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Parashat Ki Tetzei: Deuteronomy 21:10-25:19

August 16, 2013

Rabbi Rachel Goldenberg

This week’s parasha mostly consists of issues between people, whether between neighbors,  within a family, between the underprivileged and other members of society,  or even between people and animals.

A theme running through many of these laws is that of dignity. Even if we need to take the only garment a person has as a pledge for a loan, we need to return it to that person every night so that her or she may sleep in it. We are not allowed to take someone’s upper millstone in pawn, because that is akin to taking their life (their means of grinding grain for bread or olives for oil.)  We must leave the overlooked sheafs and grapes in our fields for the poor and the stranger. These and many other laws in the parasha emphasize people’s humanity and aim for a sense of equality and fair treatment within society.

In addition to these laws, issues pertaining to women are very prominent in this Torah portion. Here, it becomes more challenging to see the theme of dignity and humanity in the laws. We read that if a woman is found not to be a virgin when she marries, she is stoned to death on her father’s doorstep; that a virgin who is raped is then forced to marry her rapist; that a wife who ceases to please her husband can be given a bill of divorce; and that a woman who is widowed before she has children must marry her husband’s brother.

Most of these laws seek to ensure that women get married and stay married. In the context of a traditional society, adult unmarried women are unprotected and do not have independent means to sustain themselves. And so these laws are meant to protect women. But it is challenging to know how to approach these laws as a modern person and a feminist.

The parashah ends with the reminder to blot out the name and memory of Amalek, the nation that attacked the Israelites just as they were departing Egypt. We are to blot out their memory because they attacked the weak, and the stragglers. Here again we return to the theme of how we are to treat the weak in our midst.

As we study together, we’ll explore this concept of dignity. I want to hear your thoughts on whether these particular examples of dignity and fair treatment still apply today, what barriers do we encounter in ourselves and in our society when we try to create a world that reflects this value of dignity?