Parashat Shofetim + for 5781/2021

Torah Portion for Shofetim: Deuteronomy 20:10-21:4

10. When you come near a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace to it. 11. And it shall be, if it gives you answer of peace, and opens to you, then it shall be, that all the people that are found in it shall be tributaries to you, and they shall serve you. 12. And if it will make no peace with you, but will make against you, then you shall besiege it; 13. And when the Eternal your God has delivered it into your hands, you shall strike its every male with the edge of the sword; 14. But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, all the plunder from it, shall you take for yourself; and you shall eat the plunder of your enemies, which the Eternal your God has given you. 15. Thus shall you do to all the cities which are very far off from you, which are not of the cities of these nations. 16. But of the cities of these people, which the Eternal your God does give you for an inheritance, you shall not keep alive anything that breathes; 17. But you shall completely destroy them: the , and the , the Canaanites, and the , the , and the ; as the Eternal your God has commanded you; 18. That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done to their gods; so should you sin against the Eternal your God. 19. When you shall besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, you shall not destroy its trees by forcing an ax against them; for you may eat of them, and you shall not cut them down. For is the tree of the field a man that it should besieged by you? 20. Only the trees which you know are not trees for , you shall destroy and cut them down; and you shall build works against the city that makes war with you, until it is subdued.

1. If one is found slain in the land which the Eternal your God gives you to possess, lying in the field, and it is not known who has slain him; 2. Then your elders and your shall come forth, and they shall measure the distance to the cities which are around him who is slain; 3. And it shall be, that the city which is nearest to the slain man, the elders of that city shall take a heifer, which has not been worked with, and which has not pulled in the yoke; 4. And the elders of that city shall bring down the heifer to a rough ravine, which is neither plowed nor sown, and shall strike off the heifer’s neck there in the ravine; Haftarah for Shofetim: 51:12-52:6

12. I, I myself, am he who comforts you; who are you, that you should be afraid of a man who shall die, and of the son of man who shall be made as grass; 13. And have forgotten the Eternal your maker, who has stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and have feared continually every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor? 14. He who is bowed down shall speedily be released, and he shall not die in the pit, nor shall his bread fail. 15. And I am the Eternal your God, who stirs up the sea, whose waves roar; The Eternal of hosts is his name. 16. And I have put my words in your mouth, and I have covered you in the shadow of my hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and say to Zion, You are my people. 17. Awake, awake, stand up, O , who has drunk at the hand of the Eternal the cup of his fury; you have drunk to the dregs the bowl of staggering. 18. There is none to guide her among all the sons whom she has brought forth; nor is there any who takes her by the hand among all the sons whom she has brought up. 19. These two things have befallen you; who shall console you? Desolation, and destruction, and the famine, and the sword; by whom shall I comfort you? 20. Your sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as a wild bull in a net; they are full of the fury of the Eternal, the rebuke of your God. 21. Therefore hear now this, you afflicted, and drunken, but not with ; 22. Thus says your Eternal the Eternal, and your God who pleads the cause of his people, Behold, I have taken from your hand the cup of staggering, the deep bowl of my fury; you shall no more drink it again. 23. But I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you; who have said to your soul, Bow down, that we may pass over; and you have laid your body like the ground, and like the street, for them to pass over. 1. Awake, awake; put on your strength, O Zion; put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city; from now on there shall no more come to you the uncircumcised and the unclean. 2. Shake yourself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem; loose yourself from the bands of your neck, O captive daughter of Zion. 3. For thus says the Eternal, You have sold yourselves for nothing; and you shall be redeemed without money. 4. For thus says the Eternal God, My people went down the first time to to sojourn there; and the Assyrian oppressed them without cause. 5. Now therefore, what have I here, says the Eternal, that my people is taken away for nothing? Those who rule over them howl, says the Eternal; and my name continually every day is blasphemed. 6. Therefore my people shall know my name; therefore they shall know in that day that I am he who speaks; behold, here I am.