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From the Rabbi

Rabbi Dr Benjamin Elton

e: admin@greatsynagogue.org.au

DEVAR TORAH SHOFTIM 5785

This Shabbat we celebrate several important milestones. We will call to the Torah Alex Sperling for his aufruf, prior to his wedding to Evelyn Smith-Romero on Sunday. Evelyn and Alex have been part of our community for almost three years, and it is beautiful to be able to celebrate with them this weekend. Mazal tov to them and their families!

This Shabbat Caroline and David Lewis are generously sponsoring the Kiddush, first, in honour of their fortieth wedding anniversary. I know we all wish them mazal tov and many more years together in good health. This Shabbat is also the occasion when we will mark as a community the end of David’s period as our President. After six years on the Board, and the maximum five consecutive years as President David is standing down. I will have the privilege of saying a few words in his honour at the end of the service, as we reflect on his outstanding contribution to our congregation.

Although there will be one more Shabbat before the AGM we are honouring David this week because next week I will be overseas, at the Chief Rabbi’s Pre-High Holiday Conference in London. I have been asked to speak at the Conference about the condition of Australian Jewry, and I know I will bring back many expressions of solidarity from my British colleagues. I leave the spiritual leadership in the capable hands of Rabbi Feldman while I am away. In particular, I hope you will come to hear Rabbi Feldman’s ever-inspiring first night selichot service with the Choir, at 10:30pm on Saturday 13 September, followed by refreshments. I am very sorry to be missing what is always an early highlight of the Yamim Noraim.

The Dubno Maggid, Rabbi Yaakov Kranz (1741-1804) was a travelling preacher, known for his stories and parables, but he also taught more direct interpretations of passages in the Torah, and this is one of them. The verse tells us that the men of Ammon and Moav cannot marry into the Israelite People for two reasons: first, because they did not supply us with food and water when we left Egypt, and secondly because they hired Bilam to curse us.

The Maggid asks why the failure to give the Israelites bread and water is mentioned first. Perhaps these nations were poor and simply had none to spare. If that was the case we should not censure them for not doing so. However, as the Maggid observes, the fact that there was spare money to hire Bilam to curse the Israelites shows that there were enough resources to give assistance, and these nations chose deliberately to withhold them.

The Maggid’s explanation implies that having spare food and not sharing it (a sin of omission) is worse than hiring someone to cause harm actively, either through a curse or we can infer, through another means, which is a sin of commission. That still seems an odd way round.

Perhaps we can suggest that the failure to supply spare food to hungry and thirsty people was not just an act that could be assessed in isolation, it was a reflection of the corrupt character of these nations. We can all do things which are unworthy, but having a personality that is cruel in general is much more serious, and it is that which rendered these nations ineligible to marry into the Israelite People.

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