Collective Reparations

by Andreas Wittenstein

לֹא־יוּמְתוּ אָבוֹת עַל־בָּנִים וּבָנִים לֹא־יוּמְתוּ עַל־אָבוֹת: אִישׁ בְּחֶטְאוֹ יוּמָתוּ:
Don't execute parents for children, nor children for parents; only execute people for their own sin. —Deuteronomy 24:16

During the month of אֱלוּל Elul, we need to prepare for Rosh Hashanah by doing תְּשׁוּבָה teshuvàh with those we've wronged. Once we recognize our sin (often the hardest step), Jewish law commands us to:

admit responsibility;
regret committing it and express remorse;
make appropriate reparation;
resolve not to repeat it;
devise a plan to avoid relapse.

Teshuvah between living individuals is straightforward. But what if groups sin or are wronged? And what if the perpetrators or victims have died or won't cooperate?

This month we read in Ki Tetse' that people should only be put to death for their own sins, which Ezekiel [18:20] and talmudic rabbis extended to all vicarious punishment. But punishment is for vengeance, while teshuvàh is for justice. Do I want wicked people to die?, asks the Lord God. Rather that they turn back from their ways and live! [Ezekiel 18:23].

Everyone a sin harms, teshuvàh must heal: perpetrator, victim, God, even the public —a special concern for ethical role models such as Jews. Teshuvah relieves us sinners of bad habits and guilt, relieves us victims of victimhood and resentment, relieves us bystanders of bad examples and anxiety, and returns us all to help God repair the world. So we can't let one party delay justice for the rest; teshuvàh must still be done.

This means the mitzvah of teshuvàh is unilateral: we must make amends with everyone we've wronged, even if they've wronged us or others more. At the other end, we must forgive those who sincerely ask our forgiveness, and if we reject them three times, it's our problem, and they're absolved anyway.

If victims can't be compensated, we help their identity group instead, such as kin or an appropriate charity. If the perpetrators can't or won't do teshuvàh, the rest of us in their identity group step in to expedite justice in their stead. Failing that, we as Jews help God repair all wrongs in the world —תִּקּוּן עוֹלָם tiqun ‘olàm— regardless of whose ‘fault’ they are. Especially sins committed by Jews, which desecrate God's name —חִלּוּל הַשֵּׁם khilul haShém.

After the Sho'ah, West Germany initially stood in for all Nazis and paid reparations to Israel, which initially stood in for all Jewish Holocaust victims. As a German descendant, even though I was born in America and after World War II, and even though my parents were in the Resistance, I feel greatly relieved that Germany made reparation, even though I myself didn't help.

In this country, ‘Americans’ dispossessed the ‘Indians’ in every way imaginable. Even though I wasn't around then, and even though my ancestors didn't participate in this horror, as an American I'm deeply ashamed it still hasn't been rectified. The heirs of the dispossessed still suffer while the dispossessors' heirs —meaning us— continue to profit from stolen property. We need to make amends.

In Israel and the occupied territories, Jews dispossessed Palestinian Arabs through every oppressive means, beginning over a century ago, when the Jewish National Fund bought up land from absentee Turkish landlords, had Ottoman police expel the Arab tenants, and placed it under a covenant prohibiting sale to non-Jews for all eternity. Whether our victims have reciprocated with worse atrocities is halachically irrelevant to our obligation of teshuvàh. As a Jew, even though I've never been to Israel, and even though my ancestors had no hand in this atrocity, I'm profoundly ashamed it still hasn't been righted and is only worsening. The rest of us Jews need to step in and do teshuvàh collectively in the Israeli government's stead, or be silently complicit. Because the perpetrators are Jews, we are specially bound to rectify this khilul haShém.

Collective punishment is an abomination; Collective teshuvàh is a mitzvàh.

This Elul, let's go beyond righting individual wrongs, and address collective injustices that burden us. Let's make reparations not just with our next-door neighbors, but with the whole world: tiqun ‘olàm.

—from our August 2002 Newsletter

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