What to Leave in, What to Leave Out

Mishpatim
Exodus 21:1 - 24:18

Précis: Having received, in the previous parasha, the Ten Commandments, Moses now reveals ordinances (mishpatim) needed to flesh out the legal system. The first group relate to the rights of servants (slaves), followed by rules about murder, crimes against parents, personal injury law, injury caused by animals, offenses against property, and bailment. A list of moral offenses follows, including seduction, witchcraft, sexual perversion, polytheism, and oppression of the “widow, the orphan, and the stranger among you.” The parasha includes the command to observe a sabbatical year, the Shabbat, and then lists the requirements for the observance of the pilgrimage festivals (Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot). The command not to boil a kid in its mothers’ milk is mentioned, and at the conclusion of the parasha, we find a ceremony where the People, represented by Moses and 70 elders, have an encounter with the Divine Presence and accept the laws and the Covenant.

Exodus 21:1 - “Now these are the rules you shall set before them…”

This parasha is also known as the Book of the Covenant, because of its length and because of the great number of mitzvot contained in the reading. It begins with a relatively simple and straightforward statement of intent: “These are the rules that you shall set . . .” What follows is the lengthy list of specific “dos and don’ts” of a code of law by which we are to order our lives. Let’s be presumptuous and ask the question “why” we observe mitzvot.

For some, the question of “why” we observe mitzvot is simply answered, “Because God has commanded us to do so.” For others, a more nuanced answer can be found in a traditional Jewish concept of “shleimut” which can be translated as “wholeness” or “completeness.”

Our tradition acknowledges that there is a difference between what is holy (kadosh) and what is mundane (chol). The tradition instructs us that to attain wholeness – shleimut – we have to take both aspects of existence into account. A “whole” life cannot be lived by ignoring the day-to-day mundane, nor can a “complete” life be lived without an appreciation of the holy.

Many of the mitzvot of this parasha deal with the daily requirements of a civil society, while others seem to have no rational basis, and seem aimed at some unknowable element of the holy. I maintain that we can achieve real completeness only by recognizing that the holy and the ordinary, the spiritual and the physical, the knowable and the unknowable are all part of a single existence we inhabit. The search for shleimut is the subtext for the mitzvot of this parasha.

There is no doubt that day to day life is a challenge: our families, our jobs, what the singer Bob Seger called “deadlines and commitments, what to leave in, what to leave out.” Finding “life balance” is a serious matter for many of us. We may be too “busy” to see to the needs of those we love and care about, or to those to whom we owe a duty. We can even overlook those aspects of our own well-being (be it eating, exercise, study, or worship) that are important parts of shleimut. Hillel famously said, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me?” This was not a selfish declaration. Rather, it means that “If I am not for myself, I cannot be able to help others.” By seeking shleimut, we try to find a completeness that gives us the ability to help and love others.