The future of Am Yisrael will not be built only by those who know how to fight, nor only by those who know how to learn. It will be built by those strong enough to protect, humble enough to listen, and wise enough to hold complexity.
There are moments in history that leave us asking a simple question.
Why?
When radical Islamist movements began capturing the world's attention, one of the most puzzling phenomena was watching young women from free countries willingly leave everything behind to become part of those movements. The easy explanations were always broken homes, trauma, or abuse. Sometimes those answers were true.
But psychologists pointed to something much deeper.
For many people, certainty is comforting. It is far easier to live in a world of black and white than in a world of complexity. It is easier to believe that one side possesses all the truth and the other all the evil. Fanaticism offers clarity. Complexity demands maturity.
Parashat Pinchas presents us with two extraordinary leaders.
The first is Pinchas.
His act of zealotry ends the plague, and Hashem Himself rewards him with a Brit Shalom, a covenant of peace. His actions were necessary for that unique moment, and they were affirmed by Heaven.
Yet when the time comes to choose the next leader of Am Yisrael, Pinchas is not even considered.
Instead, Moshe turns to Hashem with one of the most moving requests in the Torah.
יִפְקֹד ה' אֱלֹקֵי הָרוּחֹת לְכָל בָּשָׂר אִישׁ עַל הָעֵדָה… אֲשֶׁר יֵצֵא לִפְנֵיהֶם וַאֲשֶׁר יָבֹא לִפְנֵיהֶם וַאֲשֶׁר יוֹצִיאֵם וַאֲשֶׁר יְבִיאֵם
"May Hashem appoint a man over the congregation… who shall go out before them and who shall come in before them, who shall lead them out and who shall bring them in."
These are remarkable words.
To go out and to come in.
To lead out and to bring back.
The Torah deliberately speaks in opposites.
The commentators explain these phrases in many ways. A leader must know how to wage war and how to govern in peace. He must know how to stand courageously before enemies while remaining devoted to his own people. He must know when to fight and when to embrace.
Leadership is not built on a single quality.
It is built on the ability to hold opposite truths at the same time.
Pinchas could save a nation in one extraordinary moment.
Yehoshua could build one for generations.
That is why Yehoshua becomes the leader who enters Eretz Yisrael.
Because Eretz Yisrael is the place where heaven and earth meet. It is where holiness is found not only in prayer, but in planting fields, building homes, creating courts, defending borders, raising families, and living ordinary lives with extraordinary purpose.
That kind of world cannot be built by zealotry alone.
It requires people who can hold complexity.
Perhaps this is one of the greatest challenges facing our generation.
Everywhere we look, people have become convinced that only their camp possesses truth.
The religious against the secular.
The secular against the religious.
The right against the left.
The left against the right.
Everyone is certain.
Everyone is shouting.
Everyone is convinced that if the other side succeeds, everything will be lost.
But Jewish history teaches us something painfully different.
We have just entered the period beginning with Shivah Asar B'Tammuz, when we remember the walls of Jerusalem being breached.
The Romans were powerful.
But they did not destroy us alone.
Long before they entered the city, we had already opened the gates through hatred, suspicion, and fanaticism. Each camp believed it alone represented Hashem's truth. Each side became so consumed with defeating the other that they forgot they were brothers.
That danger has never disappeared.
Fanaticism can occasionally be right.
Like the broken clock that tells the correct time twice each day, someone driven only by certainty will sometimes arrive at the right conclusion.
But being right is not the same as building.
Being right is not the same as healing.
Being right is not the same as leading.
The leader Am Yisrael needs is not the one who sees only evil across the aisle.
It is the one who can confront what is wrong without becoming consumed by hatred.
The one who can criticize while still recognizing goodness.
The one who can fight our enemies with absolute determination while treating fellow Jews with dignity.
The one who understands that truth without humility eventually stops searching for truth.
None of us sees the whole picture.
Not the Haredim.
Not the religious Zionists.
Not the political right.
Not the political left.
Every community carries wisdom.
Every community has blind spots.
Every community has something to contribute.
If all we search for is what is broken in the other side, then we are no longer searching for truth.
We are simply defending our own certainty.
Yehoshua teaches us that true leadership is not choosing one side of complexity.
It is carrying both.
Perhaps that is the leadership our homes need.
The leadership our communities need.
The leadership our country desperately needs.
The future of Am Yisrael will not be built only by those who know how to fight, nor only by those who know how to learn. It will be built by those strong enough to protect, humble enough to listen, and wise enough to hold complexity.
Shabbat Shalom Rav Shlomo