Hukkat Shabbat
July 5, 2008
I want to thank Rabbi Eric Polokoff for some of the references I’m using.
In our Haftarah reading we met a man named Yiftah who made a really disastrous decision.
First of all, as you know every Shabbat we read from the second section of our Tanakh, the Neviim, or Prophets. The first several books are not actually about prophets but about the Israelites leaving the desert and moving into the Land of Israel. It was not a smooth process by any means. As long as Joshua was alive and leading the Israelites, they were able to maintain the worship of God and the camaraderie among themselves.
But when Joshua died and there was no one to take on the sole leadership of the people, things begin to fall apart and that falling apart is discussed in horrifying detail in the book of Judges. And that’s where our story comes from today.
Yiftah was, we are told, a mighty man of valor and the son of Gilad. But Yiftah’s mother was a prostitute and so he was rejected by all of his brothers who sent him away. But when the Ammonites attacked Israel, the brothers came back to him and asked him to lead them into war.
Yiftah agreed on the condition that they brothers made him chief over all Israel. The said yes, immediately because they knew he was a fierce and mighty warrior and would win the war.
We are also told of Yiftah that when he was an outcast, idle men gathered around him. Those men were not evil, they didn’t go around inciting trouble, rather they would hang out by the city gates and do nothing all day long. This is important because Yiftah’s laziness, his lack of pursuing knowledge about Jewish law led him to make his disastrous mistake.
As Yiftah was ready to begin the battle with the Ammonites, he made an oath. He promised if God allowed him success in battle and he returned home safely whatever came out of the door of his house to meet him, he would sacrifice as a burnt offering to God. He won the war, arrived home and his only daughter was the first to come out of the house, running to congratulate her father on his victory. Yiftah was properly horrified but was determined to follow through with his vow.
Our rabbis looked at this story with horror. They said that Yiftah was to blame for this child’s death. They said that if a donkey, a dog or a cat, none of which are animals that can be sacrificed, had come out of his door first, he certainly would not have made them a burnt offering. It would not be acceptable. There were already laws about which animals could be sacrificed and which could not. Yiftah was unfortunately too unlearned in Jewish law to know that his vow was automatically null and void.
But even worse that that, Yiftah was so filled with false pride that he would not go to anyone who could give him the information he needed. He was horrified that he was about to kill his only daughter but not so horrified that he would look for a way to nullify his vow.
The Rabbis are equally shocked by the actions, or rather inactions of Pinchas, the High Priest. He could certainly have gone to Yiftah and explained his mistake and the daughter would have been saved. But our rabbis tell us that Pinchas said, ‘He needs me, and I should go to him? He should come to me!’ And Yiftah said: ‘I am the Head Officer of Israel. I should go to Pinchas? He should come to me!’ Between the two of them the girl was lost…”
Yiftah’s daughter was sacrificed not just because of religious zealotry, nor just because of religious ignorance. Yiftah’s daughter died as a direct consequence of arrogance, false pride and willful conceit.
It’s ironic that Yiftah’s name means “he will open.” Rather than opening, he closed the door for himself and his family.
How often do we close rather than open doors because we do not allow ourselves to get the information or education we need? How often are we too prideful to reach out to others and say we don’t know? An even worse scenario is when, like Yiftah, we do not even know that our understanding is wrong. We can hope that our ignorance will not cause as horrible a disaster as the one that Yiftah created but any ignorance can cause trouble for us and for others.
How can we gain the correct information and knowledge if we don’t even know we need it?
We have to remain open to the pieces of news and information that are always around us. We have to seek out experts, those people who know more than we do about the subjects we have questions about. We have to be open to information that we hear even when, maybe especially when, it doesn’t fit with what we already believe to be true. We owe it to ourselves, our families, our communities to have the knowledge that is correct and relevant to our lives. We cannot be like Yiftah, refusing to ask for help or knowledge when we need it. Nor can we be like Pinchas refusing to help people when we see what they need.
We learned from our Torah portion a few weeks ago that we have a second chance at making the Passover offering. If we cannot make it during the month of Nissan, we have a second chance a month later in Iyar.
God gives us second chances. When we paint ourselves into a corner, we have to look for the information, knowledge or advice that we need to make the right decision for ourselves and those around us. We have to take those second chances, let go of our arrogance and find out the right things to do.