Matot Masei, my teacher in Memorium.

There are moments when Divine Providence touches you on the shoulder

and makes you see a certain truth with blazing clarity.

Let me share with you such a moment that happened to me

as I was writing this covenant and conversation.

For technical reasons, I have to write these essays many weeks in advance. I'd come to

Matut Masse and had decided to write about the cities of refuge, but I wasn't sure which

aspect to focus on. Suddenly, overwhelmingly, I felt an instinct to write about one very unusual

law. We know the cities were set aside for the protection of

those found guilty of manslaughter, that is, of killing someone accidentally without malice

of forethought. Because of the then universal practice of blood vengeance, that protection was necessary.

The purpose of the cities was to make sure that someone judged innocent

of murder was safe from being killed. As Chauftin puts it, and he shall flee to one of these

cities and live. This apparently simple concept was given a remarkable interpretation by the

Gamara. The sage is taught if a student was exiled, his teacher was

exiled with him as it is said and live, meaning do the things for him that will enable him to live.

Maimonides explains life without study is like death for scholars who seek wisdom. In Judaism, study is life itself, and study without a

teacher is impossible. Teachers give us more than just knowledge. They give us life. Now,

this isn't an agadic passage, a moralizing text not meant to be taken literally, it's actually a halakhic ruling codified

as such, nor is it a stray text, out of keeping with the rest of Jewish law, to the contrary.

Jewish law rules as follows, just as one is commanded to honor his father and fear him,

so he is obliged to honor his teacher and fear him, yet more than his

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