TORAH FOR CHRISTIANS
SEASON EIGHT EPISODE THREE
A JUST WAR
As we further engage in examining the Israel-Hamas war, the next concept to consider is the idea of a just war. The Torah clearly differentiates between a milchemet hovah, a mandatory or just war, and a milchemet reshut, an optional war, commonly known as a war of conquest. Since Hamas attacked Israel, we will focus on the first topic, a mandatory or just war. All Jewish sources, Biblical, Rabbinic, and modern all agree that Israel has a right to defend itself. Even so, there are limits imposed on warfare, limits which require Israel to maintain a high moral standard, even when engaged in a war of self-preservation.
I’m Rabbi Parr and this is Torah for Christians. Welcome to our study of the just war in Judaism.
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The origin of the laws regarding a just war is found in the Book of Deuteronomy, Chapter 20.
When you approach a town to attack it, you shall offer it terms of peace. If it responds peaceably and lets you in, all the people present there shall serve you at forced labor. If it does not surrender to you, but would join battle with you, you shall lay siege to it; and when the LORD your God delivers it into your hand, you shall put all its males to the sword.
Putting aside the killing of the men if the town does not surrender, uncomfortable to read as it is, Israel cannot offer up a surprise attack; it must first attempt to take the town peaceably. In modern terms, it means that the Israeli Air Force dropped leaflets on Gaza, announcing an imminent invasion and asking the inhabitants of northern Gaza to leave so that their lives might be spared. This leafletting follows the spirit of this law, that one must offer terms of peace prior to an attack. While the practical effect of this leafletting is to make a bad situation worse, the Israelis are acting in the spirit of this law.
The Rabbis added another caveat to this law; that when Israel laid siege to a city, it could only surround a city on three sides; there had to be a way for civilians to escape. Moses Maimonides encoded this precept in his Mishneh Torah: Laws of Warfare.
Of course, by the 13th Century, Maimonides’ ruling was moot since Jews lacked statehood. Waging war demands, at least until the past few years, statehood. When a state has an army, rules of engagement are necessary. But Jews did not have an independent state for 2,000 years and so these laws of a just or unjust war were mostly theoretical until the establishment of the State of Israel. With the Jewish State, we have revisited the Bible, Talmud, and later legal codes to define the rules of war in Israel.
Another Biblical law comes into play when we talk about a just war. Later in that same chapter from Deuteronomy, we read that Israelites may not cut down fruit-bearing trees to use the wood for siege engines. Not only does it ban the use of these trees, it goes on to say:
Are trees of the field human to withdraw before you into the besieged city?
The ancient rabbis were quick to equate fruit trees to human beings. If Jews are not allowed to kill, as it were, fruit trees, how much the more so are Jews forbidden to kill innocent civilians.
Reuven Kimmelman, a noted rabbi and author, writes the following:
… (T)he resort to military force requires a moral as well as a political raison d'etre. Otherwise, the war effort risks being undermined by the morale of the very community that constitutes the resource of power. As former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion noted, "two-thirds of military prowess is popular morale."
In modern warfare, these rules of war are sadly hard to enforce. The danger of abrogating these rules is best expressed in a rabbinic commentary called Akedat Yitzchak (81.1.7), written by Rabbi Eliyahu Monk. It reads in part:
During wartime, not only does one concentrate on hating and killing the enemy, but the values that are paramount during times of peace, tend to become perverted. Cruelty and murder occur even amongst brothers in arms, members of the same side. Actions which are unavoidable in war, have a way of developing into independent virtues in wartime, corrupting all normal norms. … It is not enough to prepare for war and resolve that in the event a peace offer is forthcoming one will accept it; one has to make the first move in this direction. War is acceptable only because of the peace and justice that follow it. … Whenever a war outside the boundaries of Eretz Yisrael is contemplated, "you will have to call out "peace" to her." (Deut. 20,10-11) Since the Torah couples this legislation with the prohibition of cutting down fruit bearing trees of a city under siege, it is easy to understand that the Torah places even greater emphasis on the need to spare human life….
Offering terms of peace and sparing innocents can easily be corrupted when engaged in a war. Dehumanizing the enemy is often the only way to get soldiers to kill their enemy. We Americans did this in WWII, when we denigrated the Japanese, even imprisoning many Japanese citizens living in the United States; they were not deemed fit to live among “real” Americans. We did this in Vietnam as well. Nazi Germany dehumanized Jews so that they could enlist soldiers to operate the camps and participate in the killing squads that roamed Eastern Poland and Russia.
Dehumanizing Arabs is quite difficult for Israelis to avoid, especially in the wake of such a massive terror attack. As far back as the 1970’s. Golda Meier, the famed former Prime Minister of Israel, once commented that, “We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children, but we cannot forgive them for making us kill their children.” This is an important counterweight to the dangers of dehumanizing Arab populations in Israel itself, Gaza and the West Bank.
So far, we have discussed the necessity of waging a defensive war. We have also discussed the rules of engagement for when Israelites and later Jews must allow for an escape route and to offer terms of peace. Indeed, we Jews must be proactive in pursuing peace. As the Torah states, “Seek peace and pursue it.” We don’t wait for peace to come to us, we are obliged to take the first steps towards making peace.
But there is another aspect to a just war: what happens after the war?
To answer this, we must go all the back to Genesis, Chapter One. God creates humankind b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God. If we must dehumanize our enemy during war, we must also remember that these people are human beings after the war. There is an important Jewish teaching that states that God created a single man, Adam, so that no person can say, “My father is greater than yours.”
Modern warfare almost demands indiscriminate killing of civilians and horrific war crimes. Yet, the pogrom that these Hamas terrorists inflicted upon Israel and especially upon individual Israelis, certainly are war crimes. Perhaps one could argue that Israel has committed war crimes due to their aerial bombardment of Gaza; that’s an open question. But the difference between Hamas and Israel is that, if history is any proof, Israel will investigate and punish those who committed war crimes, up to and including government officials who countenanced such attacks. Hamas, on the other hand, will celebrate these war crimes; their leadership will not be subject to review unless they are captured.
Israel is not perfect, to be sure. But it does try to follow Jewish tradition and international law in the prosecution of this awful war.
But perhaps the best way to conclude this study is to quote the Prophet Isaiah (2.4), who famously said:
… (T)hey shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.
Let us take up the mantle of Isaiah so that this war will be the last war in Israel, the Middle East and indeed, in all the world.
I want to thank you for listening to Torah for Christians. You can find previous episodes, such as the first podcast of this series about Biblical covenants, at www.torahforchristians.net or on your favorite podcast site, such as Google, Apple or Spotify. You can also comment on this podcast on our website or on our Facebook page. Polite comments only, please.
Next week, we will examine the importance of Jerusalem in Islam. While I am not an expert in Islam, understanding the importance of al kuds, the holy city as it is referred to in the Koran, is essential to understanding the present crisis. I’ll do my best to explain it; if I make any errors or omissions, I’m sure that somebody will correct me and I will dutifully amend my words in the subsequent podcast.
Now, more than ever, we say Hinei Mah Tov. L’hitraot. Till we meet again. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.