Learning To Rise Above the Hatred

Learning To Rise Above the Hatred

D'var Torah on Parashat Ki Teitzei--Deuteronomy 21:10--25:19

by Rabbi Boaz D. Heilman

A “limited war” is defined as the opposite of an all-out, total war. With less manpower and equipment resources going in and with goals defined as less than total destruction of the enemy, limited wars have been the norm during the second half of the 20^th century. Korea, Vietnam, the Arab-Israeli conflicts and the Iraq War are examples of “limited wars.”

Perhaps this style of warfare emerged as a result of the two world wars and the unimaginable destruction they brought about. The Cold War, in which the world’s superpowers squared off with neither side yielding to the other, preferring instead to duke it out in local, regional confrontations, led to at least some of these outbreaks of limited war.

But the term is misleading. First of all, it implies some sort of limit or conclusion. Yet, with the possible exception of the Vietnam War, none of the other limited wars of the 20^th century has come to any sort of conclusion. These regional conflicts still continue on an almost daily basis.

Secondly, even if “limited” refers to hoped-for boundaries or scope of the conflict, the term certainly doesn’t hold true when it comes to the unspeakable brutality and the immeasurable pain that are the result of even the most limited war.

Of all creatures of the earth, sky and water, not one other has begun to plumb the depths of depravity and cruelty we human beings have. Yes, we are capable of exalted achievements. We can create magnificent edifices of engineering, culture and art, of literature, architecture and science; but we also have invented an unbounded number of ways to torture, destroy and turn progress back to chaos.

I have been spared the direct effects of war. I was born after World War Two, after the Holocaust. Though I served in Zahal, the Israel Defense Force, I did so during a time of relative peace. I personally saw no “action.” However, even though I was a young child then, I do remember the Sinai Campaign of 1956, of having to shutter our windows, taping and covering them at night so no light shone out; I remember being awakened one night by an air-raid siren warning of an Egyptian aircraft that had reached Netanya, the city we lived in. I was almost seven, but the memory is still there. I also remember June, 1967, even though I was in the US by then. It was the first war my brother fought in, and I remember the sleepless nights my parents sat at the kitchen table in our Los Angeles apartment, waiting for a word from him. I was in Israel again for the War of ’73, the so–called Yom Kippur War, and the second war my brother fought in. There were the Intifadahs; the #37 bus in Haifa that my parents nearly took on the day that a terrorist detonated a bomb on it, killing seventeen people (most of them school children) and injuring 53 others. I remember the Gulf War, and the Second Lebanon War with its rain of Hizbollah-launched missiles falling all over Northern Israel—including Haifa, where I was that summer. And I remember “Red color,” the alert signal that sent the citizens of Sderot in the Negev scurrying for cover during the 7 years of incessant missile bombardment by Hamas terrorists.

The terrors and horrors of being witness to the brutalities of war are etched deeply in my soul.

I remember the hatred and intense desire for revenge I felt when a suicide bomber killed three little girls in a Tel Aviv shopping center during the holiday of Purim, 1996. I was at services at Hebrew Union College that morning when the news was announced. The rage I felt made my whole body tremble for a few moments—and then I understood. To the core of my being I began to comprehend a lesson I had learned earlier that day—how the Torah and the rabbis tried to control rage, forbidding blood-vengeance, placing limits and boundaries on the evil cravings that war and bloodshed bring out in us. It was a process that began with this week’s Torah portion, Ki Teitzei (“When you go out to wage war”), Deuteronomy 21:10—25:19.

Still, this parashah isn’t only about war. It’s also about how to be a human being—a mensch—invested and ennobled by God’s image of justice and compassion. It’s only the outer parts of the portion—the first few verses and the last—that actually deal with forbidden behavior during war. The rest of the portion gives scores of other examples, other times and occasions when we’re tempted by our basic instinct to take the easy—but wrong—path. Such as when we see a lost animal and think we can claim ownership; when we see a bird and its eggs in a nest on the ground—and think we can take both; or when the poor come to us in need and we think we can prey on them because, after all, they are weak and defenseless.

Yet, after all these commandments of noble—even holy—deeds, the parashah does return to the opening theme of war. Only this time, it’s a type of war that truly is limitless, without bounds. This is the war against Amalek, the tribe that attacked the Israelites during our wanderings in the Sinai Wilderness, concentrating their attacks on the rear of the camp, where the weak, the sick and the helpless were. “Remember that which Amalek did to you,” the Torah admonishes us. For the opposite of holy is evil, and the war on true evil, whether it comes from within ourselves or from some outside source, can never be “limited.” Evil knows no bounds; there is no finite limit to its depth or depravity. Our war against evil must know no bounds either.

Ki Teitzei is like an exercise regimen. It teaches us to hold back our rage. At the same time, this portion makes us practice acts of kindness repeatedly, in one case after another, until we realize that menschlichkeit, the ability to remain human despite all the evil we see around us, comes only when we learn to be in charge of our emotions.

This is no easy task for us human beings, so easily manipulated by charismatic leaders, so simply swayed by our passions. It isn’t enough to merely control our hatred. We have to counter the hate with love. We have to balance—and even overcome—the injustice with compassion. And that takes constant training.

© 2010 by Boaz Heilman