Rav Joseph B. Soloveitchik on Responsibility: Chizuk for Iron Sword from Rabbi Dr. Ahron Adler

good morning bov um at this moment if not for the fact that I we committed for this particular Shure I actually would have been on my way to Har Herzel unfortunately there's a price to be paid in every single War we all know that we all understand that the bitter price that we all paid a month ago before we entered the war was just um beyond belief and now that we are committed to a ground operation Gaza in a holding operation in the north we unfortunately have sustained several losses every single person Soldier civilian alike is an entire world and the Mish tells us in that the world would have been created for every single individual and that is why Kosh does not have any human being look like the next one every person is different every person is unique and it would have been worthwhile for a kadh to create the world for each and every one of us individually and that's why the tell us in the mishna that kadosh creates the world with one person with Adam and not with 10,000 or 10 million individuals but somehow when you happen to know the people involved whether it's the person who has fallen whether it's the family who you're acquainted with it's extremely painful and this is a country where small country and everybody knows everybody it's almost like um an oversized Bungalow colony where everybody knows sometimes too much about the Affairs of the next one and sometimes a lack of privacy but there's a lot of good to that as well because for those who are really engaged in the suffering itself they know that they're not alone and there are so many people with them to support them to join them to empathize with them it's very very difficult each name is important but I'm just going to name one kayal who fell yesterday in Gaza who I personally acquainted with the family yav RZ lein his father ala Shalom was a friend of mine Mor Dr morai Lenin from my Beva days someone who HED from Toronto came in alah moved to Yim when we did and then moved on to malim unfortunately succumbed to illness several years ago his son fell yesterday his mother his mother is the sister of myet from tmon so we know the family some of you may know the grandparents the Solomon family from talbia it's a very very hard moment for anybody who knows anybody in the war and it's a hard moment for all of us just to hear this the news in the morning about the next set of names that unfortunately have been reported yet when we talk to the families and theim and sometimes some of these Kim left legacies with notes to their families about how strong we should be it gives each and every one of us you know some type of some type of strengthening uh to continue not to let go and that's how we are as a people one of the issues that has indeed surfaced in the last month has to do with taking responsibility believe me I'm not going to utilize the few minutes that we have together to engage in a blame game we'll leave that to the politicians and hopefully at the end of the war now is not the time to engage in the issues of who's responsible for this and who is responsible for that but to talk about the essence of responsibility that's clearly something that uh I believe is part of our mandate it's interesting that within the both the political and the military uh worlds there have been those who've come forth some earlier some later by accepting responsibility and said saying okay but now let's move on and win this war and we'll deal with the responsibility issues will deal with the various investigations that will take place at a later date and I believe that that is correct that is the proper approach I don't believe that now is the time to call for the um any type of replacement of anybody in government now just not the time to to deal with these kind of issues but with regard to the question itself about the essence of responsibility so that things should be clear in our own minds how Ric many many years ago addressed the issue from the point of view of seit you just can't get a book in the Torah that speaks of responsibility of than the book of Brit we're going to highlight some of those uh issues that the r pointed out and what we can learn from that one of the issues of um one of the issues of responsibility has to do with a leader who has to be trained to what leadership is all about you know that Yakov ainu he he knew that Yosef was going to be a leader and hence as a youngster Yosef is in training for leadership and our our sages have taught this to us many many things that have to do with parv we know that in parad VV ysf is is a youngster he's 17 years old and he sold into slavery into to Egypt and ultimately as the Torah tells us he actually Rises to power and he becomes the vice King in Egypt and responsible for all the uh economics during the days of hunger in mitzraim Egypt the idea that yov is training Yosef is born out at the almost the end the climactic side of the story where the brothers return to the land of Canan and they reveal this great news to the father Yakov that OD Ys Y is still alive and here for 22 years yov is living with the thought that ysf is dead he's been killed by a ferocious animal and in Torah states that yob feels he's going to die in mourning there's just no way to console him by is going to die a mourner and here after 22 years the brothers come back from Egypt and they report that yoseph is alive and not just alive perhaps surviving in some dungeon in Egypt he's a leader in all of Egypt it's very difficult for yob to accept the news except there is a clinching moment that Yakov realizes yeah this this is actually true because the Torah says that yov recognizes the truth of the story when he sees the AAL sh sees the wagons that y sent what's so startling about the wagons that y sent I mean here he's being told jakob's being told that yose is a leader and he's a political leader he's second to the king so of course he has some limousines at his disposal that he'll be able to send to ER Canan to bring bring down the family that's that's not something that should be so shocking except that several verses earlier we actually told that the one who sent down the AAL the wagons to transport the family down to Egypt was actually parro the king himself and not ysf so why does the Torah tell us that when yov sees the wagons that y sent down jakov's spirit is rejuvenated yov is convinced finally that yoseph is actually alive so Rashi tells us that the word aala is a play on word with an interesting that's found in the end of of the book of the section of what is Raji tells us inash that yov remembered the last lesson that he and ysep were discussing before Yosef was sold into cap was abducted and sold into slavery and that was the section of is very strange par where the Torah tells us that if a a a a dead body is found assumably murdered between two cities it didn't happen in a city it happened in the outside of the city so theim the elders the leaders of the two closest cities have to engage in a type of measurement which was the closest city to this Anonymous dead body no one has a clue who he was and he was killed out there between cities and they have to go through these these Elders have to go through a ceremony where you take a calf inel and the calf is beheaded by a river it's very strange ceremony and then there's a declaration by these Elders that while well we didn't murder him nevertheless we the leaders are going to ask forgiveness we will will ask God for forgiveness why because if something like this happened to between two cities and and an anonymous person was murdered that shows that there's some decadence in society something's wrong we failed in our leadership by educating every single person to the value of life and this is a message for leaders to understand that if something like this happened it's very very easy to point fingers at a variety of uh reasons that may have brought about the murder of this a Anonymous person but you most probably would look to the elders the diim the judges the Educators the top people who represent the spiritual life that they should be held responsible and yet the talk as they do and this was a message that yov is inculcating into his son y by preparing him to be a leader don't forget that the responsibility is on top and this was the last lesson say our sages that Yakov teaches y the message of the parisha of UA so when y sends back the AAL the wagons to transport yakob and his family down to Egypt the AAL become a coded message of the of that which was taught 22 years earlier by yov to Y the message of leadership this is the first uh message and the truth of the matter is you have the very notion that Yakov gives and provides Yosef with the konet Pim the multicolored garment striped garment what was this all about I mean this was a garment that um caused immense jealousy amongst the brothers and ultimately that jealousy grew to the extent that they first want to perhaps kill him but ultimately they sell him down to Egypt and literally want to dispose of him what was behind theim so it had nothing to do with fashion it had nothing to do with yov giving his almost favorite son a wonderful beautiful birthday gift at age 17 it had to do with the symbolism of what this was all about ysf is being trained that as a leader never to forget that the audience the community at large that you are now leading they're not robots programmed in identical ways but rather human beings are all different and it's almost reminiscent of what our say in with regard to just as two faces are not identical so two two people people's opinions are not identical and indeed we have different opinions here different people and yoseph had to understand that as a leader he has to take into consideration that the people at hand are very different and they have different a points of view and different needs and and this is something rather essential for a leader uh to undertake but it goes beyond that the idea of a leader assuming responsibility for the moral climate of the people is not only a evident in Thea ARA par but there's another para that's rather similar in terms of the message of responsibility and it has to do with someone who's involved in an act of homicide so we know that there's a difference between uh a uh there's a difference between someone who um is is is m is a murderer first-degree murder and that's called R in modern Hebrew but uh in legal terms somebody who's involved in homicide which means that he didn't get up in the morning to kill somebody but he ended up causing the death of somebody uh that's called Hara it has a different status certainly a different status not only in the world of uh law but certainly but in the world of Torah as well a difference between intentional murder and this unintentional murder and with regard to unintentional murder so the Tor speaks of the six cities the AR mlat where the person who um killed somebody unintentionally and and that could be perhaps um given as an example somebody who killed somebody in a car accident in a car accident the person didn't get up in the morning to kill someone but ended up killing somebody so it wasn't something that he that he planned to do but because of some degree of negligence he ended up killing somebody and that person in the days of old would have to run to the city of refugees of AR mlat and he would have to live there for the rest of his life until the demise of the K it was very strange because if if um if we were dealing with uh somebody who um deserved a a a punishment and the Torah would say all right let him spend 10 years in the AR mlat we would understand that it would make no difference for one murderer to another murder not a murderer somebody who killed inadvertently to another person who killed inadvertently you get your 10 years you get your 20 years you get you five years whatever it is the to could have spelled it out how many years this person would be in Exile basically galut in Exile from his family for that amount of years to a certain degree it's being imprisoned imprison you know that the the British in the 19th century had this great idea very benevolent idea to not to have some of the prisoners that they had in prisons but to ship them off to Australia and figuring that Australia they're far away from England and they can live their lives almost freely within the framework of living in a different on a different continent and here arlot is a concept where the person is in prison but he's not really behind bars he he can live in in in the context of the city but um he can't leave but when when is his license to leave when the coal dies now the coal might die the next week or he might die 50 years later I mean the the the amount of time that this this person who killed inadvertently is going to sit in the in in the AR mlat is dependent upon the longevity of the which is rather strange and can you imagine what the was doing day in and day out in the aric he was saying till that the co should have a heart attack and die tomorrow because his freedom was directly dependent upon the death of the K so the med says that the mother of the co would actually go to the mlat and and feed the with all kinds of goodies that um that he should stop daving for the death of her son I mean so much so but what's really behind this idea until the death of the co that if there is negligence amongst the population then somebody who is responsible for the education of the generation is actually at fault and what does the K have to do with this so we know that the sh Le the sh Lei was entrusted with education of the population right and the idea that the um um the idea that not just the who were given their 48 cities throughout AR Israel from north to south and they were to educate the population but also the kohanim people because you have to realize kohanim and the viim who had tasks at the BET mikdash were on duty in B mikdash for no more than two weeks a year that's all they needed them for they were a type of miluim a type of reserve duty but for 50 years weeks during the year they were the Educators and who was the top educator no one but the kadong he was the S the minister of Education of all of is and that's what is said in the book of Mali where he says in the second chapter something about the lips of the Kain that we are to draw Torah knowledge and there are many many parim who associate this p with none other than aain who was the first Kain G and we know that when we talk about Torah learning we're also talking about Torah behavior and one of the ideas of Torah Behavior has to do with responsibility and guarding from negl Ence the um when the RAB talks about the laws of murder for example it's entitled here are the laws of murder or killing and prevention guarding of Life which means guarding and preventing accidents is no less important than studying the laws of murder because that will ultimately prevent murder and hence in the context of r that's where the Ra's going to talk about all the laws of of of the person who kills inadvertently and hence it would be the coad who ass assumes top responsibility for any type of uh Act of of of of of of of killing even on the level of inadvertent fish gate in society and that's why the person who goes to the irat will remain there until the death of the coad it must be perfectly clear to all that there is this level of responsibility but if we go back to saer the book of Brit we have again uh a a detail within the story of Yosef so we know that Joseph was is sent to the prison after the episode with the wife of potifar and he meets up with the uh two ministers who are also thrown into jail the butler the sarim and the baker the sarim but they're not just butlers and Bakers the SAR maskim is the Minister of drinks which means he's not a bartender in any sense of the word he is responsible for all the wines that are going to come into the Palace of parro and has the assign task an honorable task of presenting the the Goblet of wine to parro himself that must have been an an actually great honor the butler the the Baker on the other hand he wasn't somebody who sat there next to the oven or sat there kneading dough and the sarim was the kitchen manager he was responsible for the entire operation of of baking so you know we all know that there are home kitchens and we'll have our home kitchens with whatever uh appliances and utensils that we have and then there are also public kitchens so the Public Kitchen could be a restaurant the Public Kitchen could be a school and and and and it could be an army base um a hotel whatever it is a public kitchen and uh we know that public kitens are usually much larger than anything that we may even imagine in our own homes when with sometimes different utensils and different appliances and more sophisticated appliances and so on and usually have a team of perp people working there and so on one of the great things that I had a I say a great SW that I had in in this country was for 16 years uh having to Casher kitchens in in the Air Force base near Beva in the town of Kim the Air Force Base called Kim um it it wasn't the small kitchen that was massive massive kitchens to to to kha so I say this because I assume that the kitchen in the house of parro was also not a kitchenet was a massive huge kitchen providing food for the entire Palace and so on so the sarim he's the kitchen manager and the Tora tells us that the two of them the s s thrown jail because they sinned they sinned so Rashi quoting a midash actually acces us into what the great sin was what the great sins were of the sarkim sarim so it says that with the SAR maskim as the butler was was presenting the Gava the Goblet the wine goblet the Royal go goblet to the king um par noticed that a fly had dropped into the wine and uh you know that wasn't aesthetically too pleasing as you can imagine and he was extremely extremely upset and he threw the SAR maskim into jail and what happens with the sarim is that the Paro takes a bite into his warm bunman and he almost cracks a teeth tooth on a pebble that was baked into the into that piece of bread and he summons the sarim and throws him into jail as well now with the toah reports that three days later parro is celebrating his birthday and he takes the SAR maskim and sarim out of jail SAR maskim is restored to his position and the sarim the baker is hanged okay that is um these the this this result is is is exactly the way um yoseph interprets the dreams of the SAR maskim and Sim and it's exactly what happens what salic asks is what was fundamentally different between the the AA if you may of the SAR maskim that he's now restored to um to his position and parro is willing to Grant him full clemency as opposed to the SAR who gets hanged for what he does the idea that parro threw both of them into jail for a few days that was because par himself realized that he was so upset with what had happened that day he didn't think that he would be able to proceed calmly and logically and therefore he needed a cooling off period he needed those three days and after three days of a cooling off period he was able to realize that the sarkim was not really responsible for what happened I mean my gosh the man is holding a Gava is holding a goblet ready to present it to Paro and some fly from the sky takes a a dive right into the Goblet of wine you can't hold a human being responsible for the action of a fly dropping into a goblet so while it was aesthetically very much not pleasing at the moment but you can't hold the SAR maskim responsible for that and hence Paro restores the SAR maskim back to his position however with regard to the the the the piece of bread the RO the lman that had a little Pebble in it what what has to be done here so you may think what has to be done is we have to open up an investigation and go into the kitchen and go into ledgers of all the workers of the kitchen who exactly was on duty when flow was being sifted that would ultimately make make the dough that ultimately baked into the roll who's responsible who didn't catch the pebble from going into the um into the dough and we can most probably figure it out after some type of investigation and punish that particular slave or servant for for his Mis action not catching the pebble but par doesn't that parai takes the manager of the kitchen the SAR Finn and he pays royally with his hanging he's put to death he's executed for this what is the level the lesson of the Torah we're today towards the end of the month ofan in um you know about a week and a half's Time almost two weeks time will be the fourth of klave it's will be a week from Friday in 12 days time the fourth of klave the fourth of klave doesn't mean much to most people unless it perhaps is their birthday or perhaps there's a yard site in the family but there there is a yard site here in Israel on the fourth of klave it happened back in 1987 1987 there was an Army base a not far from kacha in the north of the country very close to the Lebanese border and a terrorist came over in a glider in a motorized glider known as a Galan air and he came with With Grenades and weapons and all that and flew into an army base and this terrorist went into the tents and murdered six and wounded another 10 there was much investigation until finally some of theim there mow him down the there was there was tremendous investigations that went on who is respons who was responsible for this was it the the fellow the at the Gate of the of of the base who should have seen this Galan this uh this glider fly by and and and alert immediately was it somebody perhaps in keeping their eyes on Lebanon who should have noticed this happening earlier in the game perhaps it's somebody higher in the high in the echelons of military command who should have perhaps known from intelligence reports that this could possibly have happened is it somebody who's even higher than that officer does it go all the way to the commander of the northern front does it go all the way to the chief of staff does it go all the way to the Minister of Defense does it go up to the Prime Minister who's responsible for this we call a m for what happened on the fourth of klave back in 1987 who is responsible I remember that day I remember that day what became known as the night of the Galan the night of the of of the entry of this Mel I remember them and you know who ultimately took the wrap that one low ranking soldier at the gate known as the shin giml the sh gader the shin and this became known as the tonet Hashim the syndrome the shin giml syndrome of pinning responsibility on the lowest in the totem pole of responsibility nobody in the higher levels of the army assumed responsibility and there was a public outcry a public outc in those days because the only one who took the rap was one soldier and he spent a year and a half in military prison for his role in allowing the Galan to come into the base and causing this um tragic uh uh result of six dead and 10 wounded ton did not know of the story of 1987 he taught what he taught at least in my years in the late 60s and in the 70s and he taught Kish and he T taught the story of the Sarah ofin why the baker why the kitchen manager paid royally and they did not investigate down to the last slave or servant in the kitchen who was responsible for the pebble that was does not siphon out of the flower and it makes it into the dough which makes it into the rooll that parro cracks a tooth on who was it not the lowest in the totem pole but the highest ranking person who's responsible for the kitchen activities the sarin this is where the responsibility lay and hence the tah was teach teaching us here a tremendous lesson of responsibility and and you know this goes on to a the last dimension of leadership I'd like to mention this morning is that a leader must necessarily Encompass or personify the entire nation we have this with mosenu he shaked he's equivalent to the entire nation the rub once pointed out that when ham and he wants to punish mulai he wants to punish mulai for not bowing down to him but he's not's it's not enough to punish Mori he wants to punish the entire nation that morai comes from why because morai is referred to as am morai the nation of morai because morai personifies the entire uh people and even within the framework of the laws of monarchy the laws of of leadership the rambam tells us about the king of Israel Leal is he his heart must beat the heartbeat of the entire nation and it's true as well for the coing Gad we mentioned Co gadal earlier because the co wore the Kosen the breastplate and on the Kosen he had the names of all of theim and so on but we know that the co also carried another two stones on his shoulder on the a where it said six names on one side and six names of the other of the tribes of Israel so why did the coal carry the names twice the answer is that on the on the aod on the two stones on his shoulder he was carrying the scene of all of am Israel there was a scene once when am Isel split into six against six and that was at harim and haral as the Tor tells us in so this is the message of the co representing the totality ofel but on his heart on his heart he had to have theen Alo because there he represented each and every Jew not just Ruan who was the son of yov but every Ru of am and every Shimon ofel and every Ley of Amel the co represented the the the needs and the worries of every individual and the r said that on the paraa of this week that we read yesterday so we had the from well there we have stories about Elish and they seem to be stories that have nothing to do with CLA Israel there's a a woman who's a a a widow and she's in trouble financially and Alicia intercedes to help her out and then there's a story of the is who has no children and then finally with a blessing of Alisha he does she does have a child who then dies as a child and Alicia was able to somehow bring about the child's resuscitation Alisha was involved in theot in the worries in the difficulties in the pains in the anguish of individual people and you might think this is Alisha hanavi this is somebody who's representing aosh on the big level we call the macro nope the to the navi teaches us that even on the micro on the small level the Davi was interested being in involved in helping helping Jews and the r said that's the connection to parad which opens up with a scene of it was Abraham ainu who in his tent a tent was open on all four doors so that he shouldn't miss a potential visitor so much so he shouldn't miss a visitor coming from any other direction but the RS are of the opinion The Four Doors weren't just Geographic d directions but they were all different types of people abrino was not just interested in inviting his type of person people who belong to his community people who Daven like him who wear the same stria like him who wear the same kipa like him or don't wear a kipa like him that's not what abrah Ain was interested he wanted to invite everybody all types of people because that is the mark of a true leader who understands the needs of every single person and and and not just deals with the with the larger the larger picture hopefully hopefully our country will mature will mature in the aftermath of the great tragedy we sustained a month ago and hopefully Kosh will give us all the strength to see the a great a great great momentous Victory not only on the battlefield but more so in the king of omn Israel into one great nation that will have great leaders who will take care and and and and pay attention not only to the larger cause and the larger needs but also to the needs of so many individuals who are going to need help after the are in rebuilding their lives um their homes their families and it's going to be uh a tremendous challenge for but at the end of the day we should hear for all of us our surroundings in all of Cl Israel shalom