Torah Portion

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Maintaining The Pursuit
Of Life And Liberty

We also must strive for global eman-
cipation, in the words of the late Rabbi
Morris Adler of Congregation Shaarey
Zedek, "to cast light upon all corners of
the globe by giving force to the biblical
injunction to 'Proclaim liberty
throughout the land ...'"
30:11-16;
For those who are quick to dismiss
Kings 12:1-17.
the notion that there remains servitude
in our country, take stock of your own
lives. Are you enslaved? Are you unduly
dictated to by time, your job, peer pres-
his week's sedrah includes a
sure, social pressure and day-to-day liv-
larger group of laws and
ing? Are you so oppressed by these
ordinances that became the
intangibles that you cannot practice
core of the whole legal sys-
your religion meaningfully? Are you so
tem of Halachah. These laws reflect the
driven that your blinders keep you
moral as well as the legal aspects of
from
seeing the suffering of your fellow
Jewish jurisprudence.
man?
Leading off the legislative ordinances
Are you so shackled that you are
are several pertaining to the rights of
powerless to recognize the needs of oth-
people, specifically servants.
ers and to act to alleviate
It is coincidental that this
them? Are you so burdened
sedrah comes during a time of
by
the yoke of your need to
the year when we observe the
get,
to be, to do, that you
birthday of one of the great
cannot
appreciate the life
emancipators — Abraham
you
have?
Lincoln — and a week devot-
After all the laws are
ed to brotherhood.
enunciated in Mishpatim,
What the Torah does is to
Moses reads a statement of
humanize the institution of
ratification of these laws,
slavery, making the slave a
SEYMOUR
known
as the Book of the
member of the family rather
MANELLO
Covenant,
and reads them to
than the indentured slave of
Editorial Assistant
all
the
people.
When the
Lincoln's day. Jewish law
Torah
says
"all
the people," it
attempts to alleviate the lot of
doesn't mean just the elders or just the
the slave. The attitude, summarized by
men — it is all the people; they
the Rambam, is: "It is allowed to work
responded,
"We will do and we will
the slave hard but while this is the law,
understand."
The laws, then, are not
ethics and prudence suggest that a mas
just
for
our
judges
or our rabbis, but
ter should be just and merciful. A slave
for
us
all.
may not be maltreated or offended.
We must maintain the idea of indi-
The law destined them for service, not
vidual
commitment and responsibility
for humiliation."
to
the
laws
of Judaism. We must main-
Jewish tradition felt uneasy about
tain individual freedoms for ourselves
the whole subject of slavery. Though it
and others. It is then that we will truly
was a universal institution, some con-
understand the beauty of life as a Jew.
sciences were troubled by it. Philo in
Following Jewish law keeps us free
Alexandria asserted: "Servants are free
and
moral, protects the unprotected
by nature, no man being naturally a
and
brings
us closer to God and our
\ slave."
fellow
man.
We are asked to keep in mind that
the basic religious insight of Lincoln's
Emancipation Proclamation was an
unfaltering faith in the dignity of every
human being — a dignity that neither
government nor society can reduce.
Congregation Beth Achim will have a
We who are living so long after the
Tot
Shabbat 10-11 a.m. Saturday, Feb.
struggle of the Emancipation
28,
as
part of the city-wide Rekindling
Proclamation are not free to stop in our
\
Shabbat program. The service will be
vigilance or efforts to carry forth the
for children ages 3 through 5 and their
ideals of equality, freedom and human
families.
dignity for all. Any progress that has
After the service, participants are
been made cannot make us complacent;
invited attend to attend the regular ser-
for such complacency brings on back-
sliding that may rob us of whatever vali- vices in the sanctuary and join the con-
gregation for kiddush.
dation may have been accomplished.

Shabbat
Shekalim/Mishpatim:
Exodus 21:1-24:18;

II

T

❑

Beth Achim
Tot Shabbat

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