Mitzvah d'var

Should you always listen to G-d's commandments, even if it feels like the wrong thing to do? This is a question I had and am going to address in this D'var Torah.

But first I am going to tell you what Parshat Devarim is about. 

My parshah is the first portion of the Book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy is the last book of the Torah, and is a series of speeches given by Moses, to the Israelites right before they go into Israel and before he dies. He knows he is not going with them and in this portion, he wants to remind them of the many things they have been through to get to the promised land. This includes reminding them why they had to wander through the desert for 40 years, and why they had to avoid engaging in war with some tribes and then waging wars on others. Early in the portion, Moses reminds the people that G-d told him to appoint judges and leaders of the tribes. At the end of the portion Moses assigns each tribe a different portion of the land they conquered and that G-d promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 

I had a lot of questions about this Torah portion which has a fair amount of things in it that made me feel bad for some of the innocent people who died during the battles that killed two kings - Sihon and Og and everyone in their tribes who lived In Heshbon and Bashan, two places that were part of the land that G-d promised to the Israelites. Along the way, there were tribes that G-d instructed Moses to leave alone because they were descendants of Lot and Esau (EE-saw) - relatives of Abrahams but G-d wasn’t so generous to the Amorites. He instructs Moses to “doom everyone, men women, and children and retain as booty all the cattle and the spoils of the town.” This feels wrong to me- why would G-d order them to kill everyone and not just kill the people who were fighting? 

A big question in war and a big question right now is who do you kill during a war? You can just try to kill the people fighting, or the adults, or like in this situation, everyone who lived in the land. It’s a confusing question because it asks -is it right to kill innocent people to get your way, like bombing random places in a country or killing kids, or people that aren’t involved in a war, to try and weaken your opponent? Or kill those who could sometime in the future be fighting against you? 

In a commentary by Tzvi Freeman on Genocide in the Torah, he poses the following: 


"Q: If I was told that I could have pushed a button in 1932 and killed every adult Nazi, would I have? A: You bet. I would probably be traumatized for life by the event, but I would (hopefully) understand that it had to be done.

He continues by saying - 

Q: If I was told that I could have pushed a button in 1932 and killed every Nazi and every baby who would someday grow up to be a Nazi, would I have? A: No, honestly, I don’t think I could have done that.

Q: If I was living in Biblical times would I have participated in the slaughter of women and children? A: Obviously, the thought sickens me, as it should any decent human being. Of course, Torah values also mean that you obey G‑d’s law, even when you don’t understand. Here, I’m again at a loss.”   (END OF COMMENTARY)

The Israelites could have just beaten the armies of King Sihon, and King Og and kept walking to the holy land, but they killed everybody on G-d’s orders. Did the Israelites do this because of wanting to listen to G-d, or being scared of disobeying G-d? Were they making a bad decision, or was it just them not thinking straight? 

I think it’s the Israelites wanting to listen to G-d’s commandments, because if they didn’t, then G-d might have weakened them in some way. The big question though is - did the Israelites commit genocide, or were these people casualties of war? 

In this portion, we learn that before engaging in a war with the Amorites, Moses sent messengers to King Sihon asking if he would allow them to pass peacefully. According to the Rabbis, Moses made this decision on his own, and as a response, G-d hardened King Sihon’s heart and King Sihon denied the Israelites safe passage. King Sihon attacks and G-d makes sure that the Israelites win the battle. The same thing happens later on with King Og of Bashan - this is described in the section I just read from the Torah. 

In other words, they tried to go peacefully first through his land but had to fight when King Sihon rejected their offer to pass.  Maimonides, (a rabbi in the 12th century) supported Moses’ actions when in his commentary he said a Jewish nation can’t ever start a war with a country or group of some kind unless they have declined a peace treaty that you have offered them. Maimonides also said that education can take the place of war.

According to the Sages and Maimonides, Moses initiated peace talks with Sihon behind G-d’s back - because Moses felt that doing that was consistent with what he thought G-d would want him to do- knowing that G-d was loving and compassionate. In their commentary they claim that Moses secretly asking for peace is what G-d needed Moses to do, but then to make a point, like he did with the Pharaoh in Egypt at the time of the exodus G-d hardens Sihon's heart. While we don’t understand G-d’s motives it would seem from the portion G-d needed to appear powerful and for everyone hearing about the battles, to fear the Israelites so they would leave them alone. 

What would I have done if I was Moses, and G-d had commanded me and the Israelites to cross into Heshbon after a peace offering had been refused by King Sihon? Would I have done what Maimonides suggested - educate them to show them they were not in danger from us? 

Sihon might have said no even without G-d interfering because there was no gain for him to let the Israelites pass. Also, he had never met me and the other Israelites before, so he probably would not trust us or imagine how to live side by side with us. If he declined to let us cross the land, I would have told him why we would want to cross - because we needed to enter the Promised Land. I’d also say what Moses said to him, “Let us pass through your country. We will not turn aside into any field or vineyard, or drink water from any well. We will travel along the King’s Highway until we have passed through your territory”. One of the problems might have been that the Amorites and the Israelites did not worship the same G-d - the Amorites probably believed in many different gods and we didn’t. So King Sihon does not care about what our G-d has commanded us to do.

My next step would have been to try and make a trade with King Sihon. I would say “If we get to cross Heshbon, we will give you some money and cattle.” Hopefully, by offering him things of value he would have been convinced to let us through the land. This would be a fair deal in my opinion because he probably wouldn’t even notice us crossing his land. He might have wanted slaves, but I would decline that offer because we were already slaves in Egypt, and that would defeat the purpose of trying to be free.

If he declined the trade I would either offer more things of value or threaten him and his people. I’d tell him I’ve got about 2.5 million people who could destroy his tribe. I'd then say, we will either go through with the trade, or we will kill you and your tribe. If he and his army attacked us at any point, then I would order the Israelites to try and kill every person who fought us, but leave alive everyone that didn’t fight us. That’s the difference between me and what happened. This answers my initial question - I wouldn’t have followed G-d's commandment if it felt like such a bad thing to do, but if it wasn’t an extremely bad thing that G-d commanded me to do, then I’d listen to G-d. 

According to the portion, King Sihon attacked the Israelites, and the Israelites defeated them and doomed everyone to death. These details of the story bring me to an important question, was this a genocide? Since King Sihon attacked the Israelites, it would most likely be considered self-defense by the Israelites, so in my opinion it was not a genocide.

If you look back at all of the wars that have happened or are happening now no matter who initiated them, things mostly didn’t work out or aren’t working out for the armies and for the innocent civilians who are harmed. I think Maimonides was right, it is much better to seek peace first before going to war and to educate instead of killing.

What this means for me is learning how to stand up to things I don't agree with or think are right and helping those who are being targeted and abused because of something about them they cannot change, like their religion, race, or gender. It’s not easy for one person to end a war but imagine what would happen if we all stood up to something we didn't agree with, and made our voices heard. 

Shabbat Shalom