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In Defense of Decency

Shabbat Zakhor 5780 / 7 March 2020

March 10, 2020

This morning’s special maftir Torah reading is a tough one to wrap our heads around. Taken from the book of Deuteronomy, it appears to call upon the Israelites to carry out full-scale genocide: “When the Lord your God grants you safety from all your enemies around you… you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.” In the haftarah for Shabbat Zakhor, the prophet Samuel makes this explicit in his charge to King Saul: “Go, attack Amalek, and proscribe all that belongs to him. Spare no one, but kill alike men and women, infants and sucklings, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys!” Not exactly the picture we like to have of God or the Jewish People – and we’re not the first generation of Jews to wrestle with what this all means.

The fifth chapter of Pirkei Avot opens with a seemingly innocent observation: בַּעֲשָׂרָה מַאֲמָרוֹת נִבְרָא הָעוֹלָם, “The universe was created through ten statements.” For years, whenever I studied Pirkei Avot I would breeze past this line; it seemed like merely a setup for the conclusion of the passage, a self-evident fact about Genesis that we could all see for ourselves but that needed to be stated outright in order for the remainder of the teaching to flow properly. That, however, turns out to be far too shallow of a reading.

In his teaching for Shabbat Zakhor, the Hasidic master Reb Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev famously proposes a psychological reading of the story. According to Reb Levi Yitzhak, rather than an actual nation we are supposed to wipe out, Amalek is a characterological tendency within each person – even Jews, even great rabbis – which we are each required to subdue in order to ensure that our better inclinations will prevail. Less well-known is the conclusion of his teaching: he highlights the power of speech as the defining Jewish power in the world. The way we use our voices, for study and for prayer, defines us as people and as the Jewish People. And it is from within that power, specifically, that we must root out the Amalek’s insidious evil.

Out of all the nations, throughout history, who have attacked and persecuted the Jews, what is it about Amalek that warrants their singular punishment of complete annihilation? How are we to make sense of the Torah’s command to wipe out Amalek when, just a few chapters earlier in the same parashah, the Torah forbids us to discriminate against an Egyptian because we were sheltered in their land – despite the Egyptians’ going on to enslave and oppress our people for hundreds of years? 

The justification lies within this morning’s maftir. While the original story in the book of Exodus focuses Moses and Joshua’s leadership during the battle itself, in Parashat Zakhor Moses reflects on the nature of the battle: אֲשֶׁ֨ר קָֽרְךָ֜ בַּדֶּ֗רֶךְ וַיְזַנֵּ֤ב בְּךָ֙ כָּל־הַנֶּחֱשָׁלִ֣ים אַֽחַרֶ֔יךָ וְאַתָּ֖ה עָיֵ֣ף וְיָגֵ֑עַ וְלֹ֥א יָרֵ֖א אֱלֹהִֽים׃, “how, undeterred by fear of God, he surprised you on the march, when you were famished and weary, and cut down all the stragglers in your rear.” Unlike other aggressors, Amalek’s attack focused on the weak and defenseless, the people who had fallen behind the main Israelite convoy. Faced with the abject weakness of former slaves on an arduous journey, Amalek felt no compassion whatsoever – only contempt.

The Mishnah’s statement, בַּעֲשָׂרָה מַאֲמָרוֹת נִבְרָא הָעוֹלָם, “The universe was created through ten statements,” 10  offers us far more than a synopsis of Genesis, chapter one; it suggests a powerful and potentially dangerous truth about the world. God’s choice to create the world through the pathway of speech invests speech itself with the power to create – and along with the power to create necessarily comes the power to destroy. Our own words, then, have the power to create and destroy. The choice lies with each of us as to how we will use them.  

Amalek emerges when we allow our words to target the vulnerabilities in others. No person is without some weakness, some part that cannot be fully protected. We all know, to our shame, how easy it can be to zero in on those weaknesses when we find ourselves in conflict with others; how tempting to use every soft spot as a way to gain traction and score points. But this morning’s maftir screams, No! The Jewish way rejects Amalek wholeheartedly, not just as a way of life but even as a momentary tactic. There are times where greater considerations might lead us to condone a falsehood, to bend certain rules or suspend ordinary principles. When it comes to Amalek, however – the abuse of others’ vulnerabilities – the Torah commands us never to yield. Here is the place where the Torah draws a thick, eternal line in the sand: לֹ֖א תִּשְׁכָּֽח, “Never forget!” 11 

I found myself thinking about these questions a lot this week as the Democratic primary field narrowed and public attention began to shift even more toward the general election. To live fully as Jews we must vote as Jews; we must make choices at the ballot box that will bring us closer to the world the Torah would like to see us create. These choices are never easy; it’s hard to think of a candidate whose every position and policy leads in the directions Jewish values ask of us. Reb Levi Yitzhak’s insight into parashat Zakhor, however, reminds us that how we speak – and the kinds of public speech we support – are of utmost importance. Among all the problems our country faces at the moment, one of the most severe, and potentially most destructive, is a crisis of decency. As Jews, we must demand that our elected leaders return decency and dignity to public discourse – even when others in the conversation will not do the same. On this question, the Torah demands our utmost vigor: the ways of Amalek, targeting weaknesses in others to score victory for ourselves, can never be tolerated.

1-Deut. 25:19.
2-1 Samuel 15:3.
3- Pirkei Avot 5.1.
4- Kedushat Levi, Parashat Zakhor.
5- Deut. 23:8.
6- Cf. Shai Held, The Heart of Torah, Ki Tetse’ #2.
7- Deut. 25:18
8-Jeffrey Tigay, JPS Torah Commentary: Deuteronomy, 235-237; Held, 2:257; Ibn Ezra, Deut. 25:18; Bekhor Shor, Deut. 25:18; Ralbag Deut. 25:18.
9- Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch, The Hirsch Chumash, Deut. 25:18.
10- Pirkei Avot 5.1.
11- Deut. 25:19.

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