Torah Study Blog

In this week’s Torah portion, the Israelites are called to stand and enter the covenant with God as a group. The understood aspects of the covenant are that the Israelites worship the one god, Yahweh and, in return, God looks out for the Israelites. This week, many of us will, similarly, stand before God with our congregation during Rosh Hashanah, or New Year, and pray for a good year ahead.

In ancient times people chose their god based upon if the god delivered or not. Our God takes care of us by providing rain for our crops and by protecting us from enemies. People may have asked, if our God is so good, how could the Assyrians come and conquer us? Or, similarly, the Babylonians? It is not that our God is inferior ... no! The reason given is that bad things that happen are a form of punishment from God for not worshipping him properly. We did not live up to expectations. This reasoning has even been used in more modern times, for example, when traditional believers lay the blame for the Holocaust on their claim that German Jews had become too assimilated.

While you stand to pray, have you ever wondered what the others around you are praying for? Maybe the well-being of the community? Maybe praying for the health of themselves or a loved one? Maybe for success in business?

Our Torah portion warns that, in ancient times, when the community was supposed to be worshipping God, there might have been one person who was thinking about turning away from God to go worship a different god. The punishment from that one strayer would be realized by “plagues and diseases that the Lord has inflicted upon that land” (Deuteronomy 29:21).

The final redactor of the Bible agreed that this punishment was inexplicably harsh. If an entire people can be punished by the thoughts of just one person, the people might as well just give up now. There is no way to police everyone’s private thoughts.

At the end of the chapter a verse was inserted that reads: “Concealed acts concern the Lord our God; but with overt acts, it is for us and our children ever to apply all the provisions of this Teaching” (Deuteronomy 29:28). This one line erases the threats before it. Now, if someone is thinking wrong thoughts, that is something God will deal with. But if we, or our children, observe wrongdoing it is our responsibility to take steps to address it. In sum, we are told that we need to police our own.

Although that verse was inserted and seems to cancel out disaster to the community by the private action of one individual, the book of Joshua recounts a story where the actions of one individual impacted the entire community:

After the victory at the Battle of Jericho, when the walls came tumbling down, the people are told that everything in Jericho will be proscribed. “Proscribed” means that every living thing is put to death, and any goods of value are given to the Temple. Everything belongs to God and no people are allowed to take any portion as payment for their part in the battle.

All seems to be going well, but then the Israelites go to fight their next battle and they lose badly – suffering embarrassment and the death of 36 men! The enemies will surely think that the Israelite God is not powerful, and Joshua chides God saying, “What will You do about Your great name?” (Joshua 7:9) But God responds by announcing that one man had taken items of value from the Battle of Jericho. It is not that God was not powerful enough – it is that ONE person of the Israelites did wrong and brought calamity upon everyone, and death to 36.

Joshua demanded that each tribe appear before him until they can ferret out the guilty party. It is revealed that a man, Achan, had kept some items of value from the battle – so it was his fault! The community, realizing that they need to make retribution to God, gather together Achan, his wife, his sons and daughters, and his livestock and stoned them all to death.

Then, the Israelites won the next battle, and all was right in the world. Or was it? The ancient Rabbis had to grapple with this episode of one person doing a bad thing and the entire community suffering for it. The Rabbis

were able to address this issue by saying that Achan did not do wrong alone. Achan’s wife and children knew that he had kept treasure, so they were also guilty. The defeat could be blamed on the entire family, not just one man, so they all had to die.

We cannot know what thoughts are happening in the heads of each individual. But our tradition says that it is a responsibility to be concerned with the actions of other people. If I see a person in my community doing something harmful or wrong – it is my responsibility to rebuke them.

As we gather for the High Holidays in our community, we will have a wide range of belief. We have some people who believe in God, and others who do not. But even those who do not believe in God, believe in community and the sense of belonging it gives. We can look around, in our community, in our nation, and in the world, and see what is. But we can also imagine, hope for, and pray for what ought to be.

Wishing everyone a Shanah Tova!

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misquotes or misunderstandings in what Rabbi Jaech taught us are the responsibility of Tara Keiter