One of the main issues discussed in our Parasha is that of the “king” of Israel. Unlike all other monarchies in the world, for the Jewish people the king was not the central figure. The Tora seems to “tolerate” the people’s desire to have a king, it does not “prescribe” it as the ideal situation for the People of God. And so we see it also in the book of Shemuel, chapter 8: 7. When God tells Samuel that the people are for a king because “they have rejected Me… ” .
The Jewish king must keep a low profile. This is in complete opposition to gentile kings that imposed their superiority on their subjects in order to earn their respect. Gentile kings viewed themselves – and behaved – as “gods.” Egypt had many gods, but Pharaoh was above all of them. As Yechezqel (29:3) says of the Egyptian monarch: “The Great Crocodile [that’s how Pharaoh referred to himself], who says: mine is the Nile River [also a supreme divinity in Egypt] and I created myself “. Something similar happened with Roman kings and emperors, like Caligula, who presented himself as a god, even in the Roman Senate. In the Middle Ages kings were not much different. Perhaps they did not present themselves as gods, but they considered themselves the “spokesperson” of their gods, which endowed their decisions — no matter how immoral and arbitrary– with Divine character and infallibility (as is the case with the Pope to this day). Gentile kings in general were above the law and not accountable to any superior authority because there was none. Obeying the king was obeying God. And thi is how innumerable abuses and outrages were committed by the Kings in the name of their gods. The Tora is unique in this respect, absolutely “revolutionary.”
Our Parasha describes three unique characteristics of the king of Israel:
1. The king of Israel has limitations. He cannot accumulate treasures, thus he could not justify charging excessive taxes from the people. The Jewish king couldn’t have too many horses either, so he would not build up a more powerful army than necessary. And he could not have too many wives in his harem, which at that time implied, among other things, a limit in the alliances that he could establish with neighboring Gentile peoples (Debarim, 17: 16-17).
2. The king of Israel had to be a talmid hakham, that is, a Tora scholar. He had to write a Sefer Tora, or the book of Debarim, (17:18) and take it with him wherever he went, so he would never forget that the king, must be faithful to the Divine law. The king of Israel had to study the Tora “all the days of his life” (17:19) to learn everything that HaShem expects of him and of each one of his subjects. This learning activity was not with the purpose of showing off his wisdom to nobles or commoners, but to improve his own behavior and refine his character, as we will see below.
3. Perhaps the most characteristic thing about the Jewish king was that — in complete opposition to the attitude of the Gentile kings and even of some contemporary presidents– he should behave with humility. The Tora indicates explicitly Debarim 17:20: [The king will have to read the Torah…] so that his heart does not exalt itself above his brothers and does not depart from His commandments to the right or to the left … “. The supreme lesson of this pasuq is that the Torah does not state that the king should not exalt himself above “his subjects” but above his “brothers.” Why? Because in the Jewish people, the king-subjects relationship was not vertical: it was horizontal. It is NOT “king / subjects”, but rather as “elder brother / brothers.” While in the other nations the king was the exception in terms of obeying the law– in the sense that he was not subject to it and could change it at will due to his status as spokesman for the gods– the king of Israel should be the example, the first person to declare his submission to the law. In the Jewish people the king is not “the central figure” because the law does not depend on his authority. And that is why the Tora does not mention any obligation (Mitzva) to obey the human king: the kings and subjects of the Jewish people are obliged to obey the same law that obligates anyone else: the Tora.
The following sentence summarizes all that should be known about the difference between the Jewish king and Gentile kings.
WHILE IN OTHER NATIONS THE KING IS GOD, FOR ISRAEL GOD IS THE KING
Shabbat Shalom!
