Parshas Shoftim: The Weight of Leadership

This week’s parsha, Parshas Shoftim, is best known for the pasuk “Justice, justice, shall you pursue” (Devarim 16:20). This pasuk is a cornerstone of Torah living and the important parameters of halacha – that we are to try to emulate Hashem and create a just society. It is not an easy task, and it is not always an easily understandable concept when we examine the parameters set by the Torah.

As an example, this week’s parsha also contains the laws of the egel arufa, of the heifer killed as an atonement for a man found slain outside of a city’s boundaries. The basics are thus: If a body is found between two cities, a measurement is taken to determine to which city the body is closer. The elders and judges of that city, along with kohanim, must then take a calf that has never been yoked to a valley and break its neck, washing their hands over it and declaring “Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see [this crime]. Atone for Your people Israel, whom You have redeemed, O Lord, and lay not [the guilt of] innocent blood among your people Israel” (Devarim 21:7-8).

 How is this justice? It is assumed that the elders and the judges represent the upstanding citizens of the city, those who are least suspect of such a crime (we won’t get into the wonderful plots of modern-day murder mysteries). Why must they assume any level of responsibility?

 The most widely discussed answer is that there is a responsibility to the fact that a guest in their city was sent on his way without consideration, without escort. Interestingly, the sefer Taleli Oros cites “Zeved Tov observes that the verse writes shifcha with a hey at the end rather than shifcho, which would be the grammatically correct form. He explains that the hey is an allusion to the five things that a host is required to provide for a poverty-stricken guest: clothing, food, drink, shelter and escort.” In the case of the man found in the field, this last one is assumed to have been lacking.

 This does not, however, resolve the question of why the elders and the judges are responsible. Can they really be expected to know every guest or stranger who appears in the city and then leaves it? That seems a bit high of an expectation, especially in a larger city.

 Dr. Arnold Lustiger writes in Chumash Mesoras Harav, based on the teaching of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik: “It is almost frightening how demanding the Torah is concerning the leadership that goes hand in hand with power. It is a responsibility that encompasses not only direct action but indirect – in fact, very removed – action. Of course, the leader is responsible for all his actions. His judgement must be right; he must not accept bribes; he must act in accordance with the principles of justice and charity. However, he is also charged with responsibility for things and events that are, prima facie, far removed from his concerns and interests. The people wielding power are the ones responsible for and guilty of the crime (Vision and Leadership, p.48)” (Lustiger 167).

 The laws of the egel arufah teach us that there is an expectation on the elders and judges to establish a culture in which the casual taking of a life could never be acceptable, in which a stranger would never be left to wander off to another town without protection. This might mean that they make certain to live in the ideal and to demonstrate righteous living and-or it might mean that they establish regular patrols to maintain civil law.

 The egel arufa has very defined parameters. It is a halacha that is meant for living in the land of Israel in a time when we have elders and judges and kohanim. But the Torah is eternal, and all that we learn in it applies to us in all living situations. Each of us is or can be a leader in our own way. A parent is a leader of a family. An organizer is a leader in the community. An upstanding citizen who strives to be a kiddush Hashem is by nature a leader whom others will emulate.

 The current civilization has prioritized living one’s true life and has accentuated a culture of “me” while claiming that this is a truly free and just society. The clamor of the modern world is to be an influencer by being the loudest or the brashest or the most “free to be me.” But leadership, as the Torah reminds us here with the laws of the egel arufah, is really about the weight of responsibility for the entire community.