Parshas Vayeira

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Parshas Vayeira:

The Lawful Society of Sodom 
 
By: Rabbi Tzvi Price

 

 

This week’s Perspective is dedicated in memory of:
HaRav Moshe Aaron ben HaRav Tzvi Hersh z”l

may the Torah studied through this publication be an eternal zechus for his Neshama 
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THE LAWFUL SOCIETY OF SODOM
 
            What is the point of a law that society cannot or does not want to enforce? Although this question might at first sound more philosophical than practical, it has some very real ramifications. Currently, America is heatedly debating the legitimization of such social ills as drug use, gambling, abortion, euthanasia, and a host of other immoral behavior. Of course, these corruptions are not new to American society. However, only recently has there been a move to legalize and, ipso facto, validate them.

 
            Many, if not most, Americans consider these behaviors to be morally reprehensible. However, they are often convinced to back these sorts of initiatives. They are fed the argument that since the laws outlawing these conducts are not properly enforced in America for various reasons, these laws serve no purpose for society. They ask themselves, “Since so many people do these things and almost all of them get away with it, what’s the point of having these laws in the first place?” A lesson from this week’s Parsha tells us that this argument is fundamentally wrong.
 
            When Hashem wanted to determine how widespread Sodom’s depravity was, He sent two angels in the guise of travelers to the city. Lot, Avraham’s nephew, took these poor ‘men’ into his home at great risk to his life and the lives of his family members. Lot knew that, according to Sodomite law, inviting guests into one’s home was strictly forbidden and punishable by death. Unfortunately for Lot and his guests, word got out that he had invited strangers into his home. The entire city of Sodom, bar none, mobbed Lot’s house. The mob demanded that the strangers be handed over to them. They wanted to sodomize the strangers as was their hallowed custom (hence, the word ‘sodomize’). Only through Hashem’s miraculous intervention, were the two guests saved from the citizens of Sodom.
   
         Eerily, there is an episode chronicled in Sefer Shoftim (chap. 19) which sounds almost like a replay of this story. A man and his pilegesh (concubine) found themselves on the road at dusk. They turned into the nearby town of Gibeah to spend the night. Although they waited in the town square for some time, no one offered them any hospitality. Finally, an old man came from the field and offered them a place to stay in his house. After the guests had been in the old man’s house for a while, a gang of lawless men banged on the door and demanded that the old man hand over his male guest to them. This mob wanted to do to this man the same thing that the mob of Sodom had wanted to do to Lot’s guests. Seeing that he was in great danger, the man grabbed his pilegesh and pushed her out the door so that the mob would abuse her instead of him. The men brutally molested her and she died.
 
            The Baal HaAkeidah (Breishis 19:1) asks the obvious question. Why was Hashem so harsh in His punishment of Sodom and relatively lenient with the town of Gibeah? “Is there some kind of favoritism going on here?” asks the Baal HaAkeidah. The answer that he gives is both eloquent and profound:
 
“…A city that is surrounded by good statutes and enactments, and straight customs, though sometimes jackals may breach the fences and silence the laws; behold, please, this city is close to being healed and fixed. A man from the city will come, and two from a family, to rebuke the people and to awake their hearts. And they will return to their original strength. However, if the city has no fence, no enactments, no good customs, and certainly if it has a high wall of snakes, and scorpions, thorns and nestle, statutes that are not good, and laws that are not possible to live with…. Behold, in truth, this was the sin of Sodom…. They held evil and disgusting laws to be good laws and nailed them solidly in place with penalties so that no one would transgress them…. In contrast, the people of Gibeah had good laws. They just transgressed them for a time. That could be fixed….”
 
            The Malbim also asks this question and gives the same answer as the Akeidah. He writes, “The sin of the Sodomites was due to their intellect because they established bad laws, and accepted these laws upon themselves and their children as if they were good statutes and righteous laws, and a sinner like this will never be healed….”
 
           America is at a crossroads. It can keep on the books its good laws that forbid vice and immorality, though they are not enforced properly and are ignored by many. If that will be the case, then there is hope. If, however, it chooses to repeal these laws, and even enact new laws that validate aberrant behavior, then America has irretrievably thrown itself into a Sodom-like abyss.
 
           In the introduction to his classic work, the Shev Shmaitsa, Rabbi Aryeh Leib HaKohen Heller (the author of the K’tzos HaChoshen) quotes a statement from Chaza”l in the Sifri. The pasuk states “Judges and court officers you shall appoint in all your gates.” (Devarim 17:18) Say Chaza”l, “The appointment of worthy judges is enough to justify the giving of sustenance to all of Israel, and keeping them on their land….” The Shev Shmaitsa points out that the Sifri does not state that adherence to the laws of Choshen Mishpat is necessary for Hashem to provide Klal Yisroel with its needs, but simply the appointment of worthy judges alone is enough. He asks how this can be so.
 
            The Shev Shmaitsa answers this question by quoting our passage from the Baal HaAkeidah. He explains that Klal Yisroel’s appointment of worthy judges who study and espouse the laws of Choshen Mishpat shows that “Hashem’s laws are still on Klal Yisroel’s books.” The judges are there and they know His laws. All those that have lost their way can be exhorted to come back because there is something to come back to. There is yet hope for Klal Yisroel, for it has not fallen into the abyss. Therefore, it is worthy of being sustained.
 
            Truly, America is at a crossroads. No one can know which way it will go. Let us do all we can to ensure that Klal Yisroel does not follow America down that same path to the threshold of that same awful abyss. Let us make sure that “Klal Yisroel keeps the laws of Choshen Mishpat on its books.”

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