{"id":42341,"date":"2018-10-18T16:26:01","date_gmt":"2018-10-18T13:26:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=42341"},"modified":"2022-05-15T16:46:47","modified_gmt":"2022-05-15T13:46:47","slug":"a-mandate-to-champion-the-cause-of-the-powerless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/a-mandate-to-champion-the-cause-of-the-powerless\/","title":{"rendered":"A Mandate To Champion The Cause Of The Powerless"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":50634,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[379,414,522,411,600],"acf":{"old_id":"42341","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":37918,"related_cahpter":"72","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"To listen when others will not; to see even when others look away","content":"

\u201cYou shall not oppress any widow (<\/span>almanah<\/span><\/em>) or orphan\u201d (Exodus 22:21). By widow, we mean a woman whose husband has died, but in the ancient world, the primary issue is not whether a woman\u2019s husband has died but whether there are any male relatives to be responsible for her after his passing. \u201cOrdinarily,\u201d Bible scholar Paula Hiebert notes, \u201cthe widow\u2019s maintenance would have been the responsibility of either her sons of her father-in-law. When these male persons were nonexistent, then the widow… became an <\/span>almanah<\/span><\/em>.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

What are we to make of these verses today, when, in some parts of the world at least, women are (blessedly) no longer as vulnerable and helpless when their spouses die?<\/span><\/p>\n

Sometimes biblical laws are meant to be illustrative rather than exhaustive. R. Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972) writes that \u201cthe prophets… tried to teach us how to think in the categories of God: His holiness, justice and compassion. The appropriation of these categories, far from exempting us from the obligation to gain new insights in our own time, is a challenge to look for ways of translating biblical commandments into programs required by our own conditions\u201d (God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism (1955), p. 273).<\/span><\/p>\n

Heschel understands Biblical laws not as concrete norms but paradigms; invitations to \u201ceach generation to develop contemporary commitments that apply the eternal essence of the laws to particular times.\u201d For example, a modern reader who learns of the biblical requirement to build a parapet around one\u2019s roof (Deuteronomy 22:8) will discern from the concrete norm that the Torah is concerned with a broader commitment to public safety.<\/span> Similarly, one who reads of God\u2019s (com)passionate concern for the plight of widows and orphans should perceive in the Torah\u2019s words a broader mandate to champion the cause of the vulnerable and powerless\u2014whoever they may be in a particular society.<\/span> To refuse to read biblical norms as paradigms is to destine significant swaths of the Torah to irrelevance. If there are no longer <\/span>almanot<\/em> <\/span>in the biblical sense, after all, then the Torah\u2019s words may be beautiful but they are also inconsequential. If we do not read such norms as paradigms, in other words, we run the very real risk of domesticating the Torah by admiring it even as we rob it of its normative force.<\/span><\/p>\n

To be a religious person is, in part, to follow God\u2019s example: To listen even when others will not, and to see even when others look away.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":104848,"id":104848,"title":"-62810433df4f2--62810433df4f4ex22-helpless powerless poor beggar.jpg","filename":"62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/a-mandate-to-champion-the-cause-of-the-powerless\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar-jpg\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar-jpg","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":42341,"date":"2022-05-15 13:46:27","modified":"2022-05-15 13:46:44","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1920,"height":1143,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg-300x179.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":179,"medium_large":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg-768x457.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":457,"large":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg-1024x610.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":610,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":914,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1143,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg-1200x714.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":714,"home_baner":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2018\/10\/62810433df4f2-62810433df4f4ex22-helpless-powerless-poor-beggar.jpg-706x420.jpg","home_baner-width":706,"home_baner-height":420}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"A Mandate To Champion The Cause Of The Powerless","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"To listen when others will not; 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