DEUT1444 The rabbis, taking their cue from the Torah, instructed that the essence of prayer, the Amidah, be a silent prayer, so that when people enumerated their personal sins, they could not be overheard (Sotah 32b). Jewish law is often more sophisticated and sensitive then courts of the twentieth century. One of the five categories of payment for damages was to be for embarrassment, based on [this] Torah verse. Even though this payment was subjective and according to strict rules of embarrassment (Maimonides, Hilchot Chovel Umazik 3:1 and 3:7), nevertheless, the Talmud (Bava Kamma 90b) states that the "lowest" poor person still was paid for embarrassment since he is a member of the Jewish people, giving him stature and dignity.

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DEUT1445 If the only way to save someone's life is to kill his pursuer, we are obligated to do so. We are commanded to save someone who is being pursued even at the cost of the life of the pursuer. When it is possible to prevent the pursuer from murder by merely injuring him, it is obligatory to do so. However, if the only way to save the life of someone who is being attacked is by killing the pursuer, you are required to do so. (Chinuch 600).

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DEUT1446 Rabbinic interpretation of another law in the Pentateuch yielded a special category of damages called boshet, "shame" or "indignity." Thus, we find the law [this and preceding verses]. Interpreting the "cutting off of the hand" as monetary payment, the rabbis concluded that the woman was to pay for the embarrassment and dignity which she caused. This was formulated in the Mishnah thus: "If a man wounds his fellow man he becomes thereby culpable on five accounts: for injury, for pain, for healing, for the loss of time, and for indignity inflicted.… How is one compensated for indignity inflicted? All according to the man who inflicts the indignity and the man who suffers the indignity" (Bava Kamma 8:1 and 8:6) The rabbis in the Talmud go on to demonstrate how the nature and extent of dignity/indignity is different for different people and depends upon any number of factors, including the social status, age, and sex of the individual involved, and the place, the time, and the public nature of the incident.

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DEUT1447 What is the intent of: "you shall cut off"? Monetary compensation. Whence is this derived? It is written here: "you shall have no pity," and elsewhere (19:21): "and you shall have no pity." Just as there, monetary compensation [is indicated]; here, too, monetary compensation [is understood] (Sifrei)

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DEUT1448 Sexual abuse is also the source of much embarrassment. The Torah makes this exceedingly clear (this and next verses). Fight the special justification the woman had for shaming her husband's assailant, the Torah demands drastic steps in retribution for the degradation she caused--although the Rabbis transformed this to a monetary payment that she had to pay. (Sifre on Deuteronomy 25:12; compare M. Bava Kamma 8:1 and B. Bava Kamma 83a, 86a-b, 28a, etc.). (Incidentally, note that, as the Torah recognized, feelings of shame and embarrassment are experienced by men who are sexually abused just as much as they are by women.) The Talmud, when determining the payment to be exact it for the shame involved whenever one person assaults another, uses this case as the paradigm for what embarrassment means. We are humiliated when we are sexually abused – even just touched in our private parts against our will--four we feel that our sense of self has been invaded, that our honor has been compromised in the most fundamental way possible.

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DEUT1449 Rescue the pursued. If a Jew is chasing his fellow with intent to kill him, we are commanded to rescue the pursued from his assailant’s hand. If no other recourse exists, we must even kill the assailant. Key concept: The Creator wants His world to be settled and civilized. Social order requires that the weak be rescued from the hands of those who would harm them. Another reason for this commandment is that when someone is pursued and his life is threatened, his eyes turned to Hashem for salvation. Therefore, Hashem commands us to intervene and do everything at our disposal to rescue him.

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DEUT1450 It is a negative commandment not to retain in one's position any short (defective) measure or weight for Scripture states, You shall not have in your bag two kinds of stone weight… two kinds of measures, great and small [this and next verse]: even if he does no weighing and measuring with them.

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DEUT1451 More specifically to our interest in business ethics, the Torah is aware that commerce can provide special temptations to cheat, and so we are warned: (Deuteronomy 25:13-15]. These verses from the Torah teach that it is not acceptable to cheat. If you are selling a pound of olives, you are obligated to deliver a full pound of olives. Obviously, this concept extends to other forms of business cheating and shortcuts. You are obligated to deliver "the full measure" of what the client buys. This is readily understood to include quality as well as quantity: a discussion in the Talmud shows that when people pay for a specific product--vinegar, medium-quality wine, or select wine--they are entitled to receive what they purchased (B. Bava Metzia 73a). The concept of "do not steal" is extended beyond the theft of physical objects to include intangibles. We are forbidden to engage in geneivat da'at--deception, literally "stealing the mind," creating a false impression, or misleading people. The Talmud explicitly states that such deception is forbidden, and it specifies that one may not deceive "idol worshipers," which is to say not only gentiles, who are also ethical monotheists, but anyone at all. (B. Hillin 94b) (By Barry J. Leff, "Jewish Business Ethics")

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DEUT1452 Do not keep faulty weights or measures. See [[LEV804]] Leviticus 19:35 judgment CHINUCH 163-4 and [[LEV819]] Leviticus 19:36 weights CHINUCH 164-5.

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DEUT1453 God's role as covenant partner and as Israel's Lover probably has the greatest effect on creating moral character within us. We should abide by God's commandments, in part, because we were at Sinai, we promised to obey them there, and we should keep our promises. Thus, as the Haggadah of Passover reminds us, "In each and every generation a person is obliged to view himself as if he himself went out of Egypt" on the trek to Sinai, where God made the covenant with all generations to come: "It is not with you alone that I created this Covenant and this oath [of obedience], but with those who are standing with us this day before the Lord, our God, and with those who are not with us today.… Secret things belong to the Lord, our God, but that which has been revealed is for us and our children forever to carry out the words of this Torah." (This verse, Deuteronomy 29:28). Ultimately, though, God serves to shape moral character by entering into a loving relationship with us. That is, not only is the covenant a legal document, with provisions for those who abide by it and those who do not, but also the covenant announces formal recognition of a relationship that has existed for a long while and that is intended to last, much as a covenant of marriage does. Relationships, especially intense ones like marriage, create mutual obligations that are fulfilled by the partners sometimes grudgingly but often lovingly, with no thought of a quid pro quo return. For God, as for a human marital partner (God is depicted as Israel's marital partner a number of times in the Bible, whether fondly, as in Jeremiah 2:2, or angrily when Israel proves to be an unfaithful lover, as in Hosea 2), we should do what the norms of morality require, and then we should go beyond the letter of the law (lifnim m'shurat ha-din) to do favors for our beloved. In moral terms, we then become the kind of people who seek to do both the right and the good, not out of hope for award but simply because that is the kind of people we are and the kind of relationships we have.

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