Ki Teze 5784

Another teen in jail for taking a gun to school, murdering two teachers and two students, and physically wounding several others. Needless to say, the emotional scars of the students and teachers in Winder, Georgia will not heal overnight. Here in Connecticut, Sandy Hook remains a constant reminder of what it takes for victims and the community to heal and find a way to move forward. We all sense the anguish of the parents, siblings, spouses and friends. We pain for them.

In our Torah reading for this Shabbat, we read that a parent is not to be punished for the crimes or sins of a child, nor visa-versa. The verse actually states that “parents shall not be put to death for children, nor children be put to death for parents: they shall each be put to death only for their own crime.” (Deuteronomy 24:16)

Rashi wants us to think that these words are not related to the child’s crime, but rather when a child implicates a parent for a crime. Could the 14-year-old suspect testify or bring evidence against his parent or parents that could be used to bring punishment upon them?

If we follow Rashi’s commentary in this verse in Ki Teze, it might seem obvious: that the Torah is quite specific that the actions of the child may not be used to charge a parent, even in a case of murder. It might seem then that the parent of this alleged teen murderer should not have been charged for the actions of his sons. But that is not what the Torah is actually stating in totality.

The Torah states that a parent may be put to death for their own crimes. Moreover, the Torah provides us a case where the child is more than simply a handful. The Torah requires that a parent report a totally disobedient child to the magistrates in the land. Such a wayward child, known as a “ben sorer u’moreh,” is one who is not only a nuisance to society, but one who is a danger to society. If the court then determines that this child is on the level that he/she is dangerous to the community, then he/she can be put to death with the parents casting the first stone.

Needless to say, such an instance was truly rare in the times of the rabbis. One 17th century commentator, the Kli Yakar, states that the law was never intended to be carried out. Rather it was a way of reminding parents to teach their child the laws of compassion, decency, and respect of our fellow human being and for that of the animal world as well.

Many of these laws are found in our Torah reading for this Shabbat. Our reading consists of seventy-four of the six hundred and thirteen commandments found in Scripture. Several of these laws deal with caring for others and having compassion. The laws relate to many different living beings in our world. Compassion for animals is the most known, such as not harnessing an ox and a donkey together to pull a load, or shooing away the mother bird before taking the eggs from the next. Even our enemy’s donkey who falls over from the weight of its load must be tended to by one who dislikes its owner. We find laws related to women and their mistreatment, and how we must be understanding when a man overtakes her, takes advantage of her and rapes her. But it also speaks about when a women is complicit. We have laws related to building a house and ensuring that it is safe and structurally sound, for example by falling off a roof deck because a fence was not installed around it. There are laws related to paying a worker on time as they complete the job, for he is expecting that pay in order to be able to feed his family that night.

At the same time, while the actions of this teen alleged murderer in Georgia, in the eyes of the Torah, may not be used to implicate his father, the actions of the father may be used. The Torah states quite specifically: “they shall each be put to death only for their own crime.”

In this tragic school shooting in Georgia, I am puzzled by the fact that the law protected this teen who had been reported by others as being what the Torah may state as a wayward son, known as a “ben sorer u’moreh.” Local police agencies had him on their radar. Maimonides provides us with perhaps one reason why: “If his father desires to convict him and his mother does not desire, or his mother desires and his father does not desire, he is not judged as a "wayward and rebellious son," as implied by Deuteronomy 21:19: "His father and mother shall take hold of him."(Mishne Torah). In this instance, the father protected his son, maintaining that his son could not have been responsible for an earlier threat posted online.

On the other hand, a father teaching his son how to use a firearm and then purchasing one for him shows an indiscriminate act, and one that the father should be held accountable for.  

It will be up to the courts in Georgia to make that final determination, but clearly Torah law could not defend a father in this instance - it is not the child’s actions, but that of the father that he is being implicated for. 

Shabbat shalom.

Am Yisrael Chai

Bring them home.

Rabbi K