Kodoshim: Shoah

This weeks parsha i is Kodoshim; what we call the victims of persecution, the victims of the Holocaust. The Mishnah Yomi program was established as a Memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. In that program, we recently completed Nezikin.

The parsha contains the verse (19:16):לֹא-תֵלֵךְ רָכִיל בְּעַמֶּיךָ לֹא תַעֲמֹד עַל-דַּם רֵעֶךָ. The idea of standing by the blood of your friend has always reminds me of the American reaction to the Holocaust.

This year, I am struck by the juxtaposition of the idea of commerce to the idea of standing impotently as millions of relatives were slaughtered, sanctified. It was probably commerce that brought many from Europe to America. It is hard to know how much standing idly by was motivated by the desire not to interrupt commerce. Thus, the simultaneous completion of the section of the Mishnah dealing with commerce at this time of year strikes me as ironic. Furthermore, the section ends with laws pertaining to judicial error. It raises the question of whether there were errors of judgment on the part of our leadership at that time.