Every four years, with each new presidential election, Americans come face-to-face with the unpleasant reality that we don't trust each other.
After all, each major party issues a lengthy platform spelling out in great detail their plans and intentions should they succeed in winning the election. And each candidate stands before countless audiences, solemnly promising what will happen under a new Administration. These campaign promises are a centerpiece of American politics. But only a Rip Van Winkle who slept through the last forty years would expect a candidate to seriously intend the pious cant of the campaign trail.
Think back a bit: Jimmy Carter was going to restore candor to government. Ronald Reagan was going to rein in government and balance the budget. And George Bush was going to be the education president, the environment president, and the one to put America to work? again. Remember?
Few voters bother to consider the campaign promises, let alone take them as any indication of how a president will actually perform. As a result, our "trust gap" is so enormous that a majority of eligible voters regularly sit out the most important election in the world. We suffer a crisis of democracy because we cannot trust each other to do as we say.
The Torah posits a very different expectation, one in which a person's word creates an unshakeable commitment, so great is the correlation between promise and deed. Today's Torah portion speaks of the vows made by an adult man, by a daughter, a wife, and a widow. In each case, the Torah provides guidelines for how a vow may be made and when it can be nullified without the incursion of guilt for its violation.
Did you know that the expression "abracadabra" comes from the Aramaic (the ancient language of the Talmud) meaning "he does as he speaks"? What is now the words of genies on sitcoms was once a morality that pervaded Israelite society. The world of the Torah and the Talmud is one in which words matter, in which what we say creates an enforceable obligation.
Vows were taken so seriously that the rabbis looked with great disfavor on making vows, since their violation was held to be an assault against God: the Talmud records the view that "if one makes a vow, it is as if one has built a bamah (a forbidden idolatrous altar), and if one fulfills the vows it is as if one had sacrificed upon it." Precisely because words count, the rabbis discouraged making promises that might not be kept.
They also extended their understanding of vows beyond the p'shat (the contextual meaning) of the Torah itself: whereas the Torah seems to assert that only an adult man makes irrevocable vows, the rabbis extend the responsibility for vows to anyone whose intention matches their words. Thus, the Mishnah explicitly states that, "a statement is not binding unless intention and expression agree."
An incident recorded in Sifre Zuta (a tannaitic midrash on the Book of Numbers) illustrates that general principle:
A child came before Rabbi Akiva and said: "Rabbi, I dedicated my shovel." Rabbi Akiva asked: "Perhaps you dedicated it to the sun or the moon?" The child answered, "Rabbi, do not worry. I dedicated it to the One who created them." Rabbi Akiva said, "Go, my child, your vow is valid."
Because the child's intention was grounded in an accurate knowledge of reality and the consequences of the vow, Rabbi Akiva considered the vow to be valid.
We have a lot to learn from the biblical and the rabbinic treatment of vows. They share a lofty expectation of human responsibility, a recognition that we are held accountable for what we say, and our word is to be our bond.
Only in that context is it possible to take seriously what other people tell us, and only in that way are the endless speeches and promises of our politicians significant.
Just as our leaders must focus on finding a new way to address America's problems, so they must also return to an old way of addressing our people: like each one of us, they must mean what they say.
Shabbat shalom.