Parashat Mishpatim

In Parashat Mishpatim the Torah takes us from Mount Sinai to daily life, to the laws of damages, responsibility, honesty, and money. Rav Kook explains that precisely here the uniqueness of the people of Israel is revealed, because law is not a civil domain separate from the holy but the place where holiness lives within reality. There are cultures and religions in which faith is the inner and moral space, while the systems of law are the human system, "give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's," but in Judaism our everyday reality draws its strength and spirit from the holy and is bound to it. Judaism builds justice, protects the weak, limits power, and sets truth above interest. Our religion is also a social compass. God's light lives within the economy, the army, education, and law. From the heights of Mount Sinai we continue and rise to life itself.

*