Machaneh Ayekah

Our Year 10 Students planned, prepared and conducted their own Shabbat Tefillah during Machaneh Ayekah. Below is the Devar Torah, for last week’s parashah, written and shared by Matthew Joffe at Camp.  

Following Matthew’s Devar Torah, Noah Klein engaged his peers in a peulah to further consider how we should treat non-human animals based upon the mitsvah to shoo away the mother bird when taking her eggs. Below is an outline of Noah’s peulah which generated a lively discussion and debate among his peers.

Rabbi Daniel Siegel

Mathew Joffe – Year 10

Machaneh Ayekah

 Ki Teitsei, this week’s parashah, lists many mitzvot that the Israelites are commanded to abide by. In Devarim, the final book of the Torah, Moshe is finalising his preparations for the people to enter the land of Israel. This Parashah is designed to teach the Israelites, about to enter the promised land, the requisite mitzvot before they begin the final leg of their journey.

Some of the mitzvot, commanded by God, seem fair, a key idea throughout this parashah. However, there are others that would seem outright crazy today. The Law of the Wayward and Rebellious Son instructs the parents of a misbehaving child to first reprimand their child, but if he continues to disregard them, he must be brought in front of the elders of his city, and pelted with stones until he is killed, eradicating all possible evil from the people and the land of Israel. This seems pretty harsh, right? We also need to think if parents would willingly have their son killed, as they are the ones who have been instructed to alert the town elders. To what extent will one go to serve God?

Other mitzvot seem to be more reasonable for the Jewish people, as we see in the case regarding inheritance. In the times of the Torah, having multiple wives was normal, and possibly the husband in this situation would have a favourite wife. God tells us that no matter which wife is the favourite, the husband must give the first born his birthright – double the possessions of any other child. This is clearly not relevant in society today, as having multiple wives is pretty rare, but the simple, fundamental ideas of favouritism and justice between those naturally favoured and all others still prove to have some effect in the modern world. Think about what you would do if given the choice between two options, a clearly favourable situation, and another less appealing option, but the more favourable option was morally wrong. Think about how many people you could disadvantage unfairly due to your own personal gain. Would it be worth it?

Next is one of the most significant ideas in the whole of the parashah. The idea of animal rights, portrayed as ‘sending off the mother bird’. The Bible reads that if you are to come across a nest containing bird eggs, if you require them for your own purposes, you may take them, but only if you first shoo away the mother bird. Quickly, think about why the Torah instructs us to not take the mother bird too for our own benefit. The Torah does not give us a definitive explanation as to why it tells us to do this, but many scholars have suggested that it is not to prevent animal cruelty, and not for our own personal betterment, but to allow the mother bird to have more children, and to allow her to continue the circle of life again. This brings up the issue of justice and fairness, to whom is this more fair, the mother bird or the person taking her eggs?

If there is any overarching theme in Ki Teitsei it is the distinction between right and wrong, and how one act can have deep impact later in a chain of events. The parashah aims to differentiate between ritual mitzvot and ethical mitzvot, as in how we treat other people and animals, and the effects our actions have on them, as well as how we should serve God and behave in our general day to day life.

As Rosh HaShannah soon approaches, and we hear the sound of the Shofar every morning in this month of Elul, we are requested to reflect on the past year, and think about our actions – what we did right, what we did wrong and how we can improve for next year. We are encouraged to do better next year, be better people, do more for our community and environment; keep and practise more mitzvot. But do we need to keep every mitzvah passed down to us? What about the ones we deem unfair and unjust, do we have to keep those too?

Ki Teitsei tries to teach us the most vital mitzvot before entering the land of Israel, before we need to be the best versions of ourselves. But, keeping unfair mitzvot, in theory, should lessen how morally right we are. For us, perhaps, Ki Teitsei does not suggest that we abide by every single mitzvah, but, instead, requires us to distinguish between right and wrong, ourselves. Maybe God wants us to make our own personal choices as to how we want to act, rather than forcing everybody to behave in the exact same manner, and therefore, influencing us, through Torah, to act positively.

Noah Klein – Year 10

Machaneh Ayekah

Parashah Peulah

Shiluach Haken – Shooing away the mother bird

Is it fair to take a mother bird’s children or kill them in front of it? Or should we, at least, first shoo her away, sparing her the pain?

Hey Guys, so this Shabbat morning I’m going to be running a little Peulah for us all. So as Matt spoke about in his Devar Torah, I’m going to be discussing the issue of this line that separates actual abuse to animals and using them in a positive useful way that we would struggle to live without. So what we’re going to do is put you into groups – I’m going to give you a number between 1-8 and you’ll move to your groups in a bit.

Each group should talk about the things their animal does for the environment, how they help humans and what would happen if they weren’t there.

Pieces of paper are distributed among the students:

1. RAT – sniffing out mines, use in experiments, rats trained to locate people buried under rubble from natural disasters
2. BEES – honey, pollenate flowers, bees use their keen sense of smell to detect environmental contaminants.
3. DOGS – pets, sniffer dogs, races, blind people
4. COWS – milk, beef, leather
5. SHEEP – wool, milk, lamb
6. CHICKENS – eggs, meat, feathers,
7. SPIDERS – string, Spiders eat pests. Spiders feed on common indoor pests such as roaches, earwigs, mosquitoes, flies and clothes moths. If left alone, spiders will consume most of the insects in your home, providing effective home pest control.
8. HORSES – racing, transport, food, pull things
9. CAMELS – transport, milk, meat
10. WHALES – blubber, regulate the flow of food by helping to maintain a stable food chain and ensuring that certain animal species do not overpopulate the ocean. Even whale poop plays a large role in the environment by helping to offset carbon in the atmosphere.

So now let’s order the animals in order of how important they actually are to the world.

So why did I want you order these animals?

I wanted you to order these animals because I wanted you to really think about what these animals bring to us as humans and how some are very vital and seem more important to us as humans. I guess what we have to understand is the importance and necessity of these animals upon which we rely. But, if we think about it, do we do this in the best interest of the animals and how much of our use of animals is for the need to survive, the same way a lion kills a zebra to survive?

Now let’s sit down.

1. Do animals have rights?
2. Do animals have the same rights as humans and why?
3. Should animals have the same rights as humans?
4. Do animals understand when their children are taken from them?
5. Is it right to assume that humans are the most important animal in the ecosystem?
6. If you could change one reasonable, possible thing about the way we treat animals what would it be?
7. What is cruelty to animals?