Teaching leadership and being a role model

I noticed the jeep in the distance almost immediately, raising a dust column you could see for miles. We were on maneuvers in the Negev desert, and there wasn’t anything else around but us, so we knew immediately the jeep had to be headed our way. Twenty minutes later the jeep pulled up and a man with colonel’s oak-leaves on his shoulders got out. Our commander jumped down for a hurried conference. We were happy for the brief respite; I was in the middle of tank commander’s course, and any break from the grind was always welcome.

A moment later our commander ordered the gunner off our tank and told us that this colonel was going to be joining us and that we did not need to know why or what it was about, but that for the purposes of our training and maneuvers, we should “just treat him like one of the guys.” Yeah, right, a full bird colonel, one of the guys? I don’t think so.

We did our best to stay out of this colonel’s way, though when you are sharing a tank that is not very easy. He was not a big talker, and didn’t mix much with us enlisted men, which was fine with us. Needless to say, he didn’t sleep in the tank with us, which at least meant we had a little more room than normal. We ended up sharing our tank with him for the better part of three weeks, though, so I did become fairly adept at learning how to sidestep any issues that might have been challenging with such a high-ranking officer on board. One day, however, it all finally came to a head.

About a week after he had joined us, we were on a maneuver and I was acting as tank commander. There are four crewmembers in a tank, a driver, gunner, loader, and commander, and to become a tank commander, we had to become accomplished in each position, so we would switch off, in order to become familiar with all the different tasks of a tank crew. Every maneuver had to be repeated four times, so that each of us could train as commanders, and this was my turn.

One of the rules which is taken very seriously in tanks, is what is called “gevulot gizrah,” or the limited field of the firing range. You could only fire in a certain direction, and there were always markers to denote where the field of fire actually was. Not only was it forbidden to actually fire outside the permitted field of fire, it was even prohibited to allow your tank gun to stray out of this field once there was a shell in the breach for fear of accidental misfire.

This is an issue the army takes very seriously, given the fact that a shell fired in the wrong direction could easily land in a local kibbutz or settlement, so the punishment for even allowing the tank gun to stray outside the field of fire was the loss of the entire crew’s weekend pass.

Now this becomes a challenging affair because your job as a commander is to seek out the ‘enemy’ and bring the main 105mm cannon to bear on the target, at which point the gunner takes over to line up his sights and fire. And while you can see the entire horizon from your vantage point atop the commander’s turret, the gunner looking through his magnified sights from inside the tank, can only see the limited field of vision that appears in his scope. So, if you haven’t managed to place the gun exactly on target, he will begin to sweep the main gun sideways in search of the target. And if he is moving the gun in the wrong direction, he may continue searching, not realizing that the gun is turning in the completely wrong direction. When he uses his controls to turn the gun sideways, the entire turret of the gun turns with him such that he is not aware that he is turning completely around, and along with him not only the main gun, but all the machine guns.

So on this particular day I was acting as tank commander, and this colonel was practicing his gunnery. And sure enough, he began to rotate the tank gun in search of target acquisition, and I could see the gun was heading outside the field of fire. Years later, especially once you are an officer commanding many tanks, the prospect of commanding one tank crew is a relatively simple thing. But when you are first learning to command a tank, it seems as though there is a tremendous amount to do. Remember that the tank is moving very fast, and you have to make sure the driver is headed in the right direction (the prospect of 52 tons of tank rolling off the side of a hill because you didn’t pay attention to where the driver, who can only see minimally through his scope, was going, is a frightening thought….), not to mention keeping the loader’s machine gun as well as your own facing in the right direction, ensuring the proper ammo is in the main gun, speaking on the tank radio with your platoon or company commander, making sure you are not falling behind or going too far ahead of the other tanks, etc.... In fact, the way things work, you don’t even have a hand free to take the controls over from the gunner, because one hand is holding the radio switch, and the other is firing your machine gun. So the armored corps has developed a simple system to let the gunner know he has to release the gun controls and stop rotating: as his seat is forward of your legs, deep in the belly of the tank, you simply kick him in the helmet! And he gets the message.

But what do you do when the gunner is a full bird colonel? I screamed into the radio intercom, but to no avail; with all the noise of heavy machine gun fire and the tank engine, he just couldn’t hear me.

Finally, in desperation, I decided I wasn’t giving up my weekend pass for anyone, so I kicked him in the back of his helmet, and sure enough he immediately figured it out: I heard a grunt that sounded something like “ugh!” over the tank intercom, and he released the controls. Later, when we all got out of the tank, I discovered he had a huge welt in the middle of his forehead; seems I kicked him so hard his head slammed into the gunner’s console! I was terrified that somehow I would pay a price for this over-reaction, but never heard another word about it.

Months later I discovered who this fellow was: his name is Shaul Mofaz, and I next ran into him as the base commander when I showed up for officer’s course…! He also happened to have been Yoni Netanyahu’s second in command on the famous Entebbe mission, where Israeli commandoes flew thousands of miles into Africa to rescue Jewish hostages form terrorist hijackers in Uganda.

That moment remains with me as a model of what leadership can be. Here was a full colonel, kicked in the head by a private, who offered forth no more than a grunt. Not a curse, no formal reprimand or stockade time, not even so much as a dressing down.

When I finished Officer’s course, an officer who had seen me through the tough spots offered me the following sage piece of advice:

“The stuff you learn in Officer’s course is just an introduction; it doesn’t make you an officer. Being an officer is about becoming the person whose men will follow him anywhere.”

And that is the greatest question we face today: do we have the leadership and are our teachers those individuals whom we would follow anywhere? I have always felt that Mofaz never laid into me about that kick in the head, because he had a strong sense about what leadership was really all about. Today he is a Knesset member and I do not always agree with his politics, to put it mildly; but it was a humbling lesson about leadership I learned that day.

All of which brings us back to a fascinating question we find in this week’s portion:

This week, we read the portion of Tsav, which seems to mean ‘command’:“And Hashem spoke to Moshe saying: “Tsav et Aharon ve’et banav lemor zot Torat ha’olah….”

“Command Aaron and his sons saying this is the law (Torah) of the Olah (the whole-burnt offering)” (Vayikra (Leviticus) 6:1-2)

As is often the case, the portion is named after the word that appears prominently in the opening verses. Tzav or ‘command!’ is a very significant word in the Torah, relating to the concept of commandments in general, leading us to wonder what is so special about the commandment referred to here.

If the word ‘Tzav’ alludes to the concept of commandments in general, one wonders why this is the parsha (weekly portion) which merits such a significant designation.

What is so special about the commandments of this week’s portion that this should be the portion of ‘command’? This question is especially challenging when considering that this is the second portion in the ‘book’ of Leviticus (Vayikra), which deals primarily with the different sacrifices (korbanot). Are the korbanot the most central mitzvah in the Torah, such that they should be the theme of the portion, which is actually called Tzav?

A careful look at this week’s portion suggests that the theme is not really about the sacrifices themselves, but rather about the Kohanim (priests) who offer them. At various points in this week’s portion, Moshe is not commanded by G-d to command the Jewish people regarding the Korbanot, but rather to command the Kohanim regarding their role in offering these korbanot.

The high point is when Moshe is commanded to take Aaron and his sons and anoint them as Kohanim, a role that never existed before. What is so special about Kohanim that they should be alluded to as the central mitzvah of the entire Torah?

Perhaps the central mitzvah alluded to by the portion’s name is the idea of a priestly class, or a Ke’hunah in the first place. Indeed, we are called a “Mamlechet Kohanim Ve’Goy Kadosh.” “A kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

Somehow we are all meant to be ‘priests’ on a certain level, and the Jewish people seems to be meant to become the Kohen of the world. But what is that all about?

What, indeed, is the mission of the Jewish people? As the prophet Yishayahu (Isaiah) suggests, we are meant to be a “light unto the Nations,” about being a role model. This does not mean we are meant to tell the world how to behave, but rather that we are challenged to behave on such a high, unassailable moral standard that the world cannot help but learn from us. And if this is true for our relationship with the world, it is equally true for our relationship with each other. Our ‘job’ as Jews is not (in most cases) to go around figuring out what any and every other Jew is doing wrong, in order to fix it. Our challenge as Jews is to become such living, breathing models of ethical behavior that everyone and anyone coming into contact with us cannot help but be inspired to become better….

If we are a Mamlechet Kohanim, then, it means that we are a nation of role models. And there are two important aspects of being such a role model: First, in order for someone to be a role model, he has to be somewhat apart from the group, so that he is easily recognizable. (And this may be why this week’s portion, where the Kohanim are first set aside as a separate entity, is so critical in the Torah.)

And second, you need to be clear on exactly what you are modeling; what exactly are we role models for? The Torah suggests that we are somehow meant to be a vehicle for bringing G-d into the world. Every time a human being commits one act of kindness, every time an ethical decision is made correctly, and even every time we glean a deep ethical message from Jewish ritual, so that ethical messages become inculcated in our daily routine, there is a little bit more of G-d in the world.

And this is the micro-mission of the Kohanim. Even the role model nation needs its own role models. The Kohanim are essentially our teachers, a class of people who are meant to teach best by example.

And if the Korban (from the language Karov, meaning close, according to the Ramban) is meant to bring us a little bit closer to the ‘me’ we always wanted to be, then the Kohen (Priest) is the vehicle for that educational growth.

Perhaps this is why the concept of the Korbanot is first shared with the Jewish people, and only afterwards (this week) communicated to the Kohanim.

The Jewish people, coming out of Egypt, are used to the idea of a caste society, where everyone serves those above them and the priestly class is at the top of the pyramid. And the people exist to serve the ruling class, the kings and priests.

In Judaism, however, it is precisely the opposite: the priests (Kohanim) exist to serve the Jewish people. Hence the education of the Jewish people comes first.

As we prepare to celebrate Pesach, the festival of freedom, we would do well to remember that for whatever reason, the world certainly views us as a role model, and holds us to a higher standard. And as the newly formed government of Israel begins its task of leading the Jewish people here in Israel, they would do well to take notice; perhaps this year, we will actually live up to that role and all of its incredible potential.