Shoftim 5786

The Torah tells of a man found dead on the road, with no killer and no witnesses. The elders of the nearest town must perform the ritual of the eglah arufah and declare, “Our hands did not shed this blood.” But the Sages explain that they are also declaring that they did not see this stranger and allow him to leave without food or accompaniment. The Torah therefore shifts the question from “Who is guilty?” to “Who is responsible?” This connects to the modern idea of the diffusion of responsibility: when many people witness a problem, each person assumes someone else will act. The Torah responds by doing the opposite. It assigns responsibility to specific people and forces the community to confront what happened. Even though the elders did not cause the death, they are responsible for asking how such a tragedy could have happened under their watch. The message is that a just society cannot simply ask who committed the crime. It must also ask how it allowed the conditions for that crime to exist. We cannot prevent every tragedy, but we can refuse to be bystanders. Responsibility means noticing the stranger, helping the vulnerable, and understanding that sometimes the question is not “Was it my fault?” but “Was it mine to prevent?”

The ideas are shaped and based on the work of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, and influenced by Maimonides, Nachmanides, Don Isaac Abarbanel, Samson Raphael Hirsch, David Zvi Hoffmann, Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel, and Uri Amos Cherki.