On the Disabled and Threats of Suicide: Threat and Undue Influence (Column 114)
With God's help
During a drive last Monday morning, two topics occurred to me that are worth devoting a column to on the site: the protests by people with disabilities (who at that time were blocking, and in effect paralyzing, the entire Route 40 area and El Al Junction, Route 1, Route 6, and the whole surrounding region, causing me to spend almost two hours getting to work, my son to be late for reserve duty, and thousands of other people to be late for work and get angry), and a report on the radio about the Supreme Court's ruling that threatening suicide is not a criminal offense. I thought I would begin with the second topic and leave the disabled protesters for the next column, so that what I wrote about them would not be biased by my personal anger. But when I sat down to think a bit about these matters, I saw that there is an essential connection between them, since both concern undue influence. Since the last ten columns have put my accumulated list of topics on hold, I was glad of the opportunity to combine two topics into one column, and here it is before you.
On Threats in General and Threats of Suicide
Since 1966, Israeli law has not regarded suicide as an offense (see, for example, the survey here). However, soliciting or assisting suicide, at least in certain circumstances, is. And what about threatening suicide? It should first be noted that making threats is a criminal offense.
At first glance, a threat of suicide does not fall under the category of a threat, since Reuven's threat to commit suicide does not threaten to harm Shimon, but only the threatener (Reuven) himself. But this argument does not seem to hold water. If Reuven were to threaten Shimon that if he did not do as Reuven wished, he would harm Levi, that would certainly be considered a threat against Shimon, even though Shimon himself is not expected to be harmed. Why? Because the threatened party does not want another person to be harmed, and that can be seen as a kind of injury to him himself. Think of a threat against a member of his family (a son, daughter, or wife), which certainly deserves to be called a threat. There too, it is not the threatened party who is harmed but someone close to him, and yet it is still regarded as a threat against him. Harming someone close to me is also a kind of harm to me, and therefore threatening to harm him is also a threat against me. By the same token, harming or threatening to harm another person is enough to count as a threat against me. For this purpose, every person counts as close to me (because I do not want him to be harmed). Such a threat too may cause me to change my decision or course of action, even though I myself am not the one who is supposed to be harmed.
Is Threatening Suicide Permitted or Prohibited?
If so, it would seem at first glance that even if suicide itself is permitted, threatening it is improper and should be prohibited. That was indeed the practice in the courts and in the police, which filed quite a few indictments over threats of suicide and also obtained convictions. All this until yesterday. Yesterday there was a report of a case in which a woman sent a letter to the judge hearing her case, in which she writes:
I am sitting in your chamber for the last time and want you to look me in the eyes, so that the look, full of pain, suffering, and torment, will accompany you everywhere and at all times and be a shadow accompanying your life, and will pursue you in your dreams. You are a woman of justice, law, and judgment, but a murderer of innocent souls with the blade of a ruling, in cold blood and with freezing composure… I am forced to follow the path of Judge Ben Atar [a judge who committed suicide] as a last resort. I hope that after my death you will change the judgment.
That woman was arrested, charged, and convicted by the Magistrate's Court and the District Court of the offense of threats, and yesterday the Supreme Court held in a precedent-setting ruling that she should be released, since threatening suicide is not a criminal offense.
I did not read the ruling itself, only reports about it, but the reasons I saw did not really convince me. At first glance, this is a threat like any other, and its purpose is to achieve results in an unfair and violent way. Nor, in my opinion, does the claim that there are authentic threats of suicide that merely express distress really stand up. If the police officer or the judge reaches the conclusion that this is indeed an authentic expression of intention and not a threat intended to achieve some desired result, then all they have to do is acquit the person making the threat. But that does not seem to me to be a reason to exclude threats of suicide categorically from the class of prohibited threats.
One can think of justifications that exempt a person from punishment or from responsibility (because the person was in a mental state in which he could not avoid threatening or announcing an intention to commit suicide), or of justifications that show that this is not a threat at all (because criminal intent is lacking. This is a situation in which the words are an authentic expression and not a threat made for the purpose of achieving results). But all these justifications do not mean that, in principle, a threat of suicide is not a threat, but at most that in those particular cases the defendant should be acquitted.
The judges wrote, among other things, that their interpretation was meant to allow people to express distress. The claim is that including threats of suicide in the basket of criminal offenses may further aggravate the already difficult situation of those making the threats. Daphne Barak-Erez writes:
Criminal-law restriction of freedom of expression in situations of distress in which a person experiences suicidal thoughts may therefore lead to a chilling effect on the expression of feelings of distress and despair—to family members and friends or to therapeutic professionals and welfare authorities.
With all due respect for chilling effects, I do not see how this consideration can serve as an interpretive consideration for the law. At most, one should turn to the legislature so that it can address the issue and decide how to update the law in order to prevent such harms. Beyond that, expressing feelings of distress and despair to care providers, relatives, or friends has nothing whatever to do with threatening judges, police officers, or just any other person.
Thus, for example, there was a case in which a person who received a ruling removing him from his home threatened to commit suicide, and was convicted of the offense of threats. I assume that women's organizations did not take to the streets to protest that conviction, and this time rightly so (as our sages said: even a stopped clock shows the right time twice a day). This is indeed a threat in every respect, and the person making it wants to achieve some desired result through it. This is the use of violent and unfair means to attain goals. What is the difference between that and threatening a judge in order to influence her to change her ruling? And again, if the judge reaches the conclusion that this really is an authentic declaration of intention and not a threat, he can exempt from punishment (if the person was compelled) or from guilt (if he did not in fact intend to threaten), but that is already a concrete consideration that should be applied in the specific case. A blanket exclusion of such threats really does not seem justified to me.
In the meantime, it would apparently seem that a threat of suicide is a threat in every respect. I will now try to explain why, in my view, that is not the case.
On Extortion and Inducement
I believe I have already mentioned here once Robert Nozick's favorite distinction between extortion and inducement.[1] At first glance, in both of these cases a person is trying to obtain a result he wants by placing two alternatives before the person being threatened: if you do X (which I want), you will receive benefit A, and if you do not do X, you will receive benefit B (which is lower). How is a person who threatens me that if I do not wash the floor of his house he will take 100 shekels from me, and if I do wash it he will take nothing, different from another person who tells me that if I do not wash I will not receive 100 shekels, and if I do wash I will? In both cases, I am presented with two alternatives whose difference in utility is 100 shekels, in order to persuade me to wash his house. So why, asks Nozick, does the law prohibit extortion and permit inducement?
The failure lies, of course, in looking only at the difference. Indeed, from such a perspective there is no difference between the two cases, but it is wrong to judge such cases through differential lenses. What stands in each pan of the scales matters very much, and not only the difference between them. In the case of extortion or threat, the threatener says that he will take from me something that belongs to me by right (he has no right to take it from me) if I do not do as he wishes. And if I do, he will refrain from taking it from me (something he is forbidden to do in any case). In the case of inducement, he offers me, if I do what he wants, a consideration that he is under no obligation to give me, and if I do not do it he will not give that consideration. Perfectly legitimate.
That is, the difference between the cases is the threshold of my rights. A person may not infringe my rights (take my money) under any circumstances. At most, he may refrain from adding to them something of his own (giving me money). In the case of extortion—at least in one of the two possibilities (if I do not do what he demands)—he is threatening to do something unlawful (take my money). By contrast, in the case of inducement, nothing unlawful is done in either case. He is permitted to give me money, but by the same token he is also permitted not to give it. Both actions are lawful, and therefore inducement is permitted.
One can say that in both extortion and inducement the initiator creates a junction with two branches: if I comply with his demand, he will do A, and if not, he will do B. Where both routes are permitted by law, this is inducement. He is using means available to him in a way that maximizes his gain, and that is legitimate. But when one of the routes at the junction involves an unlawful act, he is deriving gain in an unlawful way, and therefore this is prohibited extortion.
From this point of view, the case of threatening suicide already looks different. If suicide itself is permitted, then the person making the threat is actually constructing a junction at which both routes are legitimate and lawful. After all, he is allowed to commit suicide, and he is also allowed not to commit suicide. Therefore, what we have here is really inducement and not extortion, since he is using lawful means available to him in order to maximize his gain. Therefore, a threat of suicide would indeed, at least prima facie, have to be permitted. It is not like threatening to take money from me (a prohibited act) or to harm me (which is also prohibited, of course). Those are rightly considered threats because the acts are unlawful, and he is obtaining the result he wants by an unlawful means. But at a junction where both routes are permitted, this is inducement and not extortion, and therefore the conclusion is that prima facie it should be permitted.[2]
The Prosecution's Position: Undue Influence
And what did the prosecution think? Here is another excerpt from the article linked above:
The prosecution, by contrast, insisted on Tirza's conviction and argued that a threat of suicide is not a legitimate form of expression, independently of the question whether suicide as such is prohibited. It even proposed that she could alternatively be convicted of the offense of "undue influence," given that the letter was intended to affect the outcome of the judicial proceeding. It was also argued that her actions could be considered attempted extortion by threats. Justice Barak-Erez rejected the prosecution's position.
That distinction is indeed illuminating. Even if one does not see this as a threat, there is still apparently undue influence here. After all, the defendant wanted to obtain a more favorable ruling through threats of suicide. Those are certainly not considerations relevant to the merits, and her aim was to influence the judge by unfair means (see above the text of the letter she sent her. It is fairly clear emotional blackmail). So although Nozick's consideration does indeed lead us to the conclusion that there is no threat here, it nevertheless seems that there is undue influence here.
But a second look shows that this too is not very plausible. After all, the consideration I raised above deals no less with undue influence than with the threat itself. My claim was that a threat of this kind is inducement and not extortion—in other words, the use of legitimate means to maximize gain. So there is influence here, but why is it unfair? Prima facie, these are means that the law places at her disposal (since she is permitted to commit suicide), and she is making fair use of them in order to maximize her gain. True, her arguments were not relevant to the merits of the matter (they are not arguments showing a lack of guilt), and therefore the judge could have (and probably should have) remained unimpressed by them, and no one should have had complaints against her had she done so (apart from professional sentimentalists), but the very raising of the threat seems legitimate. It is like a defendant wearing clothes that make him look pitiable in order to persuade the judge to have mercy on him and not be too severe in sentencing. That too is influence by means of irrelevant considerations, and yet no one imagines that this is prohibited.
Let us return to the example I gave above. I explained that extortion is prohibited because one of the two routes involves an unlawful act (taking money from the threatened party or harming him), even though the other route (not harming him or not taking his money) is lawful. If so, one could apparently wonder why we should not also permit extortion and simply wait: if the threatened party washes his house, he will not harm him, and then nothing has happened (there has been no violation of the law). And if the threatened party does not wash the house and the threatener takes his money or harms him—then there is a violation of the law, and we will intervene (we will prosecute him and send him to prison). Why, already at the stage of extortion, before anything unlawful has been done, do we determine that this is prohibited? It seems to me that the root of the matter is undue influence. Even if the threatened party decides to wash the house, he did so under undue influence and not out of his free decision. The threat of an unlawful act influenced his decision even if in the end it was not carried out (in many cases, threats are made precisely so that they will not have to be carried out). Therefore, even if he accepts the offer—one that cannot be refused—there is still something problematic about such a threat. That is why the law rightly prohibits it and determines that the threat itself is already an unlawful act.
The conclusion is that the distinction between undue influence and threat, as proposed by the prosecution, is not self-evident, and in fact not very logical. As long as the person 'making the threat' is using lawful means, it is hard to speak of unfairness. And from this it follows that a threat of suicide, since it is lawful, also does not involve undue influence, as was determined in the ruling.
And Yet, Undue Influence
And yet, the intuitive feeling is that there is still a difference between the two. Even if this involves a lawful act, one still cannot categorically determine that there is no undue influence here. For example, if a real-life judge were in fact to take such a threat into account when determining the verdict or the judgment. Even though the act of suicide is permitted, my sense is that there is undue influence here. Only if judges were not influenced by this at all could one accept the identification between undue influence and threat.
Perhaps this can be seen differently. If the person does not really intend to commit suicide and is only threatening in order to obtain a more favorable ruling, then he is in fact lying to the court, and that is an unlawful act. In such a situation there may be no threat, since suicide is lawful, but there is certainly undue influence. By contrast, if the person really does intend to commit suicide and is merely informing the court of this, then there is room for the view that this is neither a threat nor undue influence, since it is a true fact that may be relevant to the judge when determining the verdict and sentence. Something akin to expert testimony offered before the court about what will happen to the defendant as a result of the sentence.
True, it is quite difficult to assess whether this is an authentic threat or not, but that is only a diagnostic problem. On the principled and logical level, this distinction does seem to hold. One must now assess whether the intention was to threaten or whether there was an authentic declaration here. If we manage to reach a conclusion, all the better; and if not—then, in the absence of a clear diagnosis, the defendant enjoys the presumption of innocence, as is customary in criminal law.
The Disability Protests
Several times readers on the site have asked me to express an opinion on the protests by people with disabilities and on the state's treatment of them. I have already written in the past that in my opinion there is a very fundamental distortion of values here, and here I will spell it out a bit more. On the level of principle, state assistance to the disabled is a matter of charity, and a person cannot claim charity, but at most request it. In other words, he has no right to receive charity; at most the giver has a duty to give it. To my mind, this is similar to a poor man who has been receiving from me an allowance of one thousand shekels a month, and now demonstrates outside my house and blocks my parking place demanding that I give him a monthly salary. He is interviewed on the radio and wonders: does anyone really think that a person can live on one thousand shekels a month? He forcefully demands parity with the minimum wage, as I give all my employees.
To my mind, the condition of the disabled is very similar to what I have just described. In principle, not a single worn-out penny is owed to them. No one owes them anything, since they have not worked and done nothing that entitles them to any money from anyone. True, it is proper (and in Jewish law this is even obligatory) to give charity to the poor and needy, but this is a duty of the giver and not a right of the recipient. We are speaking of a voluntary gift of charity and not a payment of what is owed. This is kindness and not law, and therefore the recipient cannot demand it from the giver, and certainly cannot demonstrate (let alone violently) in order to receive it from him.
The Comparison to the Minimum Wage
It is hard for me to think of a more absurd argument than the one that comes up here time and again: can a person live on an income lower than the minimum wage?! Our empathetic radio broadcasters tsk-tsk self-righteously and grumble together with the interviewee about the discrimination: no one disputes that you are right, they say, since even an able-bodied person cannot live on 3,000 shekels a month, so a disabled person, with all his expenses, certainly cannot live on that (there is hardly a day when I do not hear this idiotic argument). Indeed, this is an a fortiori argument with no answer, except that its conclusion is irrelevant. The fact that a disabled person cannot live on a given sum does not mean that I, or anyone else, has to give him more. At most, this a fortiori argument proves how much money is required in order to live with dignity (and even that raises the question of what the relevant standard is), but it has little significance in the discussion of the sums the state must give the disabled. The fact that so-and-so needs something does not mean that someone else is obligated to give it to him.
The state is not obligated to support people who have no earning capacity. It does so, and it is proper that it do so to the extent possible, but this is not their right; at most it is its duty (which it has undertaken). And if the state decides that it can allocate a certain sum to assisting the disabled (both through National Insurance and through the regular state budget), then that is the sum it gives. Among the givers, a dispute may develop over how much it is proper to give (the division of the budget pie), but I do not see what justification there can be for claims, demands, and demonstrations on the part of the recipients. By what right do they hold me up, together with thousands of other people hurrying to get to various places, with the demand that they be given thousands of additional shekels each month?!
One of the indications of the absurdity of this demand is the failure to distinguish between disabled people in different economic and health circumstances. These demands are framed as though disability were a kind of job for which remuneration is due (hence the bizarre comparison to the minimum wage). It makes no difference whether his family is affluent, whether he has a large inheritance, whether his friends and family help him or do not help him, and so forth. Why is that? After all, the duty to support oneself rests on the person himself. If he cannot, family and friends are supposed to help him (and again, this is not his right but their moral duty). From where did the absurd notion arise that he has a right to receive this from the state? Does the association of the disabled represent some sort of workers in the service of the state who are claiming inadequate and unfair compensation for their labor?
Duties and Rights
At the basis of my remarks stands the distinction between duties and rights. In legal thought, Hohfeld's table is accepted, according to which at the root of every duty of person A there is a right of person B, and vice versa. If I have a right that you pay me because you harmed me, then you have a duty to pay. If you borrowed money from me, I have a right that you repay the loan, and therefore you too have a duty to do so. But these two sides characterize only legal contexts. In non-legal contexts there is no such relation between rights and duties.
In my article on Choshen Mishpat I explained these matters in detail, and here I will only say that in charity, for example, there is no such relation. Charity is a duty on the giver and not a right of the recipient. The return of interest too is a duty on the recipient (the lender who received the interest) and not a right of the giver (the borrower). It is no accident that charity and interest appear in the Yoreh De'ah section of the Shulchan Arukh, and not in Choshen Mishpat. I explained there that Choshen Mishpat is the halakhic book of rights (rights for which there are corresponding duties, and vice versa), whereas Yoreh De'ah is the book of duties (for which there are no corresponding rights). In a legal context, if you do not fulfill your duty, I can sue you in a religious court or in a civil court, because this is not merely a failure on your part to discharge your duty but a failure to satisfy, or an infringement of, my right. But in non-legal contexts I have no such possibility, because your duties are your concern and not mine (at most I can turn to a religious court and have it compel you to fulfill your duty. See there for the differences).
In these areas there is great confusion, in two directions: some claim that in Jewish law there are no rights (there is only a discourse of duties). Others claim that every duty of the state is grounded in a right of the citizen. The root of both these mistakes is one and the same. In a state's legal system there are no non-legal parts. Therefore, in state law, when one party has a duty there is a corresponding right of the other, and vice versa. But Jewish law is not merely a legal system. In its legal part, the Hohfeld relation does indeed exist (the duties there are grounded in the rights of the other party), but it also has other parts. One who sees Jewish law as a legal system errs in the first way, and one who sees the state's moral duties as legal duties errs in the second. These are two sides of the same coin. As stated, the truth is that both are mistaken. The state's moral duties, so long as they have not been anchored in law and become part of its legal system, do not create rights for the citizen. The citizen cannot demand that the state give him more than what it has decided. He can of course ask, but it is not a right that he can claim.
On Communism and the Welfare State
If I want to study rhythmics and cannot afford it, is the state obligated to provide me with that service? Obviously not. By the same token, if a child has learning difficulties, he has no right that the state assist him. At most, the state has a (moral) duty to assist to the extent possible. And if it cannot—then it cannot. The same applies to a patient who needs medical assistance. There are expensive medications that are not included in the health basket. It really does sound outrageous that people are left to die. But the state is supposed to decide how much it can devote to this issue, if at all. Here there is no right of the patients, but charity that the state decides to give.
You may say that life and health are not rhythmics lessons. I entirely agree, but on the level of principle there is no difference. No human need, however important, is a right unless it is owed to the person by virtue of labor or some other legal ground. Even the compact between the citizen and his state, according to which it is supposed to care for him, has limits. The fact is that not every need is met, including health needs and even needs of life itself (such as life-saving drugs). The fact is that the state can try, but it is not obligated to succeed, and not even to try beyond its means. And even within its means, it may itself be obligated, but the citizen cannot demand this of it.
Communist overtones can be heard in the background of this discussion. The assumption is that people deserve money according to their needs and not according to their abilities and earnings. But as far as I know, communism is not yet part of Israel's constitution, and therefore one may at most demonstrate for turning Israel into a communist state, but one cannot demonstrate about "the rights of the disabled" when there are no such rights. One can demonstrate over rights that the law establishes and that nevertheless are not being given. One can also demonstrate for changing the law. But from the demonstrations being conducted lately, the impression is that the demonstrators are demanding rights that already exist and that, for some reason, the wickedness of the government is denying them. The difference between a situation in which one demands rights and one in which one protests or bargains over expanding obligations lies in the character of the protest actions. If my rights have been violated, I may sometimes take drastic steps, and perhaps also harm others (proportionately). This is basically the rule that a person may take the law into his own hands. But that applies to what is due to him by law (rights that he has). By contrast, a person who is bargaining with the giver so that he increase the charity he gives him cannot resort to violence, and certainly may not harm the giver or anyone else. Here he is not taking the law into his own hands, but bargaining with the giver over the size of the charitable sum. The violent demonstrations of the disabled reflect a communist conception of "the rights of the disabled" instead of a sane conception of "the duty of the state" (a moral duty that it would be proper to turn into a legal one).
Undue Influence: Law and Morality
I will now return to the question of undue influence. It arises in the context of the disabled as well, since presenting one's pitiable condition as a basis for a demand is itself undue influence. How is it different from the letter that woman sent to the judge (part of whose wording is cited above), or from the statements heard in the media from the disabled or from those who support them? In both cases we are dealing with emotional blackmail that tries to achieve results that are not really owed to you. Instead of asking for charity, you play on the giver's emotions. True, the disabled at least turn to an authorized body that can decide to give them something, whereas the judge was forbidden to act contrary to the law (at least theoretically), and yet one still has the feeling of plucking unfair emotional strings.
On the other hand, is every emotional pressure tactic undue influence? I think so. Not in the legal sense, but at least in the moral and human sense. In the legal sense, it is hard to say that the disabled are committing the offense of threats, since they are not threatening but at most lying (saying that they have rights when they do not), and probably at least some of them do this inadvertently and not out of cynical manipulation. And yet, to my mind, there is undue influence here. More generally, in our public discourse emotion routinely serves as a kind of instrument of undue influence.
A Note on Emotions
This returns us to previous discussions (poetry, Hasidism, Torah study). There too I argued that emotion is irrelevant to Torah study, which ought to proceed by the intellect. The same applies to our case here. Here too I argue that emotion has no place in public discussion—or, indeed, in any discussion. At most, you may describe the distress in order to give the relevant parties data on the basis of which to decide. But where you are not merely presenting data but engaging in emotional propaganda, there is an element of undue influence here.
True, it is quite difficult to maintain completely pure standards. No one can point to the point at which the presentation of facts about distress turns into unfair emotional blackmail, and as we saw, so too in the legal cases. Is it illegitimate for a defendant who comes to hear his sentence to wear pitiable clothes in order to arouse compassion in the judge? I do not know. And yet, it seems important to me at least to be aware of this distinction, and then to try, as much as possible, to overcome the diagnostic difficulties (while recognizing that we probably will not fully succeed).
As a rule, emotion is a very bad instrument for making decisions. This is probably what lies behind the popular saying that someone who is seventeen and not a communist has no heart, and someone who is twenty-three and still a communist has no head. Emotion leads to communism, but the intellect ought to reject it outright. It is also neither just, nor correct, nor practically workable, even though it greatly warms the heart and arouses wonderful and uplifting feelings.
I think I already mentioned here in the past what a student once asked me when he needed to make a decision regarding a partner. He asked whether he should follow emotion or intellect. I told him that one should always follow the intellect. The role of emotion is only to supply data to the intellect so that it can decide. Obviously, a decision regarding a spouse should take the emotional state into account (chemistry, love, and so on), but these are only data. The decision should be made by the intellect, which takes the data into account—both these and others. So it is in the cases discussed here as well. Where one tries to push emotion into the decision-making process, that is a kind of undue influence.
[1] See a more extensive discussion of this in the third book in the Talmudic Logic series, and in the article on the sixth root. There and there I used this distinction to clarify the difference between a positive commandment and a prohibition.
[2] See here for the discussion of the interpretation of the expression "not according to law".
Discussion
Regarding the first part—I didn’t understand what the initial assumption was for forbidding a threat of suicide, and it seems to me like empty pilpul (and likewise the distinction between threat and enticement). A threat must always be connected to an act that is forbidden (legally or morally). If it were forbidden to threaten with acts that are legally permitted, we would get the absurd situation that I’d also be forbidden to threaten that I’ll sleep one hour less every night or throw money in the trash. Your conclusion also doesn’t seem right to me: a judge is expected to act according to reason and not yield to emotion. Therefore, in my opinion it is permitted to multiply pleas and even to wear a kippah (though I don’t understand how that helps). Likewise, it should also be permitted for me to lie to the judge that my children will suffer, even though I have no children, because the judge isn’t supposed to take that into account (and if he is—then that should be forbidden!). That is of course different from a person who lies about facts in court, because in that case the judge doesn’t know what happened and *is expected* to rely on the defendant’s testimony.
Regarding the second part—I agree with every word. People here have gone completely crazy. The teachers too, who demand a salary increase so that my children’s education will be better (as if that’s what interests them). And even if that’s true—let me demonstrate if it’s in my interest. By the way, in my opinion the tax benefits for the disabled should also be abolished. Charity is given to the poor, not to the pitiable. Another thing that enrages me is that all the sanctimonious people who are always in favor of the greedy demonstrators don’t really understand that the money has to come from somewhere and at the expense of something else. They never suggest what to cut in order to finance the increase (except for the stupid suggestion that always comes up: cut MKs’ salaries :))
Thank you for the fascinating column, as usual.
One point is still unclear to me. In what sense is undue influence “undue”? I’ll focus on the legal case and not on the disabled protesters.
I agree that one can accuse someone who deliberately lies to the court that he intends to commit suicide of lying, but the more interesting discussion in my opinion is the case where there is no problem of lying. The claim is made in good faith, and the act being threatened (suicide) is legal.
In my humble opinion, the situation that now arises is as follows: if the judge is about to rule unjustly, then it seems to me entirely legitimate to use “undue influence” as a way of achieving justice. Is it conceivable that a person is obligated to accept a legal wrong just because he must refrain from influencing the judge in a non-rational (but legal) way?
On the other hand, if in the litigant’s view the judgment is a true judgment, then even the use of “fair influence” is morally improper, even if not legally so, because its aim is to pervert justice.
But still, I heard that according to halakhah too, if a person does not give charity according to what he ought to give, the poor can sue him in rabbinical court.
בס"ד 8 Shevat 5778
It is explicit halakhah that the rabbinical court compels charity on its own initiative and does not wait for the poor person to make a claim. Why should it reach a situation where disabled people who need support have to demonstrate in the streets? At one point there was a petition to the High Court of Justice to establish that the right to a dignified existence is among the basic civil rights, and it came to nothing.
In a proper Jewish state, the honorable judges should stop engaging in judicial legislation and in the rights of the wealthy to desecrate Shabbat while exploiting workers and employing them without rest, and should engage in doing justice for those who truly need it. One who is able to work partially should receive assistance with placement and income supplementation, and one who cannot should receive what is due to him with dignity. That is what there are judges in Israel for!
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
They compel charity just as they compel the other commandments. It’s not a matter of mercy and pity.
Communism may not be part of the constitution, but the right to dignity is, and the Supreme Court has ruled that part of the right to dignity is the right to live under minimal conditions.
I didn’t understand what the claim is in the first half of the message.
So I’ll only say that indeed I’m not a devotee of the Documentary Hypothesis, though I have no principled problem with it. On the other hand, I also don’t determine halakhah by the Written Torah, and certainly not by the proximity between commandments in the Written Torah.
It’s not pilpul. I wrote that there is undue influence here even if it is not quite a threat. In particular if the threat is false. If someone asks you for a shekel on the street or else he’ll commit suicide, and he is lying to you (he has no intention of committing suicide), do you think that’s fair? Is it permissible? In my opinion, no. If anything, then permitting threats of suicide is pilpul, not forbidding them. The prohibition is simple common sense.
As for the difference between threat and enticement—if this completely clear and obvious common sense is pilpul in your eyes, then we probably think in completely different ways.
I don’t agree. If the claim is made in good faith, then indeed there is no threat here, since it is merely an expression of distress. But if it is a false threat, there is room to forbid it.
Beyond that, we are not talking about a situation where the judge is not ruling justly. On the contrary, we are talking about his ruling justly and you trying to change that. If the judge rules unjustly, we enter a different question: to what extent is it permissible to use improper means to achieve worthy ends (whether the end justifies the means).
And on the other hand, even if the judgment is true, the duty to reach it is on the judge, not on the litigant. To try fair influence in such a case seems quite reasonable to me. By way of analogy: Joseph is not supposed to fulfill his dreams, but to leave that to the Holy One, blessed be He.
Ari"k, I haven’t heard that.
S. Tz. L., what does this have to do with judges? Are they the ones legislating the laws here? What does the sabbatical year have to do with an omelet? It seems to me that Hasidism in the path of interpretation and exposition has confused you a bit.
Then let the disabled petition the High Court and everything will work out easily. Why do they need to demonstrate and plead?
As I mentioned in the post itself, the right to live precedes the right to live with dignity, and yet there are sick people who need life-saving medicines and the state leaves them to die for lack of budget. And they too apparently won’t be able to get help from the High Court.
Perhaps the threat alone is not problematic (according to the approach presented above), but it is sweepingly accompanied by emotional blackmail, and that is already influence that is problematic. For example, a woman judge in a murder trial, in front of whose house giant signs are displayed saying “the children’s blood will be murdered again because of you.” I believe the judge would have grounds to have them removed on the claim that such a thing is forbidden, and to sue the owners of the signs for extortion. Accordingly, the case recounted above. Does the rabbi agree with this?
In addition, what is the logic of permitting suicide? If it is forbidden to take a life, why make an exception regarding the person himself? If this stems from the fact that he has no right over others’ lives, who said he has a right over his own life?
I wrote this in the post. By the way, in the case you gave, in my opinion the relevant ground is harassment, not undue influence.
Are you seriously asking the question about suicide? If a person is forbidden to take his fellow’s money, why should he be permitted to take his own money (or throw it into the sea)? This reminds me of some well-known joke based on an a fortiori argument that I’ve forgotten exactly how it goes (“and if my own hand may enter my pocket… then all the more so yours”).
I assume you were joking.
Since when is the rabbi interested in Israeli law?
In any case, if one is interested and criticizing, it’s worth reading the ruling (and at least the statute).
The acquittal is based on two reasons (each of which is sufficient on its own):
1. The statute says “unlawfully,” and suicide is lawful. That is exactly your argument (though, in the judgment, there is discussion of what precisely the expression modifies and what exactly its meaning is, because it appears in various places in the statute and creates a lot of ambiguity).
2. The statute says that the threat is of harm to the threatened person or to “another person,” and the one making the threat is not another person. On the question of who counts as “another person,” the court also used purposive interpretation (a whitewashed term meaning interpretation according to my wishes; though heh), and that is where the issue of the possibility of expressing distress comes in (which of course is connected to the purpose of the statute).
What practical difference is there between the laws of Yoreh De'ah and the laws of Choshen Mishpat? In any case, interest is recoverable by judges (though now I understand that this is by virtue of compulsion regarding commandments and not legal law). The only case that occurs to me is an atheist, on whom one cannot impose the laws of Yoreh De'ah. Are there other differences?
First, why shouldn’t I be interested? But it’s true that I have no special interest in Israeli law. I used the case in order to raise various considerations about it. Therefore, as I wrote, I didn’t read the judgment and referred to what was published. But apparently there is nevertheless correspondence. So maybe it isn’t all that essential to read the judgment…
Second, the threatener can be “another person.” There is no obstacle to purposive interpretation reading it that way.
And third, purposive interpretation is not a whitewashed name for doing whatever I want. That is cheap demagoguery. Purposive interpretation is a legitimate and important tool for understanding the law. There is indeed room to debate how far it may be used and whether there are cases in which it has been used too expansively. But from there to such a foolish statement is a long distance.
That is exactly the difference. There are several differences between compelling observance of commandments and legal compulsion (for example regarding descending to assets). And indeed also regarding an atheist. And in general, compulsion regarding commandments is left to the discretion of the rabbinical court according to the person and the situation, unlike legal compulsion. See at length in Chiddushei Rabbi Shmuel on Bava Batra (two long sections. Look in sections 9–11).
Thank you
Thank you for the column. Just two comments:
A. I do not agree with your interpretation of what is problematic about the letter to the judge. After all, if the judge is influenced and may change the ruling because of the letter, then that is the judge’s problem; she should not be influenced, similar to the case of a person who bursts into tears in court and may influence the judges. It seems that the problem here is different. The woman blames the judge for her future suicide and says that the judge is causing it. If the woman wants to commit suicide and that is her right, then let her do it; but placing the blame for the suicide on a second person constitutes a kind of injury to that second person.
B. I didn’t understand why demonstrating in order to move to a communist regime is legitimate. Even if we move to a communist regime, the disabled people’s claim is still not substantively just, and they cannot demand that someone else give them money.
1. No reason. It just seemed to me that you aren’t interested. Also from the fact that you don’t check the statute and read the case law. I’m simply trying to understand what this discussion is trying to do—if this is a moral discussion, then the law should not interest it. If this is a discussion of Israeli law, then one has to know it for the discussion.
2. I didn’t say there is an obstacle. I only said that the Supreme Court’s purposive interpretation did that. It argued that it is unreasonable for the law to prohibit a threat of suicide. It seems to me that this does not find expression in the ruling, but as I understand it there is no difference at all between a sincere threat (that is: genuine, in the mangled popular usage) and a threat that is not sincere, as the column makes out. If I threaten to beat you up if you don’t give me 100 NIS, I will be convicted even if I didn’t beat you and if I did beat you. So too, if a threat of suicide is forbidden, apparently there should be no difference as to carrying it out or intending to carry it out.
3. I am afraid you don’t really know Israeli case law (that is proven both by the column and by your foolish statement in the comment). Purposive interpretation is a legitimate thing, but what is called purposive interpretation in the Supreme Court is definitely doing whatever I want. I am of course referring to objective purposive interpretation, not subjective (because they use the subjective one less). Subjective purposive interpretation is interpretation according to what the legislator intended (and therefore it is subjective, because it is just some person’s interpretation of the law). Objective purposive interpretation is the law’s true purpose, meaning what the law ought to say in the State of Israel according to its values. In other words, objective purposive interpretation is interpretation of the law according to the purpose the judge wants to give it (and therefore it is objective, because Aharon Barak is not a subject, and neither are his genetic clones, of course). The Supreme Court of the State of Israel uses such interpretation quite regularly in a way that has no connection to the law. Thus, for example, the law allows the Minister of the Interior to revoke residency for any reason whatsoever. According to the objective purposive interpretation recently given in the High Court, the intention of the law is that the Minister of the Interior cannot revoke residency for any reason whatsoever. That is just one example. Anyone who knows even a little would not say such nonsense.
בס"ד 8 Shevat 5778
To Ramda — Greetings,
Charity in the holy tongue comes from the word “justice,” not merely a matter of compassion and volunteering, but full-fledged law. Therefore, “they compel charity,” and the great sages of Israel in every generation were active in matters of charity. And so it is ruled that charity is distributed by three judges because it has the status of “law,” and apparently Your Honor, in all your preoccupation with poetry and Hasidism, forgot “an explicit passage in Bava Batra” (in the golden phrase of R. Tuvia the Milker).
Since you mentioned Hasidism, it emphasized an additional dimension in charity: that it is also a merit for the giver, as in the Midrash on Naomi’s words to Ruth: “Where have you worked today?”—that more than the giver does for the poor person, the poor person does for the giver. Based on this, Rabbi Simcha Bunim of Peshischa instructed that after giving a poor person an amount that, in one’s feeling, would meet his need, one should add and give still more for the sake of the mitzvah. See Ariel Finkelstein’s article, “Humanity without Footnotes,” on the site “Mussaf Shabbat – Makor Rishon,” and the give-and-take between Prof. Nadav Schneur and me (there).
We thus learn that the court, according to “the values of justice, fairness, and peace in the heritage of Israel,” is “the father of the poor,” and it is their role and honor to supervise that every citizen and resident of the state merit a dignified existence!
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
Since you mentioned your discussion of poetry—
Since you concluded that the expression of feelings is the self-definition of poetry, then the protesters who expressed their feelings of distress not only with protest signs giving literal expression to the distress, but beyond that—why, they are poets in every respect, and it is fitting that the Ministry of Culture grant them generous funding as poets. Likewise, cultural halls should be put at their disposal, in which they can express their feelings!
Thank you for the fascinating column (and if the disabled people’s demonstrations were the catalyst for writing it, then that too is for the good).
Regarding the use of a threat involving an illegal act, I would be glad if you would also address the Torah sources on the matter—namely Tosafot on Bava Kamma 40b, in the sugya of “they borrowed it while presumed harmless and it turned out to be forewarned; the owner pays half damages and the borrower pays half damages.” The Gemara says that here it is a case where the court came first and seized it. And the Gemara asks: why can’t the owner say to the borrower, “Had you returned it to me, I would have fled with it to the marsh” (that is, I would have hidden the ox)?
And Tosafot ask: “This is difficult—what kind of claim is that? If so, he would have acted unlawfully… And it seems to say that he means: because of such statements I would have made, the injured party would have compromised with me for a small amount and forgiven me, and so you caused me to lose the entire advantage.”
On its face, this implies that a defendant may use manipulations and threaten to do unlawful acts in order to get a plaintiff to forgo money that legally belongs to him.
And see there in Yam Shel Shlomo, who also brings the words of Terumat HaDeshen on this matter.
A. I wrote that. And still there is undue influence here, because we are all human beings. You may not interfere with a person in the fulfillment of his role even if he is not supposed to be influenced and is obligated to fulfill his role. In halakhah this is the prohibition of “placing a stumbling block before the blind.” You hand a cup of wine to a Nazirite, but he can pour it out and decides to drink it. You have violated “placing a stumbling block before the blind.”
I did not understand the statement regarding injury to the judge. If indeed the ruling led to her suicide, then she is describing reality to her. What is wrong with that? That is the pure truth.
B. Because you are a capitalist. But if the regime here were communist, then society would thereby have decided to give equal rights to everyone, and there the disabled would indeed have rights (that society granted them).
This really is just nonsense and needless obstinacy (and unfortunately not for the first time).
1. Someone discussing a moral issue may also make use of arguments that arise in a legal context. Does that seem problematic to you? Not to me.
2. In my opinion there definitely is a difference. And we are not talking about beatings. That is a foolish comparison. I am not committing suicide in order to harm you, but because I am in distress. What does the sabbatical year have to do with an omelet?!
3. To this I really see no point in responding. You speak emphatically, but this is complete nonsense. You took a few controversial examples and inferred from them about all purposive interpretations. You would do well to read Aharon Barak’s book devoted to interpretation and see there quite a few other examples.
Well, I think we’ve exhausted this.
Our master, the S. Tz. L.-ite, you are mixing apples and oranges, and it is evident that the wine of exposition and interpretation has not yet left you.
Did I say that charity is not a matter of law? It is not from the legal part of law but from the halakhic part. Charity appears in Yoreh De'ah, and therefore it is clear that there is a law to give charity. But this is not a right of the poor person (and therefore it is not in Choshen Mishpat).
You are also mixing up a rabbinical court in halakhah, which is also the legislative institution, with a court in a modern state, whose role is to judge, not to legislate and not to care for the poor.
In halakhah there is the rule of “they hanged him and he sold,” and the assumption is that if he resolved and transferred ownership in order to escape the threat, that is still considered genuine consent.
But still, this is a threat directed at the litigant so that he will forgo; and if he forgoes, then he has forgone, no matter why. These are monetary relations between one person and another. But threatening the court so that it will not fulfill its role is certainly not permitted. And the difference is simple: a litigant is allowed to forgo his money, and if he did—forgone it is. But the court is obligated to fulfill its role, and if I cause it not to do so, I have violated “placing a stumbling block before the blind,” and the court too has sinned (it violated “with righteousness shall you judge your fellow”). The obligation to judge according to law is imposed on the entire public, and the court is its representative.
I once wrote here to clarify, on this basis, the words of the Mishneh LaMelekh, who wrote that one sentenced to death may not kill the court’s agent under the law of a pursuer, even though one who killed unintentionally may kill the blood avenger just as Zimri was permitted to kill Pinchas. And I explained that the duty to kill criminals is imposed on the public, and the court is its agent. The criminal himself is also part of the public.
Of course, in secular law this is not permitted even with respect to a private person. Threatening someone so that he will forgo his rights is forbidden.
A. Okay, I accept the “placing a stumbling block before the blind” argument in this context, but I still think there is another, more serious problem. The link judgment —> suicide is really not a description of reality. That link skips over the free choice of the one committing suicide. If I break a chair because you annoyed me, and afterward I say to you, “You broke my chair,” there is a distorted interpretation of reality here and an unjustified appeal to conscience.
B. I do not share the assumption that society grants rights, especially when this entails infringing people’s property (taking money by force from Shimon because society decided that Reuven has a right to it).
1. One can make use of whatever one wants. It just needs to be clear what one is doing and what the justification is. Only from your answer just now did I understand that this is a moral discussion. But presumably that is only because I am so stupid.
2. Here I am already surprised, because I am used to somewhat better analytical answers (in my offense, this is a compliment compared to what is written here). One has to decide whether the problem in a threat is the threat itself regardless of intention, or only with intention. Of course, one can decide that there are two different moral problems. One can also try to build a legal construction in which everything fits wonderfully, but to say there is a difference between A and B and therefore I can say whatever I like about each of them is a rather odd argument.
3. You should read rulings and know for yourself what the situation is. But as usual it’s like talking to a wall—you don’t need to read judgments to know what the legal situation is (once you also didn’t need to hear the news to know what was going on, and you didn’t need to read studies—whether in medicine, social sciences, or biblical criticism—to know they were nonsense; since then apparently you have descended from the level of divine inspiration, and apparently the process takes time).
The distribution of charity, and in some cases also its collection, are like monetary law, as explained in the Shulchan Arukh, Yoreh De'ah 256:3: “The charity fund is collected by two, for authority over the public is not exercised by fewer than two… and it is distributed only by three because it is like monetary law, to examine each poor person and how much is fitting to give him. And the soup kitchen—as it is distributed by three, so too it is collected only by three, because it is not a fixed matter and they must examine each and every person how much is fitting for him to give.”
But the distribution of charitable resources is more than monetary law, since the court is considered “the father of orphans” and “the hand of the poor,” and they are responsible that charity funds reach the poor who deserve them, even when the poor do not make a claim and even when they do not know of the existence of the funds due them—the court is obligated to act on its own initiative (see: Rabbi A. Tz. Sheinfeld’s article, “On the Religious Endowments in the State of Israel”).
Since the Supreme Court recognizes in principle the “right to a dignified existence” as a basic right, and since the court is obligated by law to rule according to “the principles of justice, fairness, and peace in the heritage of Israel,” it is therefore clear that the responsibility lies with it to ensure that state budgets in general, and welfare budgets in particular, reach those who deserve them. Judges who reveal “judicial activism” in every possible matter—precisely where the lives of truly needy people are at stake do they adopt “conservatism”?
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
I agree that here we are dealing with a threat to a litigant, not to the court.
Still, here it would seem to imply that it is permitted ab initio to use a threat to do something illegal. You wrote: “When one of the routes at the intersection involves an illegal action, he is deriving profits in an illegal way, and therefore this is forbidden extortion.” And yet here it is explained that this is legitimate.
I return to the example: the halakhah is that the borrower must pay only half of the damage. The Gemara asks regarding the ruling—why was it decided this way? The lender could say to him: “I would have hidden the ox!” That is, it assumes that every potential lender may use such a claim, and from this it follows that such use is valid and legitimate.
Paragraph 1, line 3:
… to examine each and every poor person how much …
Paragraph 3, line 2:
… it is therefore clear that the responsibility lies with them that the budgets …
A. I addressed choice. The Nazirite too has the choice not to drink. Besides, who said she has a choice? Perhaps she feels she will not withstand it and will commit suicide? As in the case of Rabbi Ilai: “If a person sees that his evil inclination is overpowering him…”
B. Society also takes taxes and expropriates money for public needs. Whoever does not want to be part of society should not be part of it. But whoever participates in the game has to accept the decisions.
S. Tz. L., you can insert your words as an appendix to the book Kedushat Levi. These are nice Hasidic homiletics, more charming than his.
I explained this. In halakhah it is permitted in the context of a threat to a litigant and not to the court, and in the legal and moral context it is not permitted at all.
So you understood that what I am really doing here is a legal discussion. Excellent. That truly is a very novel understanding, one that never occurred to me. You can add it as an appendix to the book Kedushat Levi. It seems to me that the level of understanding and interpretation you display is very well suited to the title.
I must say that since I have known you for years, I know this is not because of stupidity. The conclusion is that your anger and stubbornness are skewing your heart and leading you to these absurdities.
In any case, I think we have agreement on at least one thing: both of us feel that we are talking to a wall. I think at least one of us is right about that, and I even have a certain suspicion who. Therefore permit me to stop here and not fulfill the verse “Answer not a fool according to his folly” (I have justification, since I have no problem with the second half of the verse being fulfilled).
Okay, that is what I wanted to reach.
What you are basically saying is that here there is a halakhah that does not fit the legal norms and moral system of our time. (That is in fact what jarred the commentators on the Tosafot I cited above.)
In paragraph 2, lines 3–4:
… (see the article by Rabbi A. Tz. Sheinfeld, head of the rabbinical court in Jerusalem, “On the Religious Endowments in the State of Israel,” on the Da’at website).
And regarding the comparison to Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev,
it would be more fitting to compare to him Rabbi Michael Abraham, may his lamp shine, who is called after the angel Michael who pleads on behalf of Israel, and after our father Abraham who pleaded even on behalf of the people of Sodom. So too Rabbi Michael Abraham pleads even, by a remote route, on behalf of the judges of the High Court, who in this case refrain from activism and refuse to give clear definitions of the measure of a “dignified existence.”
And by virtue of this favorable judgment—may they on high judge him and us favorably, that it may preserve peace, and may we find grace and good understanding in the eyes of God and man!
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
A. The fact that there is “placing a stumbling block before the blind” does not mean that the Nazirite is permitted to blame me and disclaim all responsibility. As for the question who said she has a choice—fair enough; if in the letter she is describing a state of helplessness without blaming anyone, then it doesn’t seem there is a problem (at least not the problem I am pointing to), but that is really not the impression the letter gives. She is simply blaming the judge and not merely describing a psychological state.
B. Well, this is a very broad discussion, and I prefer to forgo it and not enter into it in this framework, because it is only a side issue in the column.
May it be His will, amen.
The discussion is not whether blaming the judge is justified, but whether it constitutes undue influence.
Due, due
Don’t eagles have a right to claim money from the fund for eagles? A modern state also functions in a certain sense as a fund for its needy citizens. If in the rabbi’s opinion the definition of the state is different, or the definition of the State of Israel is different, or the fund ought to support other things, that is of course legitimate, but that is not what was claimed in the column.
Not similar at all. It is comparable to a situation in which the eagles demand that a fund for eagles be established. As long as the fund has not been established, they have no rights whatsoever.
Perhaps you will say that in our case the fund has been established because of the conception of the state. Not true. The proof is that the state does not conceive its role that way; only the disabled who are interested in assistance do. Call it a welfare state or not (you assumed that Israel is a welfare state. Is that written in law? Or are these the desires of the disabled, and then we are back to the same point). Likewise, one who needs life-saving drugs cannot sue the state even though he will literally die (unlike the disabled, whose lives will “only” be harder). The fact is that he has no such right.
By the way, I already wrote here that if indeed this is part of their rights, all they need do is petition the High Court and then all their problems will be solved. It follows that even the High Court apparently does not see assistance to the disabled as “rights” vested in them. That is, the current situation is that there is no fund for saving eagles, and the eagles are demanding that one be established.
Rabbi Michi, I did not assume that Israel is a welfare state; on the contrary, I argued that this is precisely what is in dispute (to what extent Israel is a welfare state). Regarding the High Court, in principle the rabbi is right, except that it is fairly clear that the High Court will not enter so deeply into the budget law and force the government how many shekels to put here and how many there. If the petition concerns the state’s principled obligation to the needy, the High Court will presumably rule that it exists, without going down into the complicated practical details.
Decide whether you are restraining yourself in order to fulfill the verse or not. Perhaps you are creating a contradiction in order to fulfill the contradiction between the two verses.
In order to infer from all of A to B, A and B must be exhaustive. That is your fallacy. Nor is it the case that I read the column angrily. I see nothing in it that is angering.
In any case, you apparently agree that my reading comprehension is not all that bad. From other places it seems that you agree that your ability to express yourself is not all that good, and therefore some readers grumble that you repeat yourself and some grumble that they did not understand (which is one and the same: you are hard to understand [also because of the difficulty of the subjects, of course; not everything can be laid at your door], and your way of trying to overcome this is to repeat yourself in Maharal style), and perhaps it would be worthwhile to have an editor. But of course you will not draw the obvious conclusion from the two facts.
After my response yesterday, I wondered to myself why I even respond. The answer I gave myself is of course that it is not for a rational reason, but I managed to come up with three rational reasons to respond in an argument (which perhaps I should consider whether they obtain before I do it):
1. As our rabbi has taught us, the egoistic motive in an argument is to lose. That certainly happened to me.
2. In a public argument, to persuade others.
3. To persuade the other side. And here I came to the conclusion that I do not think I have ever managed to respond to you with something that would provoke thought (I’m not talking about changing your mind, but only about “that’s an interesting question; perhaps one needs to add more complexity to the reasoning”). The only case I could think of was in the column on what poetry is, but there you were actually in the midst of the process of thinking (and at the end of the process, indeed, there was a wall). And it’s not as though you are the only intelligent person I have argued with. There was even a yeshiva rebbe when I was in first-year shiur who had a principle of not conceding anything to students (I assume you recognize yourself) who conceded something to me. And on the other hand, even today you admit that in some of your arguments in those days you held views that were completely indefensible. I think I already wrote here that I remember the bizarre arguments in which you claimed that the fact that Haredim do not work does not harm the economy at all (that one, in particular, I did not bother participating in). So it seems to me that I am actually the one who knows who the wall is.
The poor person too can declare that we are partners and sue me in rabbinical court to give him my money. Declarations are not facts. As long as it has not been decided, we are not a welfare state, despite the fact that there are some (who also happen to need this) who want that.
By the way, a principled ruling by the High Court that one should help does not mean they have rights. We all agree that one should, and the question of how much is entrusted to the decision of the authorized government. And by the way, the High Court has in the past gone into the details and set the sums for living with dignity.
In short, as long as there is no possibility to claim this in law, there is no right here. A person cannot decide on his own that he has rights against others. It doesn’t work that way; otherwise you have abolished the whole doctrine of rights.
Who said it was not declared that we are not a welfare state? How does one declare it? With skywriting? This is a field of research for political science and for jurists. The truth is that the situation is like the heap paradox, namely there is a spectrum of welfare-statism and so on.
Subtract one “not”
How much can one keep floundering around this issue? I said what I had to say. If they think they deserve it, good for them. In my opinion and in the opinion of the authorized government, they do not deserve it, and the matter is comparable to a poor person who declares that in his opinion he is my partner. That is all.
On the subject of rights and obligations—I once wrote an article on the matter. My conclusion was that there is no such thing as commandments between man and his fellow; there are only commandments between man and God whose fulfillment is through one’s fellow. The concept that a right entails an obligation exists only in legal obligations. In the system of commandments—all the commandments relate to the one commanded.
I really do not agree. Charity is a commandment toward one’s fellow (albeit by virtue of the Torah’s command). The poor person is not merely the occasion for fulfillment (and there is a practical difference for one who lives in a walled city and sends a gift to a poor person in an unwalled city—whether he sends it on the 14th or the 15th; though this can be rejected with difficulty). The Chatam Sofer notes the difference between commandments to one’s fellow and commandments to the Holy One, blessed be He, where the fellow is merely the occasion for fulfillment (such as betrothal).
בס"ד 9 Shevat 5778
Seemingly, one can compare roadblocks to the institution of “interrupting the reading” that developed in Ashkenazic Jewry in the Middle Ages and received recognition in halakhic literature. Someone who felt that an injustice had been done to him by individuals or by the community leadership would stand “between Yishtabach and Yotzer” or before the Torah reading and would not allow the prayer service to continue until justice was done for him.
Obviously, the interruption greatly irritated the worshippers and sometimes caused delays of hours and the cholent to burn. Yet precisely stepping on the nerves of the whole community advanced, “at the end of the day” 🙂, the efficient resolution of the problem, because in such a pressured situation, where everyone is hurrying to finish, the gates of creative thinking suddenly open and a magic solution is found that compromises between the disputants.
To a certain extent, a strike or roadblock is similar to “interrupting the reading.” Problems—especially the problems of “invisible” people—that are neglected or dragged out because the decision-makers have another agenda, are brought to efficient discussion because of the intolerability of the shutdown, and the sides begin a marathon of talks that leads to an agreed compromise.
However, attention must be paid to the fact that in shutting down an essential service or blocking a traffic artery, many people may suffer not only inconvenience, wasted time, and frayed nerves, but also heavy financial damage, and sometimes even danger for someone who must urgently reach a hospital and the like.
Therefore, it seems to me that it is vital to have an “institution of compulsory arbitration” that can obligate the parties to appear before it and propose (and when necessary also impose) a reasonable compromise arrangement, thereby obviating the need for shutdowns and blockades. Perhaps the framework already exists, and for these purposes the High Court, with its tendency toward activism, could be helpful.
In any case, shutdowns and blockades are good when they come to expedite the settlement of the dispute as a tool that spurs the parties to sit down for efficient negotiations. By contrast, when an agreed arrangement has already been reached and there is a minority that is unwilling to accept the compromise—it seems on the face of it that there is less legitimacy to a struggle by means of shutdown and blockade.
To sum up: it seems that “interrupting the reading” and its counterparts, shutdown and blockade, are appropriate as a spur to negotiations that will bring an agreed compromise, and that an efficient arbitration framework is preferable to them.
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
Regarding “interrupting the reading,” I heard in a lecture by Prof. Avraham Grossman that this institution developed specifically in the small Ashkenazic communities of the Middle Ages, where there were no permanently sitting courts. By contrast, in Spain and in the lands of the East, where there were large communities (the difference in community size can be seen in the travels of Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela, and this was the first lecture of Prof. Yom Tov Assis, z”l), there was no need for the institution of “interrupting the reading.”
The smallness of the communities in Ashkenaz was apparently also the reason for the development of the custom of selling Torah honors, since community taxes did not suffice for the needs (about the development of the custom of selling aliyot in medieval Ashkenaz, Prof. Ron Kleinman wrote. It is quite possible that the two customs—interrupting the reading and selling aliyot—“contributed” to the problematic situation of diminished reverence for the synagogue, which led to leniency regarding idle chatter in the synagogue. Once one gets used to holding discussions and sales for the sake of mitzvot in the synagogue, one may slip down the “slippery slope” to unnecessary conversation as well.
To Rabbi Levinger:
I think the rabbi will agree with you that there is a similarity between interrupting the reading and blocking roads. Perhaps we can define it this way: there are demonstrative tools that the public agrees in advance that someone who feels wronged may use, despite the suffering caused to each member of the public.
The argument here was not whether it is permitted to use this tool. The discussion is whether their claim that it is “their right” to receive an allowance equal to minimum wage is a just claim.
בס"ד 9 Shevat 5778
To Aharon — Greetings,
Can one live with dignity on minimum wage? It seems to me that one should aspire that the income of the disabled reach at least the average wage in the economy—we are dealing with princes’ sons! Especially since a disabled person’s expenses are greater: treatments and special equipment that the disabled person needs like air to breathe, and the like.
And if every person’s living needs are expensive—for a disabled person they are more expensive!
If a physically whole person can save on living costs by buying cheaply at the market—a disabled person finds this very difficult and by nature of his limitation will have to order delivery from the supermarket. If a physically whole person can travel cheaply on public transportation—a disabled person needs to travel by private car or taxi. Just going to the bathroom—for a disabled person it is an operation! And when a person cannot mop the floor and wash dishes because of his disability—then a paid helper and a dishwasher are not luxuries, etc., etc.
I suggest that everyone do the exercise and calculate how much more expensive his life would become, God forbid, if he were disabled, and he will understand that even twice the minimum wage is “small change” for a disabled person’s needs.
Since this is the situation, and disability greatly increases expenses, and all the allowances that can be given will not solve a disabled person’s economic distress—it seems to me that, besides what has already been done in increasing disability allowances, it is necessary to develop possibilities for vocational training and placement, and even to subsidize employers of disabled people—so that disabled people will be able to find work that provides a dignified livelihood, which is, in the words of Maimonides, the highest form of charity!
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
Paragraph 2, line 1:
And if every person’s living needs are expensive …
Rabbi Levinger, you are mixing apples and oranges.
The question was not whether they need money, but whether they have the legal/moral right to demand it—again, to demand it.
בס"ד Eve of the holy Sabbath “and in the morning you shall be filled with bread” 5778
To Aharon — Greetings,
Obviously, a person has the right to demand what is due to him by law, and the obligation of the individual and of the public in Israel to ensure that the poor live with dignity is an absolute obligation. On the contrary, we ought on our own initiative “to consider the poor” and not, Heaven forbid, wait for “if he indeed cries out.” See the sources I brought in my comments above—“They compel charity,” “Distribution of charity is law,” and “Monetary law and more than that.” The matters are simple; it is a pity that because of over-cleverness, philosophizing, and “libertarian ideology,” even the simplest and most basic things in Judaism are turned into a “question”…
The question that requires serious discussion is: what is the proper way to solve the distress, and what is the proper way to raise awareness of the problem?
And on this I elaborated in my last two comments—“Blocking roads as interrupting the reading?” (where the question mark in the title already hints at my reservation regarding this form of protest, especially after a compromise agreement had been reached) and “Only minimum wage?” (where I concluded that the main solution to the distress of the disabled is to help them find work that provides a dignified livelihood, while the allowances are intended primarily to cover the additional major financial needs of the disabled because of their disability).
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
In paragraph 2, line 3:
… (where the question mark presented in the title already hints …
A question regarding the distinction between enticement and threat.
If a woman tells a man that she is willing to give him sexual compensation in exchange for money, is that enticement or a threat? Given that the act is morally forbidden, and may also be legally forbidden under certain conditions (assume a state where it is forbidden).
It seems clear to me that this is enticement even though she is soliciting him to do an illegal act.
The reason seems clear to me—the woman is indeed offering an illegal proposal, but one that benefits the man (in the short term).
The situation here is the opposite. The woman is offering him unlawful compensation if he does what she wants. Usually in a threat one threatens an unlawful action if the person does not do what the threatener wants. Here he can choose not to do it and simply remain without the compensation, and therefore it is enticement.
1. The whole matter of National Insurance came precisely to replace voluntary charity, so as a citizen I have the right to argue that the allowance set for a certain issue is insufficient.
2. The weapons of demonstration and strike are anchored in labor law and democratic rights. The disabled do not have the privilege of pulling the plug, and I am proud of them for choosing the route of blocking roads. They are forced to overcome their shame and do this. It is no less noble than a demonstration outside the Attorney General’s home, and the disturbance to the general public is meant to wake it from its indifference, because National Insurance is a mechanism of the entire population… so let the entire population wake up and fix the wrong…
In general, if a weak public such as the disabled, the elderly, LGBT people, and others do not disrupt the course of life, how will they achieve anything at all? Who really cares about them?
3. Regarding a threat of suicide—the problem is that it may be irreversible, and therefore they apparently treat it with greater caution… indeed, this is a dilemma…
You have the right as a citizen to demand anything, but you are not demanding your rights. Those are two different claims. You have no right that National Insurance give you a certain sum, but of course you have a right to demand it. That is not what we were talking about here. By the same token, I have the right to demand that National Insurance give every citizen 1,000 NIS every day, except that as long as this has not been decided, no citizen has a right to receive it.
So you’re retracting your claim that disability allowance from National Insurance is a matter of charity… The defense rests.. ):
And what about their right to block roads when they have no alternative?
No, I am not. I did not write that anywhere, and I am not retracting. The allowance is plain charity that society decided to give them. After society decided, they have a right (not vested and not natural, but simply because we decided—just as when I decide to give you a gift or obligate myself toward you, after the act of acquisition you have a right to receive it). But they certainly have no right to demand a higher amount. the defense failed.
They have no right whatsoever to block roads or harass anyone if this is not a matter of their right. Anyone among them who has reached the point of starvation (I assume this is a negligible minority among them) is hard to judge, but that is a discussion on a different plane.
בס"ד 13 Shevat 5778
Judge Barak-Erez’s statement that a suicidal threat should be treated leniently because of “freedom of speech” is puzzling. After all, hurling the epithet “murderer” at a judge is contempt of court, and while understanding that these are things hurled in despair by a defendant who imagines that her world has been destroyed by her lawful conviction—there is room to use the “contempt of court” provision in a proportionate way.
However, to convict a hard-pressed woman who hurled words out of her pain under a legal section originally intended to deter violent criminals and organized-crime figures who threaten judges with violence—it would seem that this was not “the legislator’s intent.” And branding a person with a conviction for “threatening a judge” tags him as a habitual criminal and irreparably harms his future and his chances of rehabilitation.
Suicide indeed constitutes harm not only to the person committing it but also to his family and friends, and when it is accompanied by an accusation against society or against certain people whom the suicide blames for having pushed him by their actions or their indifference to his desperate act, severe pangs of conscience may be caused to the one accused by the suicide, as well as harm to his good name.
But in the case of a judge accused by the suicide of responsibility for his death—the harm to the judge is very limited. Harm to the judge’s good name will usually not be created, for people tend to believe the judge more than the accusations of a convicted criminal.
Also, the pangs of conscience that the suicide tries to cause the judge who convicted him will not be increased if the judge is decent, for there is a presumption regarding a decent judge that before placing a person’s case on the side of guilt, he has gone through sleepless nights and countless “butterflies in the stomach” until he reached a clear conclusion that guilt was proven “beyond a reasonable doubt” and that the punishment is proportionate and properly considers not only the need for deterrence but also makes proper rehabilitation possible.
If it is clear to the judge that he did everything to turn the scale in the defendant’s favor, then no baseless accusation will shake the judge’s spirit, knowing that he did everything in his power to bring about a just trial.
In any case, suicidal speech may indicate severe psychological distress, which may, Heaven forbid, even lead to an act from which there is no return. The judge should calm the defendant, rebuke him, and perhaps also punish him for the things he hurls. But first and foremost the judge must remember that before him stands a desperate person who thinks his world has been destroyed, a person who should be encouraged and infused with hope for rehabilitation, and referred to professional help from social workers and mental-health professionals—and certainly not have the stigma of “threatening a judge” imposed on him, which will forever tag the convicted person with the stigma of a violent criminal.
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
In the comment “Is blocking roads like interrupting the reading?”, last paragraph:
Regarding the sale of aliyot in Ashkenaz in the Middle Ages—see the article by Prof. Ron S. Kleinman, “The Sale of Aliyot and Honors (‘Sale of Mitzvot’) in the Synagogue—the custom, its development, and its reasons,” Knishta 4 (2010), p. 279 and onward).
Good morning,
1. When do you decide that what the state subsidizes is a matter of charity:
A tax break because of an academic degree/number of children/keeping a disabled person at home/etc.
Subsidizing schools in the periphery?
Funding road paving in Lod?
In short, my claim is that the state, as representative of the people as sovereign, decides what to spend its public funds on for all sorts of reasons, mainly in order to promote the flourishing of the citizens…
The concept of charity is not relevant…
2. I would be glad for your answer regarding the disabled people’s decision to block roads when they have no alternative… because they have no other power to influence?
It seems to me the rabbi is talking about allowances—National Insurance. Although it is clear that from the standpoint of halakhah there is no charity here, since the state does not believe in the Torah. But it is also not charity, because it is not exactly voluntary, but rather out of an understanding that the people are one organism (therefore what is given to Arabs is indeed not included in this). That is, it is in the state’s interest, not that it is doing anyone a favor. On the other hand, it is not relevant that the poor can claim it by force, and it is not theirs. This is most similar to the halakhic concept of charity.
Subsidy is something else, connected to the promotion of various matters, and is not included in charity; it changes according to changing national needs (if there is sufficient population, they won’t give tax breaks based on number of children). And paving roads is altogether a public matter (unlike charity, it is not relevant that a private person should pave a road), and is therefore the responsibility of the state.
In short, every person has all sorts of expenses, and some of them are for charity (if he is religious and intends the mitzvah of charity). So too at the level of the state.
How good that there is a website (otherwise how would we talk?!) 🙂
1. It seems I was not understood. Everything the state subsidizes is a matter of charity. The only difference is between things it has already decided to subsidize—in which case it is already a right (after the decision)—and things it has not yet. The disabled are fighting for what has not yet been decided to give them, not for implementation of decisions already made. The only exception I can think of is needs that were declared as the basis for tax collection (such as external and internal security). If I paid taxes, I am entitled to the return. Well, even about that one can engage in much pilpul…
2. And I would be glad for your answer about the poor person who blocks the entrance to my house or takes things from my house while demanding that I give him charity, simply because he has no other way to get them. By the way, the answer can also be given orally. 🙂
Eilon, the state gives National Insurance because the entire Jewish people are one organism? And with Arabs it is something else, of course? A somewhat problematic theory, no? The state gives National Insurance for the same reason every state in the world does so, without any connection to the Jewish people and their unity. Simply because it thinks this is a need of its citizens and its duty toward them. No connection whatsoever to the Jewish people, etc., etc.
1. Again, charity and state—can the two walk together? No…
2. As for the poor person blocking my house: if a child whose father is obligated to support him thinks his father is shortchanging him and giving him too little, and he has no way to persuade his father because his father tends to be persuaded only by those who pressure him, then he is permitted to block his father’s house as a means of shaking him up and jolting him. By contrast, I am not obligated at all to support the poor person who blocks my house…
3. Since I understood that quite a few people follow this site (kudos..), it is important to me that a different opinion on the subject of the disabled be heard by them. (I’m surfing on the waves of affection for your site..)
I was not speaking at all about what the state intends by what it does. I already said that the state has no intention whatsoever of giving charity (and indeed its intention is what the rabbi detailed). For my part, I see the money I spend on National Insurance as charity, if only because I have no assurance at all that National Insurance will help me in my hour of trouble, like any insurance whatsoever (and I have no choice whether to pay this specific insurance or not. It is required by law, and if I do not pay they will collect it from me by force). So as insurance (which is the state’s purpose, and the purpose of all states where this insurance exists), it is not very successful, and I do not believe in it as such. All the more so in this insurance as it exists in the rest of the world. All this talk about the state’s duty to the citizen is nonsense. No one sitting in power in any state sees any duty to anything. In truth, all productive people in the world and the various politicians see (and think in the recesses of their hearts, though they are unwilling to admit it even to themselves) the poor as a burden at best and pitiable people at worst (yes, that is worse than being a burden. This kind of pity is the worst thing there is). It’s just that with respect to the people of Israel specifically, the situation is different by virtue of the Torah in general and the commandment of charity in particular. Once it is one organism, one cares for the poor (if one intends the mitzvah of charity) by virtue of caring for ourselves. Like someone whose legs are paralyzed—the body still makes sure to send oxygen and nutrients there even though apparently they are a burden on the body. (I have not seen such a person cut off his own legs because of such logic.) There is a significant matter of the body’s wholeness that is worth this investment and expense. And in truth, that wholeness has a medical significance. I have heard surgeons say several times, regarding diabetic leg amputations, that the higher the amputation site, the lower the chance of staying alive, and it seems this was not connected to the surgery itself but simply to the loss of the limb even after the amputation site had healed.
But I do indeed believe that at least inwardly (not too deeply), the situation in our state is cognitively different from other states. It seems to me the state was built on this solidarity from its very foundation. And it is also more than ordinary socialism. To build the state from scratch required much stronger spiritual forces than the ideology of communist socialism, which was the external engine of those immigrations that established the Yishuv. The story with the Arabs is the constraints of democracy and human rights and equality for citizens. But that is built on the Arabs being a minority within a Jewish nation (which is more than a sociological nation) whose state this is. I doubt whether in a state of all its citizens this arrangement would work.
And what of the other states? Are all the states of the world doomed to built-in cruelty? That is a separate discussion about the meaning of existence and repairing the world, and this is not the place for it.
בס"ד 15 Shevat 5778
To the honorable Rebbetzin Dafna Abraham, may she be blessed with all good — Greetings,
According to the law, there is joint ownership of both spouses in all the assets that either one acquires. Therefore this website too is under joint ownership of the two of you, and you need not apologize for taking part in the discussions.
If there is any need for apology, it is for insufficient participation in the discussions, but that can be understood, for someone has to maintain the home and give attention to the children, lest they block the house in protest over a lack of parental attention 🙂
The partnership of spouses in all their property is grounded in logic, for even what each spouse earns through his or her work depends on the assistance and support of the other spouse. The matter is rooted in a tradition of hundreds of years among the Jewish people, who would write in the marriage conditions document: “And they shall rule over their property equally.”
And these matters are founded on the instruction of the sages (Bava Metzia 59), that a person should consult his wife in household matters, and some say: even in worldly matters. Thus our father Jacob already acted: though an angel of God commanded him to return to his homeland, he called Rachel and Leah and consulted with them in order to obtain their agreement.
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
To S. Tz. Levinger,
Your post is thought-provoking and also brings a smile…
Except for the description of the addressee: “Rebbetzin”… because I really think that the title Rebbetzin means more than “a rabbi’s wife”… in my view it is fitting for a rabbi’s wife who bears a leadership role and influence in the community in which the rabbi serves… Unfortunately, I do not fit that definition in any way…
I hope that in this case I am not adding to myself the sin of false modesty, because that really is not where it comes from…
In any case, thank you very much
Whoever participates in the discussions here fulfills an important leadership role in a broad community of hundreds of readers of the site, representing diverse strata of society.
A participant in the discussion serves as a “mouth” for many readers who have questions and objections to what is being said, but who do not feel comfortable arguing with the rabbi or with the other participants, whether out of respect or out of fear, whether out of reverential respect or fear of punishment 🙂 fear of lethal responses.
If among the men in the readership there are perhaps one or two percent who respond—among the women almost no response is heard here. Presumably, one who takes it upon herself to respond regularly will pave the way for others too to contribute from their unique point of view. Especially on a site of lovers of philosophizing and “lomdus”—it is important that there also be proper representation for voices more connected to natural feeling.
Regards, S. Tz. Levinger
As for the title “Rebbetzin” given to a rabbi’s wife in Jewish tradition, there are several reasons for it.
Even if the rebbetzin was not directly involved in the rabbi’s communal work, there is still the aspect of “what is mine and yours is really hers,” since she enables him to devote himself to Torah study and its teaching. Incidentally, in Central Europe, the place of the Yekkes and the Hungarians, they would also call a doctor’s wife “Frau Doctor.”
But in many cases, the rebbetzin assists the rabbi behind the scenes with good counsel, grounded in a motherly trait of understanding human nature and people’s needs, as did Chava-Leah, the wife of Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook, who would express her opinion regarding the yeshiva students and give the rabbi educational advice. And the expounders of homilies already said: “A worthy wife makes—shapes—her husband’s will.”
Rebbetzins were involved in acts of kindness, such as Reyza-Rivka, the wife of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, who led a women’s group to improve the yeshiva’s material condition. Her daughter-in-law Chava-Leah, mentioned above, cared for the poor and the sick, and died young after falling ill when she went on a freezing winter day to visit poor sick people. And rebbetzins taught Torah to women, after the example of our matriarch Sarah: Abraham would teach faith in God to the men, and Sarah to the women.
The prohibition on threatening the court with suicide apparently does not specifically require the definition of a threat, because even enticement, or any other form of influence on the judicial process that is not of the nature of an argument, is entirely improper.
Not quite accurate. Arguments that explain to the judge the problematic consequences of one ruling or another are what is called enticement in this context, and that is of the nature of argument (because these really are the consequences her ruling will have), and yet they are permitted (I am not talking about offering a bribe, which is not pertinent). But this seems to me a side point in the discussion.
Lately I’ve had some thoughts regarding the disabled people’s mode of protest that I wanted to share. One can relate to the mode of protest in two aspects: the legal aspect and the moral aspect.
1. In the legal aspect, there was here a kind of civil disobedience. I quote from the Wikipedia entry on civil disobedience: “Civil disobedience is a public action that constitutes an appeal to the majority… Civil disobedience is expressed in relatively quiet but well-organized acts of refusal, built mainly on refraining from actions required by the authorities: refraining from military service, refraining from paying taxes, a general strike, and the like, as well as more active measures: demonstrations, burning tires, blocking roads, and the like.” In my opinion, such civil disobedience has justification, despite the harm to the rule of law, only when there is a substantial violation of the rights of a certain group in society. But here the rights of the disabled were not violated, because they have no moral right to receive allowances as the rabbi explained in the post (there exists only a duty of society toward them without their having a right to receive).
2. In the moral aspect, this mode of protest not only flagrantly violated the laws of the state, but also harmed the citizens themselves and did so at their expense. For example, if a certain group decides to engage in civil disobedience against laws limiting cannabis smoking by holding a demonstration in which everyone smokes cannabis, such an act does indeed violate the law but does not harm the other citizens (that is, there is no moral problem). In my opinion, civil disobedience of blocking roads, because it harms other citizens on the moral plane, has no justification whatsoever, even where the rights of a certain group are violated (just as one may not save oneself with another’s property). Perhaps only in a case where there is urgency to prevent extreme acts of violence by the authorities (such as the disengagement plan), and even then only where there are no other reasonable options for appealing to the majority.
On the subject of the threat, I accept your position. There is indeed an element of emotional extortion in what the defendant writes to the judge. Nevertheless, dealing with a person threatening suicide is complex, and as people who see life as a supreme value, certainly we would not want anyone to take his own life.
On the subject of the disabled, I disagree with you completely. The command from Leviticus, “And if your brother becomes poor, and his means fail with you, then you shall uphold him; whether a stranger or a settler, he shall live with you” (Leviticus 25:35), and its interpretations, disagree with you as well. It is sheer hard-heartedness and wickedness to impose livelihood and sustenance on the fate-stricken themselves, without considering their abilities or income. By the same token, we could say that the state has no part in the death of a person who veered with his vehicle off the shoulder and fell from the mountain to his death (for why should they build a proper guardrail?), and why should we demand that the state establish hospitals and an education system? According to your words, none of these is the state’s duty.
So I, as stated, disagree with you. The most significant percentage of the disabled are people who are unable to work more than a small number of hours per week (if at all), while disabled people who have income that allows them to get by receive a much lower allowance or no allowance at all.
The claim “How can one live on 3,000 NIS a month?” and the demand to link the allowance to the minimum wage are among the most justified demands citizens can make of the state. All the more so after the enactment of the Laron Law, which encourages disabled people to go out to work, and indeed many do go out to work. But what about the tens of thousands of disabled people (in my opinion about 70,000) who simply cannot work? Whether due to a physical, cognitive, or mental impairment. What crime did they commit that they must live on 3,000 NIS a month?! The minimum wage was set as the minimum necessary to allow a person to live with dignity; it would be fitting for the state (after all, in the end that is why we established it: to be a Jewish state that cares for every Jew and every citizen) to enable even one who has no ability to support himself to live with dignity.
Dear Or, I have a novelty for you (which is already written in the column). In everything you wrote here, I do not see even one point on which there is a disagreement between us.
Unlike in the Shulchan Arukh, in the Torah charity does appear alongside other obligations. You can solve this small problem of the commandments being found in “one basket” in the Torah by slicing it into salami pieces (the Documentary Hypothesis), but I assume you’re not a devotee of that doctrine. Likewise, in a just society, the weakest are not thrown to the side of the road, or onto the knees of the prince’s son and his friends, simply because of their weakness.
But it does not follow from this that the disabled people’s struggle, lock, stock, and barrel, is justified. As the son of a disabled father (missing an arm and a leg) and a disabled father-in-law (with muscular degeneration in his legs), I can certainly say that there should without a doubt be differentiation among the disabled. There is no greater inequality than equal treatment of those who are unequal. That is also why the IDF is collapsing under the burden of caring for disabled veterans, and why, with so many disabled parking spaces, there is almost no parking left that is not disabled parking.