This week’s parashah, Mishpatim, deals with laws of civil justice. It begins, “These are the judgements that you shall place before them” (i.e. that Moses is to teach the people).  In other words, the entire people was expected to understand the rules that make a just society.

Today we rely on experts to know what the law is, particularly in complicated situations.  But in Jewish tradition, civil law was part of the curriculum for all students of Torah, even if they would never actually judge a case.  Those laws were understood to be a source of deep wisdom for everyone, in that they challenge us to make the most ethical choices that we can, even when the circumstances are far from black and white.  Real wisdom, in other words, is not about ideals detached from the real world, but about struggling, amidst the complexity of real life, to understand what is demanded of us.

May our exploration of parshat Mishpatim this Shabbat help us to grow in our appreciation of what justice meant then, and what it might mean today.