The main idea of this week’s parashah, ki tetze, is that all of God's creations should respect each other and themselves and that this is an important responsibility for each person. The Torah portion gives us an excellent example of how you can fulfill this responsibility to respect others, other creatures and yourself. The Torah says that if you find your neighbor's ox and you cannot find the owner, you must take the animal inside your house and feed it. Not only do you have to feed it, but you have to keep it warm and healthy. If it gets sick you have to nurse it back to health. And you have to take care of it until its owner claims it. We are not allowed to benefit from our fellows' misfortune. “Lo tuchal le-hitalem.” This means “you shall not hide,” or “you shall not act as if you were blind.” When you encounter a lost item or a fallen animal that is the property of your friends or your enemies, you must help. As Nehama Leibowitz said, Responsible caring is at the heart of Jewish ethics. It seems to be at the heart of this parashah as well.

The parashah gives other examples of respect; the commandment to your parents. If you do not respect your parents, the Torah instructs, the disobedient child must be brought in front of the Elders of the town, who made all of the important decisions back then, and was stoned to death in front of the town. This is just for being disobedient and rude to your parents! Nowadays, a child would just get something important taken away from him or her, or another punishment. The child would definitely not be killed, or brought to the leader of the town. Can you imagine how busy Michael Bloomberg would be? Besides punishments, if that didn’t work, maybe today you would bring a disobedient child to counseling, or to the Rabbi.

As I said earlier, responsibility is a big part of Ki Tetze and responsibility can be defined in many different ways. For example, my parents tell me I have to become more responsible for myself; cleaning my room and doing my homework without anyone telling me to. That is personal responsibility. Being responsible in your community can mean helping an elderly person to cross the street, or something as little as picking up a candy wrapper that didn't make it into the garbage can. Parents know that being responsible for another human life is a big job, and if their child gets hurt in any way, they will feel very guilty, because it was their job to keep that from happening. We all know we are responsible for the ones we love, and they are responsible for us, but this parashah tries to teach us about being responsible for all the people in the world, even people who we don't know and love, just because we all have the same parent in God.

On the sixth day of creating the world, God created Adam, the first man on earth. Because Adam was first man ever, in Hebrew, Adam means human. God examined Adam and saw that he needed a companion. “It is not good for man to be alone,” said God. “I will make a helpmate for him” God then created Eve. Adam and Eve had children, and their descendants filled the entire world. Since God created Adam and Eve and they created all humans on Earth, everyone is related. So if a murderer kills someone, he is really killing his own brother. We should always remember that we are all related.

In fourth-century Babylon, a man came to Rabbi Rava and said, “The governor of my town has ordered me to kill an innocent man, and said if I don't, he will have me killed. Can I murder the man to save my life?” Rava refused him permission. “Let yourself be killed but do not kill him. Who says your blood is redder? Perhaps the blood of that man is redder.” In other words, no you should not kill the man to save yourself because you don't know if you are the better person. He might be a better person than you and killing him would be selfish of you. You must respect the man, even if you don't know him personally. But Rava could have also told him to kill the governor because he, after all was the one threatening his life, and Judaism affirms the principle of killing in self defense. As the Talmud teaches, “He who comes to kill you, kill him first” (Sanhedrin 72a). The man who came to Rava had to show a very serious form of communal responsibility. It is a big burden to choose your own death over another's, but it is our responsibility as Jews not to treat anyone's life as less important than our own.

The Torah gives us law about how to treat people with leprosy and implementing those laws was important in ancient times to keep the disease from spreading, though it was very difficult for the sick to live outside of the community. Sometimes, people took these laws too far according to tradition. In Jerusalem, people with leprosy were completely cut off from society. If anybody with leprosy was seen walking in town, people would throw rocks at him and say, “Go back where you came from! Stop contaminating us!.” While the sick should have known that they were not allowed within the town, throwing rocks and yelling at someone because he is sick or different is not respecting him at all. The correct behavior towards a sick or needy person was to put them in a camp outside the town, but we are also commanded to give him affection and to visit him at his home and care for him, even if you think he's strange or disgusting or you're afraid to catch his disease. A sick person also must respect the other people in his family, community and town by not giving them the disease. The sick person has a responsibility to keep everyone else healthy and the healthy have a responsibility to help the sick without disgracing them.


An important rule for Jews is “Love your neighbor.” This can be taken literally or figuratively. I think the word love in this commandment is used the same way as respect. The commandment uses the word “neighbor,” when it doesn't literally mean your neighbor. It can also mean your friends, an elderly person who lives on your block, or your friend's parent, anyone really. A better translation would be “fellow.” It makes more sense: your fellow classmate, your fellow citizens, your fellow human beings. Love them all. The love here isn’t the literal love, it is the figurative kind, a deep respect. Respect doesn't mean bowing down to them or bringing them gifts. Respecting a fellow could be opening the door for him, helping him with a heavy package, not arguing with him, returning something you have found that belongs to him, anything to show kindness and appreciation.
 

An important part of this commandment is that it doesn't stop with, “Love your neighbor,” but it continues so that it says: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Psychologists have often noted that people who don't love themselves, have trouble loving and caring for other people. This is one of the main reasons to love and respect yourself as well as others. As the great Hasidic rabbi, the Baal Shem Tov once said, “Just as we love ourselves despite the faults we know we have, so should we love our neighbors despite the faults we see in them.”
 

It is important to respect each other and show each other kindness. Also it is important to respect ourselves as well, because if we don't, it will be more difficult to show others that same respect.

Unfortunately, not all people respect everyone, in fact, many people have enemies. People have enemies for many different reasons, some include family feuds, property ownership, financial rights, race, religion, gender, political perspectives and many more. To solve these issues, people have to be mature and make peace with their enemies.

“An eye for an eye” is one of the most complicated verses in the Bible. In modern times, people do not live by this rule because it conflicts with our common wisdom of “two wrongs do not make a right.” The code of Hammurabi was a set of laws and consequences for mistakes, much like the Torah is for Jews. According to Hammurabi, there is also an eye for eye legal system. For example: If a man named Russell was building a house for a man named Kyle and the house that Russell built, fell and killed Lianna, Kyle's daughter, then Laura, Russell's daughter has to be killed. In modern times, this law would never take place. In these times, if Lianna was killed in the house Russell built, Russell would be sued, but Laura would not be killed. The rabbis who came after the Torah hated this line of thinking and wanted to avoid having to ever use this eye for an eye punishment so they changed punishments to monetary ones. This allows someone to try to forgive and forget an enemy’s mistakes and try to be kind to him. Otherwise the cycle of hatred would just continue.

In Pirkei Avot, Rabbi Eliezer said: “Let your fellow man's honor be as dear to you as your own.” In the commentary on this mishnah, Rabbi Nathan asks an important question: “Is it possible to be as concerned about another person's honor as about one's own? This teaches that just as one looks out for his own honor so should he look out for his fellow man's honor. Just as he desires that there should be no smear on his good name, so should be anxious not to smear the reputation of his fellow man.”

This paragraph means that if you take care of your property or animal, thinking that if you don't, your reputation of your great name will be ruined, you must also take care of your fellow's property or animal when it is in need to save his reputation of his good name, as well. Even if your enemy's field or animal needs care, you should tend to it because this can change your relationship with the owner. To care about your enemy's needs is to make peace with him.
 

“Love your neighbor as yourself” might be the most famous of the Torah's 613 commandments, but the verse it appears in begins with two other commandments: “Do not take revenge or bear a grudge against a member of your people” (Leviticus 19:18). The Rabbis explain how this law is to be actualized in daily life: What is revenge and what is bearing a grudge? If Rebecca says to Rachel, “Lend me your sickle,” and Rachel says, “No,” and the next day, Rachel says to Rebecca, “Lend me your ax,” and Rebecca replies, “I will not, just as you refused to lend me your sickle,” that is revenge [and is forbidden by the Torah].

Rabbi Alexandri said: Two donkey drivers who hated each other were walking on a road when the donkey of one lay down under its burden. His companion saw it, and at first he passed it. But then he reflected: Is it not written in the Torah, “If you see your enemy's donkey lying down under its burden you should help?” So he returned, lent a hand, and helped his enemy in loading and unloading. Thus peace came about between them, so that the driver of the overloaded donkey said, “Did I not suppose that he hated me? But look how compassionate he has been.” By and by, the two entered an inn, ate and drank together, and became fast friends. What caused them to make peace and to become friends? Because one of them kept what is written in the Torah. This is in keeping with the words of the Proverbs: “If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat.” - (25:21)
 

It is this topic of making peace between enemies, in this parashah that interested me the most. I think perhaps God thought making peace with an enemy was important enough to be in the Torah because hating takes up a lot of energy and isn't good for a person. To make peace with an enemy isn't only helping your relationship with the person, but you're helping yourself, fulfilling our responsibility to respect others and ourselves.
 

Making peace with an enemy will always be an eternal part of the Torah because someone will always disagree with someone else's opinion and start a fight. I believe that in many cases people do not fully understand their enemies. We need to completely understand their point of view, and be patient and calm and forgiving, because if one group starts a fight, the other will retaliate and this could create a snow ball effect. Both groups will then build a history of doing wrong things to each other. Imagine a world where people work together despite their differences, and build a peaceful and productive society. There would be so much less suffering and despair.
 

Making peace with an enemy is very important to me because I have been in fights with friends before and we always end up becoming close friends again because we're smart enough to know we're wasting time by being angry. If it's a fight over who gets to jump rope next, who pushed who down the slide, who copied who's math homework, then the answer is that we should calmly discuss the problem and figure out a solution or a compromise. I believe that's the way people should act all the time. If it's a fight over who never paid whom back, who backed into whose car by accident, or who took whose parking spot, people have to realize, whether it is an accident or on purpose, men and women have their faults and we must try to understand that.
 

Ways to fulfill this commandment today is to go to your enemy as soon as you can and help him or her with something, compliment him or her, or just say hello, which can lead to small conversation and friendliness. On a daily basis, think about what you can do to show kindness and understanding toward your enemies. It will seem like an impossible task at times, but in the big picture of life, good deeds, no matter how small, will create a better world. Think of it this way- There are approximately 6 billion, 602 million, 224 thousand, 175 people in this world. If every one of us showed kindness and compassion towards each other, even our enemies, all of us would benefit in ways we can not imagine. Making peace, in any way possible is the very definition of fulfilling our responsibility of respecting one another.

“Together we're unlimited.
Together we'll be the greatest team there's ever been.”
Dreams, the way we planned 'em
If we work in tandem
There's no fight we can not win
Just you and I
Defying gravity
-Defying Gravity, Wicked


I'd like to thank so many people for this wonderful achievement of becoming a bat mitzvah. First, of course my parents, for encouraging me to practice every day for a year, helping me with my speech, and for planning the entire luncheon and party. Gracias Mammasita. I'd also like to thank the Rabbi, for helping me with the entire process, especially the speech, and organizing everything and always being there to answer any questions I had. Thank you to the Cantor, who stood by me if I needed help with anything, I'm looking forward to getting to know you more. I'd especially like to thank my first tutor, Nomi Cheil, for getting me started for the entire bat mitzvah process. You told me everything I needed to know. My second tutor was Cantor Rubin, who sadly isn't here anymore [even though we have a wonderful replacement]. He taught me my entire Torah Portion and I'm glad I had such a fantastic tutor to help me with the largest part of my Bat Mitzvah, even though I would have done just as well with Sandy Horowitz, my third tutor. Sandy was my tutor for the few months before the big day. You have a beautiful voice and you made learning the Haftorah really easy and fun. I'd like to thank all of my family for traveling from all over the world to see me today. I'd also like to especially thank my Grandma Claire for making my Tallis. Thanks to all my friends from school, and to all my other friends I've met from various places, I know a lot of my friends have sat and listened to me practice for hours over the summer, and a few of you were even in my speech, because you helped me write it and helped me look up words I didn't know from my Torah Portion. My Hebrew school class. There are some amazing people in my class. I've known them all since I was a toddler, some longer. Hebrew school would be nothing without you guys, you have great personalities and each of you make the class more special. You're hilarious and make the class silly, but we still learn. That's one of the main reasons I love coming to Hebrew school once a week, or more. I hope to see you all in Hebrew High School. I want to individually thank Rebecca Agrest, for doing one of my Aliyahs. I'd like to thank all my Hebrew School teachers since my first year, because without you I wouldn't know enough Hebrew or Jewish history to accomplish this day. Connie, or as my mom calls you, Doctor Professor. You've really earned that name. You do so much for this synagogue and Hebrew School, and the neighborhood as well. It was fun to stop and talk to you on the street about my bat mitzvah and getting advice from you because you've already been through this process. Thank you to everyone who came today to see me, it means so much to me that you came to celebrate this amazing time with me. I love you all.