Shabbat Parashat Noach 5784

Igrot Hare’aya – Letters of Rav Kook: Making Sure There Will Be a Din Torah – #173

Date and Place: Yafo, 1 Kislev 5669 (1908) 

Recipient: Zev Gluskin, the head of Carmel Wine and the Organization of Wine Producers.  

Body: It is very unpleasant for me, but I am compelled to speak briefly about that which happened to Mr. Z.G. (by chance the same initials as the addressee). Any attempt to [allow a defendant to] run away from the laws of Israel in the Land of Israel, when he is aided by formal helpers from among the public attorneys, will always remind me of the bringing of Pompey to the gates of Jerusalem by two litigants, Hurkenus and Aristobolus. How damaging was that litigation!

We have cause to call out in pain about the degradation and the subservience, which is embedded in the feeling of contempt for the judicial system of Israel in the Land of Israel. This is especially painful in the time that can be called by the honorable name of the stirrings of national renewal, even though it is to a very small degree. What travesty did they find in the justice of the Torah of Life, whose honor lights the whole world, that they should stray from it?! Is it because they sometimes feel that the attribute of mercy opposes the attribute of judgment (i.e., that the Torah’s justice is too strict)?! Is that the approach of the Torah alone? Where do we find legal systems of the world that employ the attribute of mercy? No one should know as well as men of commerce (apparently, this is what one or both of the litigants were) that the world cannot be sustained at all with the attribute of mercy, but rather with an exact attribute of justice. The idea of combining the attribute of mercy along with the attribute of judgment cannot blur the form of justice to even the minutest degree. It is a pillar of iron for justice that one is not permitted to give preference to the poor.

Of course, my complaint relates to the people who are overjoyed to involve themselves in the litigation of the aforementioned Mr. G., and have troubled themselves to remove it from the framework of our holy Torah. It is so upsetting to me that they are supported by our distinguished Organization of Wine Producers.

Mr. G. said that he would accept even a panel chosen by zabla (each litigant picks one dayan and those dayanim choose a third dayan), just that he wants that the third, central dayan should be a Torah scholar, one who has familiarity with the judgment of the Torah. Is this a travesty?! Is the Torah so despised that it “can’t even be served for dessert” (based on Petichta, Eicha Rabba 10)!? If even this is not acceptable to the other side, and my rebuke will be treated like a voice that calls out in the desert, at least the two sides should choose the two sides for a panel of zabla to decide who will be the central dayan for the panel, and the decision of that preliminary panel should be followed.

I know that you, my honored friend, are not involved in this matter, but I have no one else to speak to that there is a chance that people will listen to; only you are the one who might be able to help.

Top of page

Print this page

Send to friend