Pinchas. If violence is sometimes inevitable...should it be 'rewarded'?

The opening of Parashat Pinchas becomes the pretext—quite literally—for a profound, unsettling, and unfortunately incredibly timely philosophical reflection:

Can violence sometimes be justified? Or worse, can it, in certain cases, be rewarded?

Pinchas killed.

A man and a woman.

I want to step away from the details of the story and focus instead on its thematic structure, which points toward a philosophical reflection that goes far beyond the pshat, the plain meaning of the narrative.

A man entered the holiest place of his people with an enemy accomplice. Together they committed an act that was causing mass destruction. Thousands of the Children of Israel were dying, while everyone else stood by, powerless, weeping.

One man stood up and killed them both, in a single act.

The plague stopped immediately.

God's response appears at the very beginning of the parashah that bears his name:

הִנְנִי נֹתֵן לוֹ אֶת־בְּרִיתִי שָׁלוֹם

"Behold, I give him My covenant of peace."(Numbers 25:12)

Many interpret this divine blessing as a reward.

But for the nineteenth-century commentator, the HaEmek Davar, Rabbi Naphtali Zvi Yehuda Berlin, the matter is far more complex.

First, he reminds us that what Pinchas did was an act of violence, and that every act of violence leaves its mark upon the soul of the one who commits it:

ובשביל כי טבע המעשה שעשה פינחס להרוג נפש בידו היה נותן להשאיר בלב הרגש עז גם אח"כ

"For the very nature of what Pinchas did—taking a human life with his own hands—would naturally leave behind a fierce disposition in his heart, even afterward."

Sometimes violence is unavoidable.

That is the case in self-defense.

It is also true of the only form of war that can be considered legitimate: one whose sole purpose is to stop a greater threat and a greater destruction, and to secure lasting peace.

And yet, even in those cases, those who take upon themselves the terrible burden of playing that role come away wounded in their souls.

This is why the Source of Life blesses Pinchas with an eternal covenant of peace.

So that he might be healed of the taste of violence that could otherwise have infected his soul.

באה הברכה שיהא תמיד בנחת ובמדת השלום

"He received the blessing that he should always remain in serenity and embody the quality of peace."

The divine blessing is not a reward.

It is a remedy.

Pinchas is blessed with inner calm, so that the quality of peacefulness may grow within him.

For peace, before it is a condition in the world, is a way of being that we already carry within ourselves.

But that is not all.

For the HaEmek Davar, this blessing is not automatic.

It comes with a condition:

באשר היה לשם שמים

"Since his act was performed for the sake of Heaven."

It is because he acted for a noble purpose that Pinchas receives a blessing of healing.

From a Jewish perspective, only peace heals.

This is why the Kohanim are described as those who "pursue peace," and why each day they bless us with peace.

Had Pinchas killed for any other reason—for anger or revenge—he would have been punished.

We see this from the very beginning of the biblical narrative, in Cain's punishment after murdering his brother.

There is therefore such a thing as "legitimate" violence, in the sense that targeted violence is sometimes, tragically, necessary to put an end to destruction on a much greater scale.

The war Israel is currently fighting against Hezbollah in Lebanon is a real-time illustration of this tragic reality.

The danger lies precisely here:

when the terrible necessity of war, undertaken in legitimate self-defense, becomes distorted or instrumentalized—on either side.

This is one of the tensions currently tearing Israeli society apart.

This is why Rabbi Berlin insists: only if an act is performed le-shem shamayim, "for the sake of Heaven," can violence be excusable.

Yet even that concept can easily be distorted.

We see it everywhere: among those who attack Jews en masse, and among extremists within my own camp. Killing "in the name of God" is one of the easiest ways to justify one's own violence.

So I would like to suggest that, philosophically speaking, "for the sake of Heaven" does not mean "in the name of God."

Rather, in a broader sense—and from a secular perspective, so that we stop dragging the Source of Life into every human conflict—it means: for the sake of the common good.

I derive this understanding from Pirkei Avot.

The sages of this Mishnaic ethical tractate remind us, by comparing two famous disputes—one from the Bible and one from the rabbinic tradition—that beneath the language of "the sake of Heaven," what is really at stake is the common good:

כל מחלוקת שהיא לשם שמים סופה להתקיים. ושאינה לשם שמים אין סופה להתקיים. איזו היא מחלוקת שהיא לשם שמים? זו מחלוקת הלל ושמאי. ושאינה לשם שמים? זו מחלוקת קרח וכל עדתו.

"Every dispute that is for the sake of Heaven is destined to endure. But one that is not for the sake of Heaven will not endure. Which dispute was for the sake of Heaven? The dispute between Hillel and Shammai. And which was not for the sake of Heaven? The dispute of Korach and all his congregation." (Pirkei Avot 5:17)

Hillel and Shammai argued in order to discover the most just legal ruling for society.

Korach, the populist—the vizier who wanted to become caliph in place of the caliph, for those who remember the comic books of the 1980s—claimed to speak in the name of the people while seeking power for himself.

His argument may have sounded noble.

But because its true purpose was self-interest, the sages regard it as a form of illegitimate violence.

The "virtuous hatred" that Eva Illouz has described since October 8 is nothing new.

Its clothing changes.

The story remains the same.

And yet, sometimes we must draw a line.

Sometimes we must fight.

Sometimes, with a broken heart, like so many men in my own circle, we must go to war.

More often, the stakes are less dramatic.

The actions are less violent.

But all of us, at times, must know how to cut.

A conversation that goes nowhere.

An unhealthy dynamic—even with ourselves.

A relationship that is harming us.

Sometimes it takes a radical act to stop a hemorrhage.

Sometimes surgery must cut into healthy in order to remove a cancer.

But precisely because we are human, our responsibility is immense.

It is up to us to clarify what is in our hearts—that is, our intentions.

To be deeply conscious.

And radically honest.

Why are we doing what we are doing?

Whenever I am about to take a radical action—even if, on a much smaller scale, it is simply sending an email or speaking a necessary word—I must ask myself:

Is my ultimate goal to satisfy my desire for revenge, anger, or hatred?

Or am I acting, even at personal cost, to protect something greater than myself—the common good, and the possibility of lasting peace?

This drasha is dedicated to the refuah shlema of my aunt.