You shall separate three cities for yourself in the midst of your land, which the Lord, your God, is giving you to possess. Prepare the road for yourself and divide into three parts the boundary of your land, which the Lord, your God, is giving you as an inheritance, and it will be for every killer to flee there.

(Devarim 19:2-3)

 

And direct roads were leading from one to the other, as it is said, Prepare the road for yourself and divide into three parts, etc. And two scholars were delegated to escort the manslayer in case anyone attempted to slay him on the way, and that they might speak to him. R. Meir says: He may even plead his cause himself, as it is written, and this is the d'var [matter, literally "word"] of the manslayer.

(Mishnah Makot 2:5, based on Soncino translation)

 

These cities [of refuge] are to be made neither into small forts nor large walled cities, but medium-sized boroughs; they are to be established only in the vicinity of a water supply and where there is no water at hand it is to be brought thither; they are to be established only in marketing districts; they are to be established only in populous districts, and if the population has fallen off others are to be brought into the neighborhood, and if the residents [of any one place] have fallen off, others are brought thither, priests, Levites and Israelites. There should be traffic neither in arms nor in trap- gear there: these are the words of R. Nehemiah; but the Sages permit. They, however, agree that no traps may be set there nor may ropes be left dangling about in the place so that the blood avenger may have no occasion to come visiting there.' R. Isaac asked: What is the Scriptural authority [for all these provisions]? - The verse, and that fleeing unto one of these cities he might live, which means - provide him with whatever he needs so that he may live. A Tanna taught: A disciple who goes into banishment is joined in exile by his master, in accordance with the text, and that fleeing unto one of these cities he might live, which means - provide him with whatever he needs to live.

(Makot 10a, Soncino translation)

 

Prepare for yourself the way: "Refuge! Refuge!" was inscribed at each crossroads.

(Rashi Devarim 19:3, Judaica Press translation)

 

Prepare for yourself the way: That the way should be wide and paved and marked, so that he should not err from going to the refuge. R. Abin said in the name of R. Yaakov: Each and every mile there was a wayfarer's shelter, and on each shelter a statue, and the statue's hand would point towards the city of refuge. That is [how the verse was observed]: He shows the way to sinners (Psalms 25:8).

(Hizkuni ad loc)

 

 

On Charisma and Institutions

Yehonatan Chipman

Over a hundred years ago, the German sociologist Max Weber, generally considered the father of modern sociology, wrote about a basic tension between two kinds of human leadership: charisma and institution.¹ Charismatic leadership is based upon the personality of the leader himself: it is in no way embedded in fixed institutions, but is rather a function of the leader's unique personal qualities, which make people wish to follow him; in religious terms, he may be seen as someone who speaks in God's name or has the Holy Spirit. Institutional leadership, by contrast, is based upon fixed institutions of society, an established system of government with fixed officers: a duly-elected leader - a president or prime minister - or, in a monarchy, a hereditary king or queen; parliament or legislature; judges and courts; various governmental ministries or bureaus; etc. Those filling these offices derive their power and authority from the office itself; not from any special quality, but from the office itself: they may be drab, colorless figures, mediocre, incompetent, or worse - it doesn't matter.

In this week's Torah reading, Shoftim, one of a series of parshiyot said by Moses prior to his death in anticipation of the people crossing the Jordan into the Land and beginning their life as a nation, we have in brief, succinct terms, an outline of the basic institutions of the future Israelite state: judges and magistrates, a king, the priestly-Levite judges who are charged with resolving those problems that "are too difficult for you," the priests and Levites who perform the Divine service in the Temple, the army with its officers and commanders, and the prophet.

Until this point, Moses had functioned as the leader of the people in the desert; his own leadership was based upon charisma; he was "Moses the man of God," the prophet, the teacher, the lawgiver, the redeemer, the intermediary between the people and God, who at times seemed more at home in the transcendent realm of the Godhead than among his fellow human beings. He was a unique, irreplaceable figure.

The essential question I would like to ask is: what kind of governmental structure does the Torah envision for Israel? Is to be based upon charisma and the holy spirit, upon fixed, mundane institutions, or on some mixture of the two?

Offhand, it would appear that, in creating the structures for a nation living in its own land, the Torah is concerned with creating lasting offices and institutions independent of the personality or capabilities of the one filling them. Moses was a unique figure, not a model for future generations. Of course, in every system one hopes that the best possible people fill the crucial offices of leadership, but in the final analysis authority derives from the office itself. As the Sages themselves put it, "Jephthah in his generation was like Samuel in his generation: you have no one but the judge [or other leader] who is in your generation" (b. Rosh Hashanah 25b). Applying this yardstick to our chapter, it seems clear that the judges and magistrates mentioned at the beginning are clearly "institutional" officeholders. Similarly - and perhaps surprisingly - the king is more a hereditary officeholder, a living symbol of the monarchy of the Davidic dynasty, a "branch of the stock of Jesse," and not a magnetic personality in his own right. The Chapter of the King emphasizes the proscriptions and limitations placed upon the king, and not his prerogatives or powers.²

On the other hand, there was great ambivalence abut the institutionalization of a monarchy in Israel; Martin Buber has argued convincingly in many of his writings,³ that during the earliest period of Israel's life in the land there was a strong tendency towards preferring direct theocracy, channeled through the emergence of occasional charismatic leaders - judges and "seers" - who led the people in the name of God. Thus, the prophet Samuel exhibits great ambivalence towards the people's request for a king, in general, and about the specific fitness of Saul, in particular. (See esp. I Samuel 8; 11:14-12:25, and the entire sequence of narratives regarding Samuel, Saul and David.)

What about the Sanhedrin or, in the language of our portion, "the priest and Levites, and the judge who shall be shall be in those days" (Deut 17:9)? On the face of it, the Torah seems to be speaking of a known, fixed institution: whatever judges (including priestly teacher-judges; cf. Mal 2:7) happen to hold judicial office at that time. Indeed, as noted earlier: "Jephthah in his day is like Samuel in his day." But note an interesting nuance in this passage: not only are these judges/priests found adjacent to the Temple, in the "place which the Lord your God shall choose" (v. 8) (again, in Second Temple times we know that the Sanhedrin or High Court sat in the Chamber of Hewn Stone - that is to say, in one of the side rooms, adjacent to the Temple courtyard with its sacrificial altar); when stipulating their authority "you shall do act in accordance with the thing that they shall tell you," it adds the phrase "from that place" - as if to say, the High Court derives its inspiration, its wisdom, its ability to judge correctly, in an almost mystical way, from it connection to the Temple, and from the Presence of God who is in some way indwelling in the Temple. (This fact is also shown by the fact that the original, proto-Sanhedrin, the seventy elders mentioned in Numbers 11:15 ff., were infused with the Spirit that had rested upon Moses (ואצלתי מן הרוח אשר עליך ושמתי עליהם; v. 17); a fact rather pointedly mentioned by Rambam in his Laws of Sanhedrin 4.1 ("the Shekhinah rested upon them"). Infusion of the spirit appears in the appointment of Joshua as successor to Moses ("place your glory upon him"; ונתת מהודך עליו  - Num 27:20), and among various other leaders as well - notably, Samson, Saul, David; but we cannot discuss this point in detail here). This might suggest that the Sanhedrin, in addition to judging by purely` rational considerations - by interpretation of the sources and examination of precedents based upon oral traditions, as well as by their own evaluation of the needs of society and the nature of the specific situation encountered - was somehow empowered by the Divine spirit.

But perhaps most significant is the last "institution" presented in the parasha: that of the prophet. Following an admonition "not to learn from the abominations of those nations" (Deut 18:9), we are told that, "The Lord your God shall raise up a prophet from among, from your brethren, who shall be like me" (15; cf. 18). In other words, following the death of Moses, while there shall never again be a revelation in which the people shall hear the voice of God or see "that great fire," they shall still have direct access to the Divine word through the medium of the prophets - and by listening to his words, they shall know what God wishes of them in difficult situations and at dramatic junctures and crossroads in their history. Surely, a note of charisma par excellence!

 (There is more than a little difficulty with this: how does one distinguish a between a false prophet and true prophet? Just a few chapters earlier [Deut 13:2-6; cf. 18:20-22], the people are warned not to obey a prophet, even if he performs signs and wonders, if he tells them to worship idols or otherwise says that which God surely has not commanded or would not want. Again, we cannot elaborate upon this point and its ramifications in the little space available here.)

After the Destruction of the First Temple, prophecy began to decline. There were three last prophets during the interim period leading to the Return to Zion - Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi - and then there were no more. Thereafter, we turn to the age of the Rabbis and Sages - men of learning, of great intellect and erudition, of human wisdom and understanding - but their authority was not based upon supernatural connections or pneumatic charisma, but upon their abilities and knowledge as human beings. "A sage is preferable to a prophet," our Rabbis say. The famous Talmudic story of the Oven of Akhnai (b. Bava Metzi'a 59b), may be read as marking the death knell of authority based upon charisma. Rabbi Eliezer invoked a series of signs and wonders to prove that the halakhah was in accordance with his view, in the end even bringing a Heavenly Voice which proclaimed in his favor. All in vain: Rabbi Joshua adamantly counters by saying "It is not in the Heavens." Once the Torah was given over to human beings, it is theirs to stay, and there is naught to go on but our own human intellect. And the process of decision-making within the Sanhedrin is based upon a democratic process of voting among its members, and in the end ruling according to the majority view.

The Talmud also includes stories of miracle workers who were far less knowledgeable than the great rabbis and Sages, and yet seemed to "have God's ear." The third chapter of Ta'anit brings a whole series of stories in which there is a drought, the people pray for rain, the prayers of even the most learned rabbis are in vain, until a relative ignorant man but one of deep piety, sincerity and simple faith (i.e., charismatic power) says "he makes the winds to blow and brings down the rain" -  and immediately the sky clouds over and the rain falls. Similarly, Honi the Circle Drawer told God, "I will not move from this circle until You bring rain" - and God was, so to speak, forced to answer (m. Ta'anit 3.8).

This tension between charisma and religious institutions continued through later periods in Jewish history, in the medieval period and down to modernity. In the Zohar and in other Kabbalistic books we read about the small circle of initiates who seek to learn the "mysteries of Torah" concealed deep within the text. One might argue that the great debate between Hasidism and Mitnaggedism revolves around this issue. Is the leadership of Jewish people in the hands of people who are learned in Torah and Talmud and poskim, or in that of individuals of lesser learning, but of great spiritual power, who may pray with great intensity and ecstasy, and who possess that intangible quality known as charisma - and whose followers see in them their own soul root?

A concluding word about our own generation. We live in an age when many young (and older) people seem to be fleeing from what thy see as a dry, arid rationalism, seeking a measure of greater emotion, of joy, a sense of real relation with the transcendent, even religious ecstasy. It is easy to criticize these movements; to warn of the dangers of abandoning all reason and common sense, of falling into a potentially cruel fanaticism, of succumbing to charlatans and demagogues, of leaders who may cynically exploit the thirst for holiness and purity to their own personal ends. But having said all that, the desire for charisma, for some sort of genuine emotion and spiritual uplift in the religious life, beyond arid scholasticism and dry obedience to the mitzvot of the halakhah, is an authentic and legitimate human need. We need to learn how to walk the narrow path between seeking the spirit and being led astray into "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." (Macbeth, 5.5).

1. Max Weber, On Charisma and Institution Building; Selected Papers, ed. S. N. Eisenstadt. Chicago–London, 1968.

2. See Yair Lorberbaum's recent book, Melekh Evyon: (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University, 2008; forthcoming in English translation, tentatively titled Beggar King: On the Monarchy in Classical Jewish Literature, by Continuum Press, New York. Here, he studies the development of these laws and the attitude towards the king and monarchy in Talmudic literature.

3. See especially M. Buber, The Kingship of God (New York, 1967) [Königtum Gottes (Berlin, 1936)];

Rabbi Yehonatan Chipman is a translator by profession, specializing in Jewish studies. He writes a weekly sheet (in English) on the portion of the week and the haftara, titled "Hitsei Yehonatan". (Anyone interested in ordering a sample of subscription can write via email to: yonarand@internet-zahav.net.

 

Midrashei Tzafon - From the pen of our member, Ronen Ahituv

For you may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down. Is the tree of the field a man, to go into the siege before you? (20:19)

Why not cut them down? Because it does not go into the siege before you, that you are not at war with the tree, rather you are obliged to preserve it, for it is said: to work and guard it (Bereishit 2:15). Man is but a salaried guard in the world of the Holy One, blessed be He.

Another idea. Why not cut down? Because you eat from it and need it. Know that if it bears no fruit you are permitted to destroy it, for it is said: you may destroy and cut down (20:20). And He also says: Fill the earth and conquer it (Bereishit 1:28). For man is like the owner of his world, and it is said, and He gave the earth to humans (Psalms 115:16). The Omnipresent has given us good advice, that we should preserve the world for posterity.

The Torah prohibits soldiers from cutting down fruit trees in order to lay siege in times of war. Two explanations of this prohibition are presented:

Rashi reads Is the tree of the field a man as a rhetorical question: Is the tree of the field a man, to go into the siege before you? This expresses the claim that a tree is not an enemy and therefore it cannot be destroyed and incorporated into the siege. It has rights that derive from its very existence and go beyond its connection to the human enemy. This explanation assumes that the tree has its own inalienable and intrinsic right to exist, and therefore its destruction is prohibited. A similar story can be found in the story of the Garden of Eden in the second chapter of Bereishit, according to which it is man's role to preserve creation.

The explanation For you may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down expresses the claim that fruit trees are properly exploited by eating their fruit, and their destruction is a waste that will eventually harm the troops themselves which are laying siege. This explanation views the prohibition as deriving from the fighting man himself. It accommodates the anthropocentric approach found in the first chapter of Bereishit, where man is granted both dominion over creation and the right to exploit it to fulfill his needs. This approach also obligates us to protect natural resources for future generations.

Thus, we see how a single verse contains two different rationales for humanity's ecological responsibility.

 

 

 

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