Conservative purists often like to point out that America is a republic, not a democracy. In a true democracy, the people rule. In ancient Athens, for example, citizens gathered regularly to vote on legislation and even punish fellow citizens accused of crimes. But they did so under the handicap that plagues every mass gathering: inflamed passions.
Cooler heads don’t prevail when talented agitators or orators stir up people’s emotions. That’s why, for example, Athens’ citizens sentenced Socrates to death, according to many historians. They did so in the heat of the moment. Had they had more time to consider the matter, they very well might have let him live.
In this week’s parshah, Moshe challenges Korach and his supporters to place their claim before G-d. Offer incense alongside Aharon and see which one G-d accepts, Moshe tells them. But do so in the morning (Numbers 16:5). Writes Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch:
“[T]hey should have time to come to their senses, especially in the quiet and retirement of the night when everyone is relegated more to the company of his own family and his own self and removed from the influence of friends who would lead him astray.”
Moshe’s suggestion to wait a day actually saved On ben Peles, according to the Midrash. That night, he went home where his wife convinced him to split from Korach’s group. The delay possibly saved the sons of Korach, too, Rav Hirsch writes. By the time the moment of truth arrived, they had “allow[ed] their better feelings to gain control” over them.
Reason, not emotions, should govern our actions. That’s why Moshe delayed the incense challenge to the following day, and that’s why America’s founding fathers set up, not a democracy, but a republic in which delays and intermediaries stand between the passions of the people and the final vote.
Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808-1888) – head of the Jewish community in Frankfurt, Germany for over 35 years – was a prolific writer whose ideas, passion, and brilliance helped save German Jewry from the onslaught of modernity.
Elliot Resnick, PhD, is the host of “The Elliot Resnick Show” and the editor of an upcoming work on etymological explanations in Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch’s commentary on Chumash.
