"To be a teacher in the right sense is to be a learner.  I am not a teacher, only a fellow student."  (Soren Kierkegaard)

• Home
• Professional Staff
• Board of Directors
• Calendar
• Ritual Events
• Education
  • Religious School
  • Adult Education
• Auxiliary Organizations
  • Youth Groups
  • Old Enough To Know Better
  • 50 is the New 30
  • Sisterhood
  • Men's Club
• Tikkun Olam
• Cemetery
• Volunteer Opportunities
• Donations & Payments
• Beth Sholom News
• Contact Us

A FEW PRE-SHABBAT WORDS FROM RABBI AARON

Going out to War

Our parasha opens with the wartime scenario of a women taken captive during battle. Just one chapter earlier, in Parashat Shoftim, the Torah provides a list of draft exemptions. These references, coupled with a few other biblical texts, teach us something which is critically important: THE CONDUCT OF WAR IS SUBJECT TO RULES.

War, especially when it clustered with issues of security and national defense (let's acknowledge FEAR as a powerful unspoken back-story), is an extremely hot-button topic. Witness the visceral tone that runs through our cultural  conversation about detention and interrogation -we find ourselves periodically locked into a spasm of anger and recrimination.

Small wonder that our current administration is quite reluctant to engage the politically explosive trickle turned torrent of revelations regarding the CIA's involvement in torture - yes TORTURE is what it must be called. Certain behaviors have always been understood to be unacceptable.

What is truly remarkable is that is that certain defenders of these abhorrent practices have trumpeted the claim that these methods of interrogation have yielded vital life-saving information. (note the psychological button being pushed: We are keeping you safe. Do not complain about how we do that. Be grateful, and shut up!) This ethically loathsome defense of torture ignores a basic pillar of our civilization. The Torah (along with a host of other sacred texts from humanity's family of faiths)teaches us that certain behaviors, even during war, are off limits. Period.

Ki tetze lamilchama al oyvecha - when you go out to do battle with your enemies... The Torah acknowledges that we will fight wars (sometimes, for compelling reasons), and that we have enemies who seek to destroy us - this, sadly, has been true for quite some time, and the outlook ahead isn't very promising on that front. Nonetheless, our Torah insists that nations at war must answer for their ethical conduct. A long, unflinching gaze into the mirror will be painful. Looking away, for whatever reasons, would be ethically disastrous.

Shabbat shalom

Rabbi Aaron