Dvar Torah on Parshat Yitro

In this week's Parsha, called Yitro (Jethro, in English), the Israelites receive the Torah at Mt. Sinai. It has often been noted that this is not the name that we might have expected for what is, after all, the most important portion of the Torah. Yitro was Moshe's father-in-law, and was, as we are told at the beginning of the parsha, a priest of Midian - an idol worshipper. Why is this crucial portion of the Torah, containing the Ten Commandments, the giving of the Torah on Mt. Sinai, named after a relatively minor figure, who only came to the Jewish people late in life, after a long career in practical paganism?

Not only the name of the parsha, but Yitro's actions in the parsha as well, raise some difficult questions. The day after Yitro's arrival, Moshe sits in judgment of the people, who, all day long, approach him, demanding solutions to their arguments, litigations, and problems. He is inundated, "from morning until night", with people seeking justice. Yitro, seeing this, approaches Moshe and, speaking just like a father-in-law, says: "This is not good, this thing you are doing." He continues and explains the problem: "You will surely be worn out, you and the nation with you, for this is too great a burden for you, you can not do it by yourself". Yitro goes on to outline a brilliant solution: he suggests that Moshe recruit suitable men - God-fearing, honest - appoint them as judges, and establish a system of upper and lower courts, with Moshe at the top of the pyramid. Moshe goes along with the idea, and the system is put into place, with only the most difficult cases being referred to Moshe. At this point, knowing when to make an exit, Yitro returns home, to Midian.

The strangeness of this story is obvious. For one, there is the naming of this auspicious parsha after a retired idolatrous priest, and why does this story come just before the actual giving of the Torah - it would make more sense for it to come right after. In addition, why is it Yitro, the stranger, the outsider, who comes up with a solution for this very basic problem; a judicial system which will more efficiently bring Torah and justice to the people? How can it be that this stranger makes such a seminal contribution to Jewish life and thought?

Well, let me tell you a story. Last night, I went to an engagement party for the son of one of my friends. The young man is a student at a Charedi (ultra-Orthodox) Yeshiva, most of the guests were his friends, and the event was run along Charedi lines, the most obvious feature of which was a very impressive mechitza - divider - which separated the men from the women. In fact, during the course of the evening, some vigilant fellow noticed that the panels of the mechitza had small openings in them, just about at eye level, and so a few of the waiters were dispatched to bring paper towels from the bathrooms and scotch-tape them across the offending openings, just in case. I kid you not.

A major feature of these events is the speakers, and the first one to address us was the venerable Rosh Yeshiva (head of the Yeshiva) of the well-known school that the groom-to-be attends. During his peroration, as he was summarizing 15 minutes of blessings and praises for the young couple, the Rabbi said "this is really a wonderful match: a real ben Torah (literally 'son of the Torah', a common phrase used to refer to a truly worthy and God-fearing scholar) together with a real bas Torah (the feminine equivalent, literally 'a daughter of the Torah)". Now, this 'bas Torah' is not a phrase one commonly hears, as in Charedi circles women are not seen as Torah scholars. As he finished the sentence, the Rabbi paused, apparently abashed at his slip of the tongue - in his world, you do not call a girl a bas Torah. After a moment, he seemed to gather his courage and continued: "Yes, that's right, that's a new phrase, we've innovated something new here, the concept of a 'bas Torah'!"

It was all I could do to stop myself from laughing out loud. Here we were, in the very epicenter of pre-Feminist, anti-Feminist Judaism, the men and women physically separated by six-foot high dividers, with only the men allowed to speak in public, and yet, somehow, feminism had managed to sneak in. Even in this ultra-Orthodox setting, the Rosh Yeshiva, influenced, I believe, by an egalitarian zeitgeist which somehow managed to leap high mechitzas at a single bound, couldn't help but present the couple as equals, both sharing the essential quality of being b'nay Torah. He couldn't deny this girl her equal rights!

The Torah stresses the fact that it is Yitro, the Midianite, the outsider, with a background in idol worship, who brings a great new idea about the way the Torah should be disseminated to the Jewish people, in order to teach us, at the crucial moment of the giving of the Torah, that, once we receive it, we are not meant to lock it up and throw away the key. The story of Yitro's contribution teaches us that the Torah is not, and cannot be, a hermetic, self-contained, inviolate system. Rather, this story is an illustration, right from the start - even before the start, before the Torah has actually been given - of the inevitable and inexorable permeability of the Torah. The Torah is meant to be influenced by outside ideas; it is in the world, part of the world, and will be influenced by the world. It is meant to be added to and improved by interactions with other cultures and civilizations. It is meant to be looked at by your father-in-law and criticized. It is not a closed book, it is an open, ongoing, living experience, waiting to be looked at with fresh eyes and willing to accept and integrate new ideas. No walls we build, no mechitzas we erect, should, or can, keep these new ideas out.

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Shimon Felix