Shoftim: Perception and Reality

Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.- Ludwig Wittgenstein

Maybe I am bringing this to the parsha rather than deriving it from the parsha - I admit it.

There are all of these realities: the judges sort out truth from lie, define justice from litigation . That becomes deriving truth from codes in the text, misspelled words, imperfect repetitions. THe truth is the statement of the torah. Reality - a mere shadow, metziuth -transient, mutable and therefore false.

All of these takes on reality! The ritual reality of the Kohanim ( fed by the foreleg and tongue of every slaughtered animal [see Mishnah Yomit, Chulin 10:1], etc). The political reality of the king (his horses and men). The extraterrestrial reality of the prophet { what is a prophet ( vis a vis a fortune teller). The lies of the fortune tellers and wizards

An interesting Rashi: 18:13 Scout out the future but don't search for it.

The judge creates the reality of law out of the fantasies of the litigants and criminals. Their ideas of justice are corrected.

Idol worship (17:2-5) is fundamentally an error in the interpretation of reality

The testimony of 2 witnesses establishes reality ( 17:5-7). Thus, the agreement of the two is the test in testimony ( don't forget the money)

The willful actor (17: 11) is the enemy of truth.

the king, the priest and the prophet all battle for the true pronouncement and each sees and preaches his own reality and each has his own temptations that distort the perception.

Cities of refuge identify intentionality as the key reality. No one denies that one person killed another, but guilt is a question of intent and the redeemer is in a good position to carry out retribution but not a good judge of culpability,

The war is a redefinition of reality. Us vs them. Peace must be an option. And don't hurt the trees.

The tree that appeared at the beginning of the Parsha. The tree that was forbidden near the altar.

Ideas of sustenance cannot cloud justice

Finally the unsolved murder. How responsible is the community? After the tragedy the community wonders what it could have done to prevent this. The elders would tear their hair out and cut themselves ( but this has already been prohibited). So they do the ritual of the broken neck calf and wash their hands of the matter... And pledge to repent. Not everything is in their control, but it is hard to find the boundary.

Now, in Elul, the struggle to find reality and the battle against our internal drives is refocused. Hard to find the boundary, and if you find it , don't move it.

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