. ‘If a bird’s nest chance before thee … thou shalt surely send the mother bird free that it may go well with thee and that thou mayest prolong your days.’”

A few moments later wings fluttered about a treetop and a bare, slender arm waved toward it from among the branches.

Then a treble cry shattered the silence.

A sprawling body plummeted downward. Simultaneously a deeper voice sounded, inarticulate with panic.

Instantly the rabbis rushed headlong down the grassy slope.

The peasant was already on his knees gathering the boy into his arms.

“Tell me,” he said, lifting a distorted face to them, “does he still live?”

One of the sages bent over the boy, then rose, shaking his head. “Blessed be the Righteous Judge.”

Translations from the Hebrew: J. Blake

Let’s consider the sages who witnessed this death. Most famous, or infamous, among them is Elisha ben Abuyah, who until now has distinguished himself with a handful of wise sayings. The boy’s death, however, proved too much. Even as his colleagues pronounced the blessing Baruch Dayyan Ha-Emet, Blessed be the Righteous Judge, Elisha proclaimed Leit din v’leit Dayyan—There is no justice and there is no Judge.

At this point, Elisha’s story turns tragic. The Sages excommunicate him; he renounces his faith, and is rumored to have become a practitioner of pagan disciplines. A mysterious story elsewhere in the Talmud refers to Elisha as having stepped into a lush orchard, where he “mutilated the plants” in corrupting Jewish teaching. Like the villain Lord Voldemort of Harry Potter’s world, He-Who-Is-Not-To-Be-Named, Elisha’s very name becomes a curse, and he is forever after called Acher, the "Other One."

Leit din v’leit Dayyan—There is no justice and there is no Judge: A shattering cry. A familiar cry.

Tomorrow we will read news from Afghanistan or Israel or some other far-flung part of the world, of another soldier ambushed. Every week brings news of a bombing, a lone gunman gone rampant, an act that strikes terror into the hearts of the innocent.

Like the tender boy tumbling headlong out of the tree, too many victims of terror and violent crime have died fulfilling a mitzvah: In houses of prayer. Defending a friend's life. Helping a stranger out of a burning building. Headlines from across the globe frighten us. How easy to say with Elisha, Leit din v’leit Dayyan. There is no justice. There is no Judge.

Too often there is no justice here at home either. Some of us have amassed wealth through hard work, only to see it devoured by circumstances beyond us. Some have expected a promotion, only to be passed over in favor of someone less experienced. Some have battled baseless lawsuits, endured public humiliation. Some have been deprived of a life’s work by debilitating illness. Others of us have buried friends, siblings, and parents who died too young, wives and husbands, our own sons and daughters.

Kohelet, the gentle cynic of the Hebrew Bible, writes, “In my own brief span of life, I have seen both these things: sometimes a good man perishes in spite of his goodness, and sometimes a wicked one endures in spite of his wickedness. So don’t overdo goodness and don’t act the wise man to excess, or you may be dumfounded” (Ecclesiastes 7:15-16).

Hard words for a hard world.

They hit even harder because we so crave the idea of fairness, that we hold out hope against all odds that the world will follow our expectations of fair play. Our religion teaches it, does it not? “A person who performs a single mitzvah will have good fortune.” We see how that passage ends: nauseatingly, with a boy falling out of a tree, to his death. We all know good people with terrible fortune. It not only disproves the rule; it is the rule.

A midrash asks what happened to the Tablets of the Commandments that Moses shattered when he saw his people frolicking around the Golden Calf. It concludes that the broken pieces must have been gathered into the Ark alongside the newer tablets. Each one of us resembles that Ark, carrying around our broken pieces, the parts of us mutilated, shattered by injustices we have witnessed or endured. We cannot let them go. They belong to us. We must live with them.

But can we respond to injustice without becoming another Elisha ben Abuyah, who threw away everything he had earned, everything he had learned, to flout his colleagues—and his faith—with “Leit din v’leit Dayyan!”?

I am not yet a cynic, gentle or otherwise. I don’t believe that you can “overdo goodness.” And I draw hope, today, for a meaningful response to injustice from two sources. One is this week's Torah portion. The other is this week's placement in the Jewish calendar. Briefly, let us consider them.

Our Torah portion, Shoftim, contains one of the most celebrated lines in the Torah. Tzedek, tzedek tirdof. Justice, justice, you shall pursue. But why say “justice” twice? The Medieval Rabbis grappled for an explanation. Ibn Ezra says: pursue justice that you may profit from it; pursue justice even if you will incur a loss. Or: pursue justice not only once, but every day of your life. Justice, justice.

We would add: justice in the courtroom, justice in your household; justice for the entitled, justice for the deprived; justice in business; justice in games; justice in a scandal-besmirched Congress; justice to the Taliban; justice to religious extremists everywhere; justice for unfairly maligned Muslims; justice for Israelis; justice for Palestinians; justice, justice, you must pursue!

The emphasis on our pursuit of justice also comes as a rejoinder to Elisha’s dilemma. The Torah would have no need to command “Justice, justice, you shall pursue,” if it in fact wished to persuade us that God’s justice is perfect, that the righteous are rewarded and the wicked punished, that life really is fair, you just can’t see it. No; justice, justice, you shall pursue.

As with so much in Judaism, we will shoulder the burden. We will live up to our covenant to exist in partnership with the Holy One. Where God’s justice does not prevail in our world, we will, we will pursue. Martin Luther King’s 16-minute “I Have A Dream” speech still calls to us, still challenges us: “The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.”

This week we began the month of Elul. Traditionally we dedicate these thirty days in advance of the New Year to cheshbon ha-nefesh, to self-evaluation. This first week of Elul, let us acknowledge that we cannot reasonably expect justice from our world if we do not demand it of ourselves.

How well do we respect rules of fair play? Do we demand honesty from our children but then pass them off as younger to get discounted theater or chair lift tickets? Do we demand full disclosure from our loved ones while keeping secrets to ourselves? Do we demand precision from our employees while cutting corners in our own work? Even as we are forced to contemplate the minefield of random injustice that pockmarks our world, Elul urges us to consider: in the past year, what have I done to make myself more just?

These concerns laid heavy on the heart of Rabbi Levi of Berditchev, who sat lonesome by his window on the first day of Elul, three centuries ago. A cobbler looking for business passed by and asked if he had anything to mend. Reb Levi broke down. “Rosh Ha-Shanah is almost here,” he sobbed softly, “and I have still not begun to mend myself.”

We too repeat the words, Tzedek, tzedek: Justice in our world; justice in ourselves.

On Rosh Ha-Shanah, less than a month from today, if you look at the night sky, you can see the sign of the Zodiac for the month of Tishri. It is a balance, a scale—symbol of justice. That night we will stand as if before the Supreme Judge and pray as if our fates hang in the balance, deeds weighed on a Divine scale of merit.

I say this not to cause alarm, but so that we might use these days to consider our commitment to justice—in our community, in ourselves—to prepare for our "day in court." May we judge ourselves in such a way as to bring strength and honor to our names, our loved ones, the Jewish people, and all God's children everywhere.

I wish you a Chodesh Tov: a month of personal growth, self awareness, and spiritual balance.

Shabbat Shalom!

Adapted from remarks delivered at Westchester Reform Temple in August, 2003