One Law for All?

By Moshe Feiglin




One law shall you have for the stranger as for the home-born, for I am Hashem, your G-d. (From this week's Torah portion, Emor, Leviticus 24:22)

Enforcement of the law in different ways for different sectors neuters the law, making it the foundation of evil.
A small-time criminal works against the law.
A bigger criminal circumvents the law.
But a big-time criminal works by means of the law – specifically by selective enforcement of the law.

The real power is not in the hands of the judges, but in the hands of those who decide whom to prosecute. Nobody would even think of destroying an apartment building in the heart of Tel Aviv or Jerusalem – even if it is the "Holyland" project, tainted with corruption. But a settlement neighborhood will be destroyed with no qualms because in Israel, there may be law, but not the same law for all its citizens. The law is not the same for all because we have forgotten the end of the verse in Leviticus, "for I am Hashem, your G-d."

Shabbat Shalom