Go Home First

The shofar started this week. Every weekday morning in Elul — the month before Rosh Hashanah — Jewish communities sound the ram's horn. No specific message. Just: pay attention. Something is coming.

We have been home for about a month after a summer that covered Israel twice, Poland, Vienna, Venice, Rome, Rotterdam, Athens, and more airplanes and trains than I care to count, the sound of the shofar in a familiar sanctuary is a particular kind of anchor. Nothing moved. The chairs are the same. The siddur is the same. I am not.

The parsha this Shabbat is Shoftim — "Judges." It opens the most constitutional section of Deuteronomy, a blueprint for the society Israel is about to build:

שֹׁפְטִ֣ים וְשֹֽׁטְרִ֗ים תִּֽתֶּן־לְךָ֙ בְּכׇל־שְׁעָרֶ֔יךָ אֲשֶׁ֨ר יְהֹוָ֧ה אֱלֹהֶ֛יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לְךָ֖ לִשְׁבָטֶ֑יךָ וְשָׁפְט֥וּ אֶת־הָעָ֖ם מִשְׁפַּט־צֶֽדֶק׃

You shall appoint magistrates and officials for your tribes, in all the settlements that the ETERNAL your God is giving you, and they shall govern the people with due justice.

— Devarim 16:18

Judges in every gate. Officers to enforce what they decide. A justice system laid down before the people even enter the land. Moses is building the infrastructure of a society in advance — deciding what kind of country this will be before anyone lives in it.

Two verses later, the most famous line in the parsha:

צֶ֥דֶק צֶ֖דֶק תִּרְדֹּ֑ף לְמַ֤עַן תִּֽחְיֶה֙ וְיָרַשְׁתָּ֣ אֶת־הָאָ֔רֶץ אֲשֶׁר־יְהֹוָ֥ה אֱלֹהֶ֖יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לָֽךְ׃ {ס}        

Justice, justice shall you pursue, that you may thrive and occupy the land that the ETERNAL your God is giving you.

— Devarim 16:20

Tzedek, tzedek tirdof. The doubling is hard to miss. The rabbis noticed it — why say "justice" twice? Rashi offers a reading: pursue justice whether the outcome favors you or not. Justice is not a tool you reach for when it serves your side.

But for all the attention "justice, justice" gets — and it deserves every sermon it has ever inspired — the moment in Shoftim that catches me this year comes later, in the laws of war.

Before the army goes out to fight, the officers address the troops. The speech they give is not what you would expect:

וְדִבְּר֣וּ הַשֹּֽׁטְרִים֮ אֶל־הָעָ֣ם לֵאמֹר֒ מִֽי־הָאִ֞ישׁ אֲשֶׁ֨ר בָּנָ֤ה בַֽיִת־חָדָשׁ֙ וְלֹ֣א חֲנָכ֔וֹ יֵלֵ֖ךְ וְיָשֹׁ֣ב לְבֵית֑וֹ פֶּן־יָמוּת֙ בַּמִּלְחָמָ֔ה וְאִ֥ישׁ אַחֵ֖ר יַחְנְכֶֽנּוּ׃

Then the officials shall address the troops, as follows: “Is there anyone who has built a new house but has not dedicated it? Let him go back to his home, lest he die in battle and another dedicate it.

— Devarim 20:5

Has anyone planted a vineyard and not yet harvested it? Go home.

Has anyone betrothed a wife and not yet married her? Go home.

Is anyone afraid and disheartened? Go home.

The army is about to fight, and the Torah's first order of business is to make it smaller. To subtract people from the ranks — not because they are useless, but because their lives are unfinished. You built something and haven't lived in it yet. You planted something and haven't tasted the fruit. You love someone and haven't begun the life you promised. The Torah says: go home. Finish what you started. The battle can wait for you.

I read an article this week about a group of LGBTQ Jews from North America who traveled to Israel this summer — some for the first time — because the communities they relied on back home had stopped making room for them. Pride events in several cities had excluded Jewish groups or turned hostile. One man, arriving in Tel Aviv, said it felt like a place where he could breathe — as a gay person and as a Jew. Not one or the other. Both. I know exactly what it means to walk into a room and realize you don't have to leave a piece of yourself at the door.

The exemptions in Shoftim are not about weakness. A society that opens with "justice, justice shall you pursue" follows it with a provision that says: we do not demand everything from everyone. Some things are more pressing than the fight. A house you built and haven't lived in is one of them.

Elul started Monday. The shofar sounds each morning. The tradition says this is the month when the King comes out to the field — when God meets you where you are, not where you are supposed to be. It is the month of return, which is a gentler word than repentance.

The question Shoftim asks before the battle: have you built something? Have you planted something? Have you begun to love? And if you have — go home first. Dedicate the house. Harvest the vineyard. Start the life.

The battle, unfortunately, will always be there. The needs will always remain in some form. It is up to us as a collective whole to manage them while still allowing for life — in all its holy messiness to flourish. But once that's attended to? Come back. Pick up your place at the front line.

The shofar each morning asks the same question from a different angle. Not "are you ready to fight?" Just: is there something you haven't finished?

Elul gives you a month to go home and do it.

Shabbat shalom.

— Uriel ben Avraham