A challenge of extremism rears its ugly head in this week’s Torah reading as God rewarded Pinchas for the execution – without arrest, trial, or judgement – of a transgressing Israelite man and Midianite woman at the opening of the Tabernacle.
While the death of these two people turned back a plague and saved other lives, our sages through the ages do not condone Pinchas’ behavior, even though it earned him a divine boon.
This is fundamental to the way we read our sacred scriptures – there is no absolute proof text to justify bad behavior. If the text offers us something that goes against our principles, then the principles prevail.
We know this from this week’s reading in another spot, when the Daughters of Tz’lof’chad challenged inheritance laws and got them changed by God.
Jews challenge our texts and each other to be better, always.