Rabbi David Baum
Parashat Shoftim
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel shared a story of how he studied the Akeidah as a child with his Rebbe in Poland.
Heschel writes, “Isaac was on the way to Mt. Moriah with his father. There he lay on the altar, bound, waiting to be sacrificed. My heart began to beat very fast. It actually sobbed with pity for Isaac. Behold, Avraham now lifted the knife and how my heart froze within me with fright. Suddenly the voice of the angel was heard, “Abraham, lay not thine hand upon the lad for now I know that you fear God.”
And here I broke into tears and wept aloud. “Why are you crying,” asked my rebbe? “You know that Isaac was not killed.” I said to him, still weeping, “But Rebbe, suppose the angel had come a second too late?” The Rebbe comforted me and calmed me by telling me that an angel cannot ever come too late.”
Heschel concluded: “Yes an angel cannot come too late but we, we made of flesh and blood, we can come too late.”
The Akeidah is the Hebrew word for the haunting story of the binding of Isaac found in the book of Genesis. In this short story, just twenty-two lines long, we read about Abraham answering a call to God to sacrifice his son Isaac on an altar, and only after he proves that he would fulfill this act, an angel of God saves Isaac. Our tradition recognizes miracles, but our rabbis were quick to point out: Jews cannot rely on miracles alone.
This week, the IDF was ‘too late’. Just days, maybe even hours away from liberation, Eden Yerushalmi (24), Ori Danino (25), Alex Lobanov (32), Carmel Gat (40), and Almog Sarusi (25), and of course, Hersch Goldberg Polin (23).
Their brutal murders sent shockwaves throughout the Jewish world despite a year of shocking news of attacks against Jews around the world.
Rather than focus on all the lives lost, I wanted to focus on one person: Hersch Goldberg-Polin. At his funeral this week, the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog gave a touching eulogy, and in it, he said the following, something remarkable that politicians rarely do: an apology.
”I apologize on behalf of the State of Israel, that we failed to protect you in the terrible disaster of October 7, that we failed to bring you home safely. I apologize that the country you immigrated to at the age of seven, wrapped in the Israeli flag, could not keep you safe.”
Herzog’s apology is extraordinary because, as the president of Israel, he holds almost no real power. He is a figurehead, not a decision-maker. He cannot negotiate hostage deals, command military operations, or implement policy. And yet, he still took responsibility on behalf of the entire nation.
Hersch’s mother Rachel said in her eulogy, “I send each of the families my deepest sympathies for what we are all going through and for the sickening feeling that we all could not save them.” Everyone is feeling guilt that maybe things could have been different, and Hersch and the other hostages could have been saved.
This brings us to an inevitable question: Are we guilty when we fail to prevent tragedy, or is guilt simply an unhealthy reaction to situations beyond our control? In other words, what does it mean to be responsible, even when we are not directly to blame?
In this week’s parashah, we learn a story about how our ancestors dealt with guilt, whether deserved or underserved, and responsibility.
The Eglah Arufah is a story in Deuteronomy (21:1–9) that speaks of an unsolved murder in a field. If a person is found dead in a field, and the identity of the killer is unknown, the elders and judges of the nearest town must measure the distance to the surrounding cities. The elders of the nearest city must then take a heifer that has never been worked or yoked, bring it to a rough valley with a flowing stream, and break its neck there. They declare that they did not shed the blood of the victim: "Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it done."
The rabbis viewed this story as a lesson on communal atonement for a tragedy. If a tragedy happens close to your community, even if the community is seemingly untouched by the tragedy, and seemingly did nothing to cause it, they must take responsibility, in some way, for the death.
But, the rabbis wonder, if this just an ‘empty’ ritual, or do communities actually have culpability? The commentators struggle with this question. The Mishnah asks why the elders of the court would have to make such a public admission?!? Would anyone suspect them as murderers?!? The Mishnah explains, of course we don’t think they were the suspects, rather, they are taking responsibility for when the man came to the town for help, and we dismissed him without supplying him with food, and we didn’t protect him when he came through the town. The priests here take moral responsibility; they are leaders of a town who let people starve and are lawless.
Here we see leadership is guilty, but everyone is implicated. As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel noted, “In a free society, few are guilty, but all are responsible.” This can be interpreted in many ways, but one way is, we are responsible for the decisions our leaders ultimately make.
Our parashah begins with the commandment to build a society built on justice, we must pursue it, tzedek, tzedek tirdof, and it talks about setting up a court system, and then, we learn about the Jewish king.
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, one chosen by the LORD your God.” Deuteronomy 17:14 – 20
We see certain requirements here: the king has to be one of your own. The Torah goes on to do something interesting - it doesn’t say what power the king has, rather, what powers he doesn’t have. The king cannot keep many horses or get more horses from Egypt. He should not have many wives or amass silver and gold to excess. On this throne, he has a copy of the Torah written on a scroll by the Levitical priests, and he holds on to that scroll, and reads it every day.
What is the reasoning behind these restrictions? Shouldn't a king be allowed to be ‘regal’?
Because leadership requires trust. Even if a king is righteous, the people must believe in his integrity. Without that trust, a society cannot function.
Today, in the aftermath of the hostage murders, we see massive protests in Israel. Some rabbis argue that these protests only serve our enemies, that the responsibility lies with the masses to remain united. But what we learn from the story of the Eglah Arufah and the laws of kingship is that our leaders shape the moral and ethical character of our society. As President Harry Truman once said, “The buck stops here.” Leadership carries both guilt and responsibility, and sometimes there is little distinction between the two.
The Hebrew word hayav חייב encapsulates this duality—it means both “guilty” and “responsible.” Our leaders may not be guilty of the tragedies that befall us, but they are certainly responsible for the safety and well-being of their people. The people of Israel, who have shown incredible resilience and unity in these trying times, deserve leaders who are worthy of their trust—leaders who recognize that the burden of responsibility cannot be ignored.
As we reflect on the pain of loss and the challenge of leadership, I want to close with another aspect to our strange Eglah Arufah story from the book of Genesis.
After learning that his son Joseph is still alive, Jacob initially does not believe his sons. It is only when he sees the wagons—agalot—that Joseph has sent that Jacob is convinced. The Midrash tells us that the last time Jacob and Joseph studied Torah together, they had studied the law of the Eglah Arufah. The similarity between the words agalot (wagons) and egel (heifer) triggers Jacob’s memory of that final lesson with his son.
This memory sustains Jacob as he prepares to reunite with Joseph. For Jacob, the memory of that shared moment of Torah was a gift that gave him strength to carry on. Today, the families of those who were lost hold on to memories of their loved ones. As Rachel Goldberg-Polin said in her eulogy for her son Hersh, the hope of his rescue was so close, it was “crunchy,” almost tangible. But instead, that hope turned into a nightmare. Now, all that remains are memories—memories that must somehow provide the strength to persevere.
May the memories of those we have lost be a source of comfort and strength for their families and for all of us. And may we honor their lives by taking responsibility for the society we build together—one that pursues justice, fosters trust, and that is worthy of their leaders.
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