Mishpatim

Parshat Mishpatim comes immediately after the thunderous revelation of Har Sinai. The heavens opened, the earth trembled, Am Yisrael heard the voice of Hashem Himself. It was a moment of pure, undeniable connection, the kind that we long for in our own lives. The clarity, the inspiration, the closeness to Hashem. And then? The next thing the Torah teaches us is not about lofty concepts of emunah, but about money, damages, honesty in business, how to treat strangers, orphans, and widows. From the highest spiritual experience, we are brought right down into the nitty-gritty details of everyday life. But this is Torah.

Hashem is showing us that true spirituality is not found in moments of inspiration alone, it’s found in how we live when the inspiration fades. The fire of Har Sinai was not meant to stay on the mountain. It was meant to be brought into the marketplace, into our homes, into our relationships.

There is something striking in the structure of this parsha. The laws of how to treat the most vulnerable members of society, strangers, the poor, widows, orphans, are intertwined with laws about business, property, and personal responsibility. Because Torah is not just about what we believe, it’s about what we do. It’s not just about our relationship with Hashem, it’s about our relationship with people. And then we come to the defining words of the parsha. We will do, and we will listen (Shemot 24:7) This is one of the most powerful statements in all of Jewish history. When given the Torah, Am Yisrael didn’t say, “We will listen and then decide if we will do.” They declared, “We will do, and then we will understand.”

This is the foundation of our Avodat Hashem. There are mitzvot we don’t always feel. There are halachot we don’t always understand. But we commit anyway. We act first, and the understanding comes later. How many times have we held back from growth because we felt we weren’t “ready”? I don’t feel connected to davening, so what’s the point? I don’t understand this mitzvah, so how can I do it with my whole heart? Our parsha teaches us: Don’t wait to feel ready. Act. If we wait until we feel 100% inspired before taking the next step in Avodat Hashem, we may never take it. But if we take that first step, the connection follows.

This is why the Torah follows Har Sinai with laws about business and justice. It’s easy to have emunah when the sky is on fire, when Hashem’s voice shakes the world. But the real test is whether we still carry that emunah when we’re dealing with money, with responsibilities, with real-life challenges.

It’s said that when a person does business with complete honesty, it’s greater than all the fasts, prayers,
and personal stringencies he could ever take on. Because it’s easy to be religious in shul.
It’s harder to be religious when you’re in a negotiation, when you’re frustrated, when you
have the opportunity to cut a corner and no one will ever know. But Hashem knows.

That is why, immediately after Na’aseh v’nishma, Moshe takes blood from the sacrifices and throws half on the altar and half on the people (Shemot 24:6-8). What is the message here? The altar represents our relationship with Hashem. The people represent our relationship with each other. The Torah is teaching us that you cannot have one without the other. A person can pray with intense kavana, learn all day, and perform the mitzvot with precision—but if he is dishonest in business, if he speaks badly about others, if he mistreats his family, then he is missing the foundation of Torah.

The way we treat people is not separate from our Avodat Hashem—it is our Avodat Hashem. The Torah repeats multiple times in this parsha: “Do not oppress the stranger, for you were strangers in Egypt.” (Shemot 22:20, 23:9) Why does the Torah keep reminding us of this? Because it is easy to forget. It is easy to justify treating someone unfairly. I am busy. I am struggling myself. They will manage. But Hashem says: Remember what it was like to be powerless. Remember what it was like to be in pain. And don’t ever do that to someone else.

The greatness of a person is not measured by how they treat those who are above them, but by how they treat those who are beneath them. The ones who have no power, who cannot give them anything in return.
That is the Torah we received at Har Sinai. Not just laws, not just rituals, but a way of life. A way of being. A way of bringing holiness into the most mundane parts of our existence.
This week, let’s ask ourselves: Where can we bring Torah into our daily lives?