PARASHAT CHUKAT - Make War – Justly and with Faith

[TorahZionist]

Rabbi Azriel Ariel

Make War – Justly and with Faith


Exhaustive negotiations were conducted between Yiftach and the King of Amon. The Ammonite army was ready for war on Gilad. Facing him was Yiftach’s small army. And then the peace talks began. The demand of the Ammonite king was simple and unequivocal: “territory for peace”. The Ammonites demanded justice: “Israel took away my land, when he came up out of Egypt, from the Arnon even unto the Jabbok, and unto the Jordan. Now therefore restore those cities peaceably” (Judges 11:13).
Yiftach did not hasten to concede, and he sent an additional delegation for talks with the Ammonites: “Israel did not take away the land of Moab, nor the land of the Ammonites” (verse 15). “No!” he said. “We haven’t stolen anything from you.” Then he began to tell a long story, containing many arguments, consolidating his premise:
1)We didn’t conquer anything from Ammon or Moab, but from Sichon, King of the Amorites and Og, King of the Bashan. (True, Sichon conquered those territories from Moab, but with that, the Moabites’ rights to them ended. As the Talmud states (Sanhedrin 94b), “Ammon and Moab’s lands were purified [i.e., rendered fair game for Israel] through their conquest by Sichon”.)
2)We didn’t initiate the war. We were attacked by Sichon. Ours was a defensive war. In light of this, we have a full right to the territories conquered in it. (By the way, the Giladites, from the half-tribe of Menashe, lived entirely to the north of the area of contention, which was in the tribal portion of Gad).
3)We received this land from G-d. Your claims to it represent an affront to G-d’s will: “Now the L-rd, G-d of Israel, dispossessed the Amorites from before His people Israel. Shall you possess it?” (verse 23)
4)Previous generations of Moabites never saw themselves as owners of these territories, from Balak, King of Moab to the present generation, including periods in which Moab had a military force that could have demanded it. Three hundred years’ Jewish settlement proves this claim fully. (By the way, even now the Moabites remain silent. The ones claiming the area of contention in the Moabites’ name is their cousins, the Ammonites, and that raises questions…)
5)The present Ammonite threat is immoral, and constitutes nothing but unbridled aggression. “I have not sinned against you, but you do me wrong by warring against me” (verse 27). The Ammonite claim of justice is blighted by a blatant lack of innocence. It is nothing more than an excuse for starting a war, whose motives are entirely different. Yiftach adds that he is so certain of his being right that he is ready to put the case to a legal test: “Let the L-rd, the Judge, judge this day between the Israelites and the Ammonites” (ibid.).
As expected, Yiftach’s words did not convince the king of the Ammonites. Yiftach did not wait for the Ammonite attack. Rather, he speedily skipped from place to place, misleading Ammonite Intelligence regarding his intentions, moving the war into the territory of the enemy and achieving a quick victory.
It thus turns out that Yiftach did not fool himself and did not think that diplomacy would be able to put an end to the crisis. Neither did he have any intention of entering into negotiations over the territories in question, for G-d’s inheritance was not a topic for political wrangling. It would seem that the main purpose of the Israelite “peace delegation”, besides as part of obeying the Torah command that “When you approach a city to wage war against it, you must propose a peaceful settlement” (Deuteronomy 20:10), was internal. Yiftach’s speech was intended for Israelite ears. It contained three main messages for his people:
1)To make clear to the people that “the territorial question” was nothing but a weak pretext for Ammonite aggression.
2)To convince the people of the righteousness of their path. His point was this: This purpose of this war is not for us to consolidate our hold on stolen lands, but to continue to hold on to what is ours by full right.
3)To make clear that the war was a war of G-d – over G-d’s gift to Israel and over the righteousness of divine judgment.
This stance placed the Giladites and their rule Yiftach in the appropriate religious, moral and existential frame of mind. As a result, G-d’s spirit rested on Yiftach as he set out for battle, and G-d gave the Ammonites into his hand.
Any connection between this discussion and the arguments arising regarding Migron and the houses of Ofra, is – obviously – a total coincidence…