Еврейская мысль к Шмот 18:13

Our Torah represents legislation at its best and most perfect, incorporating the three pillars "truth justice and peace" on which the universe is founded. Since the ten commandments and their revelation are to demonstrate that Moses and his Torah are true, it is fitting that peace and justice, the other two pillars be also represented in our Parshah. When the Mishnah in Avot speaks about shalom, peace, it refers to the quality of chessed, kindness, unselfishness, a quality demonstrated by man in his home life, in the way he treats his immediate environment. Therefore, the Torah describes Moses’s conduct towards his father-in-law, his wife and his children, as well as his father-in-law's conduct vis a vis his daughters. The din, justice part of the three pillars commences with the words "it was on the morrow." (Exodus 18,13) This describes Moses as administering justice to the Jewish people. The fact that Yitro's advice to Moses was particularly timely, will be demonstrated in the course of this story. In fact it was so appropriate that the entire Parshah bears his name. This justice is what transcends his sacrifices to G-d, though they are also mentioned in this section of the Torah.

It is for this reason that the chief and most select of the judges would stand in the place where the Divine Immanence manifested itself, this being the idea behind the presiding of the Men of the Great Assembly in the chamber of hewn stone [lishkath hagazith]. And it is for this reason that our sages of blessed memory said (Avodah Zarah 8b): "When they [the members of Sanhedrin] saw that murderers had multiplied, they said: 'Let us exile ourselves from our place, so as to put into effect (Deuteronomy 17:10): "And you shall do according to the thing that they tell you from that place" — this teaches us that the place is the critical factor'" [so that in exiling themselves from their place, they suspended the death penalty]. And all that our sages have said in this regard is to be understood along the same lines, viz. (Sanhedrin 7a): "Every judge that judges truly causes the Shechinah to reside in Israel, as it is written (Psalms 82:1): 'G-d stands in the congregation of the Almighty; He judges in the midst of the judges.'" And, similarly, (Shabbath 10a): "Every judge that judges truly — even one moment in the day — is regarded by Scripture as if he were a partner to the Holy One Blessed be He in the creation, it being written here [in respect to judging] (Exodus 18:13): 'from morning until evening,' and there [in respect to the creation] (Genesis 1:5): 'and it was evening and it was morning.'" This "partnership" is an allusion to what we have been saying — that just as in the creation the Divine effluence manifested itself in the terrestrial world, it being the source of all that was created, so, every judge that judges truly draws down that effluence, whether or not his judgment completely fulfills the societal requirements. For just as the sacrifices, though entirely outside the realm of natural cause and effect, made manifest the Divine effluence, so was this effluence drawn down by the judgments of the Torah, though these judgments had to be supplemented with the edicts of the king to guarantee a well-ordered society. We find, then, that judges were appointed to administer the judgments of the Torah alone, judgments righteous in themselves (as stated: "and let them judge the people a righteous judgment"), and the king was appointed to supplement these judgments with whatever was required for a well-ordered society and dictated by the needs of the hour.