Parshah Summary – P’shat
The parshah opens with the instruction to appoint judges and law enforcement officers in every city. “Justice, justice shall you pursue,” Moses tells them. Crimes must be thoroughly investigated and a minimum of two credible witnesses is required for conviction. Furthermore, the Torah must be alive: in every generation, the law must be interpreted and applied in new ways. Moses then reviews laws governing the appointment and behavior of a king, along with the laws of the “cities of refuge” for the inadvertent murderer. Also set forth are the rules of war: the exemption from battle for one who has just built a home, planted a vineyard, married, or is “afraid and soft-hearted;” the requirement to offer terms of peace before attacking a city; and the prohibition against needlessly destroying something of value, such as the law that forbids cutting down fruit trees when laying siege – “For a human being is a tree of the field.” The parshah concludes with the law of the eglah arufah—the special procedure to be followed when a person is killed by an unknown murderer and the body is found in a field—which underscores the responsibility of the community and its leaders not only for what they do, but also for what they might have prevented from being done.
Torah of Awakening | Jewish Meditation Teaching
שְׁמַ֣ע יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל אַתֶּ֨ם קְרֵבִ֥ים הַיּ֛וֹם לַמִּלְחָמָ֖ה עַל־אֹיְבֵיכֶ֑ם אַל־יֵרַ֣ךְ לְבַבְכֶ֗ם אַל־תִּֽירְא֧וּ וְאַֽל־תַּחְפְּז֛וּ וְאַל־תַּֽעַרְצ֖וּ מִפְּנֵיהֶֽם׃ Hear, O Israel! You are near, today, to the battle against your enemies. Don’t let your heart be distant; don’t be afraid, don’t panic, and don’t be broken before them. - Devarim (Deuteronomy) 20:3, Parshat Shoftim
Rabbi Yitzhak of Vorki once happened to visit Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk on Shabbat, who at that time had just begun to live in great seclusion and received only close friends, like the rabbi of Vorki. “Why,” asked Rabbi Yitzhak, “have you gone to such extremes in withdrawing from people?”
Rabbi Mendel replied: “The answer is in Parshat T’rumah: וְיִקְחוּ־לִ֖י תְּרוּמָ֑ה – ‘They shall take for Me an offering.’ Meaning: when one wishes to “take” the Godly Path, one must make an ‘offering.’ That is, they must offer up all companionship, not only that of evil people, but also that of good people; for a little further on we read: ‘Of every person whose heart is willing to give.’” “But there is a deeper meaning to verse,” replied the rabbi of Vorki, “When one wishes to “take” the Godly Path, they must take what every person offers them. They should accept the companionship of everyone, and by associating with everyone, receive from them whatever is given as the Godly Path. But there is one qualification: you cannot receive the Path if your heart is locked. Only the person ‘whose heart is willing’ can find the Path.” What does it mean for the “heart to be willing”? אַל־יֵרַךְ לְבַבְכֶ֗ם – Don’t let your heart be distant… The “Godly Path” appears when we bring our “hearts” close to what is actually being “given” in the moment – meaning, when we bring our awareness into connection with the truth of our actual experience, now. This is because That which we call “God” is, in fact, not something separate from our awareness; not something separate from whatever it is we encounter. How do we know this? שְׁמַ֣ע יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל – Listen/become aware, Israel! This verse begins just like the other, better known verse which proclaims the Divine Oneness. But in case we’re in denial about what Oneness actually means, the next words tell us: אַתֶּ֨ם קְרֵבִ֥ים הַיּ֛וֹם לַמִּלְחָמָ֖ה עַל־אֹיְבֵיכֶ֑ם... – You are close, today, to the battle against your enemies… This word for “close,” קְרֵבִים k’reivim, can mean not just close in space, but close in intimate connection. הַיּ֛וֹם Hayom – “today” – of course means Now. So it is saying: Open yourself; come close to this moment. We need this instruction because when we experience emotional pain, the tendency is to recoil, to contract, to project blame upon something we imagine to be the source of our pain. The imagined source – a person, a situation, whatever – seems to be our “enemy.” But here it reminds us: Come close to that urge toward “battle.” Notice this unconscious impulse; be the awareness of the impulse. אַל־יֵרַךְ לְבַבְכֶם – Don’t let your heart falter… The word for “falter” – יֵרַךְ yeirakh – is a different form of the word for “hip” – יָרֵך yareikh – the place where Jacob was struck when he wrestled the “angel,” after which he limped – hence the connection with falter. But the hip is also a euphemism for the reproductive organs, the part of the body that is usually hidden. So, we might retranslate אַל־יֵרַ֣ךְ לְבַבְכֶם al yeirakh l’vavkhem to mean, “don’t hide your heart.” Together, we can understand the two meanings of “falter” and “hiddenness” to mean: Don’t cripple your heart by hiding it away! Don’t split yourself in two – whatever pain arises is literally made out of your own awareness – be present with it and don’t be ruled by it. As it says: אַל־תִּֽירְא֧וּ וְאַֽל־תַּחְפְּז֛וּ – Don’t be afraid, and don’t panic! Don’t fear your own fear – bring your awareness into the fear. Relax; don’t panic – don’t buy into the drama, simply feel whatever is there to be felt. וְאַל־תַּֽעַרְצ֖וּ מִפְּנֵיהֶֽם – And don’t be broken before them! This sums up the entire teaching: don’t divide yourself by imagining there is something in your experience that is separate from you; everything you perceive right now is arising as a form within your own awareness. Furthermore, this awareness that you are is actually far beyond you – it is the Awareness of Reality Itself, incarnating as you; it is the Divine, seeing through your eyes. This is hinted at by the construction of each of these phrases: אַל־יֵרַךְ לְבַבְכֶם אַל־תִּֽירְאוּ וְאַֽל־תַּחְפְּזוּ וְאַל־תַּֽעַרְצוּ מִפְּנֵיהֶֽם Al yeirakh… al tir-u, v’al takh-p’zu, v’al ta-artzu – don’t don’t don’t don’t! The word for “don’t” – אַל al – with a slight vowel change, can also means both “to” (אֶל el) and “God” (אֵל El). The hint is that when we dissolve our fear by bringing our awareness to (אֶל el) the fear, that awareness is actually God’s awareness (אֵל El); the duality of bringing “my awareness” אֶל el (to) the feeling, dissolves into the Oneness of אֵל El, the Oneness of God. The Divine Oneness is ever-present as the own “light” of our own awareness. When strong emotions threaten to pull us into contractedness, into “hiding” from ourselves, our deliberate Presence With the the truth of our experience is the ever-available remedy. This practice of Presence With is represented by the letter ח het, which is also the letter for this month of Elul. As it says in the psalm for this month, Psalm 27: אוֹרִ֣י וְ֭יִשְׁעִי מִמִּ֣י אִירָ֑א יְהֹוָ֥ה מָעוֹז־חַ֝יַּ֗י מִמִּ֥י אֶפְחָֽד׃ יְהֹוָ֤ה The Divine is my Light and my Salvation, whom shall I fear? The Divine is my living essence; whom shall I dread? מְרֵעִים֮ לֶאֱכֹ֢ל אֶת־בְּשָׂ֫רִ֥י צָרַ֣י וְאֹיְבַ֣י לִ֑י הֵ֖מָּה כָשְׁל֣וּ וְנָפָֽלוּ׃ בִּקְרֹ֤ב עָלַ֨י When aggressiveness approaches to devour my flesh, tormentors and foes against me, it is they who stumble and fall… - Psalm 27:1, 2 That is, through our recognition of the Divine power of awareness, they “fall” back into the Oneness from which they arise. The shape of the letter Het חis כְּנֶ֙שֶׁר֙ יָעִ֣יר קִנֹּ֔ו עַל־גֹּוזָלָ֖יו – “…like an eagle rousing its nest, hovering over its eaglets” (Devarim [Deuteronomy] 32:11), suggesting the practice of Presence With, of “hovering” over whatever we are feeling, neither trying to escape nor trying to change it; this is meditation. Meditation is the practice of radical acceptance, of Being With What Is. It leads to the recognition of ourselves as awareness, which is our essential life, hinted by the word for Life that begins with ח Het: חַיִים Hayim.
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