Cantor's Corner by Eric Schulmiller

The mandate to protect an individual’s right to privacy was articulated early in Jewish law. The Torah is especially concerned with the rights of the least powerful members of society, such as resident aliens. For example, we read in Leviticus 19: “When strangers live with you in your land, you must not oppress them. The strangers who live with you shall be to you like citizens; you shall love them as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”

As Jews, we are commanded repeatedly and clearly to treat strangers fairly, to consider them citizens, to love them as ourselves. This theme – that we must treat strangers as our own people because we were strangers in the land of Egypt is repeated more than any other law in the Torah – appearing dozens of times in the Five Books of Moses alone! With direct knowledge of what it is like to be “strangers in the land,” the authors of these texts and subsequent commentators understood how easy it is to take advantage of a minority group, and they applied an ethical imperative that still speaks to us today.

The Administration has introduced new policies and regulations that impact civil liberties, particularly as they apply to non-citizens. Since September 11th , the Justice Department has begun a strategy of widespread preventive detention, resulting in the secret imprisonment of more than 1,200 individuals - mostly non-citizens of Middle Eastern descent. Also, “Special Registration,” initiated by the INS in November 2002, requires male non-citizens ages 16 and older from 24 predominantly Arab and Muslim countries and North Korea to present themselves at INS offices for registration. The registration process includes questions on residence, comparison with lists of suspected terrorists, fingerprinting and face scans, and questions about constitutionally protected activities such as mosque attendance and political views. Such practices are clearly at odds with the age-old Jewish mandate to protect the rights of all those living in our midst.

In terms of privacy rights, The Bible and the Talmud outline rules for protecting the privacy of one’s home, granting protection against intrusion by creditors or neighbors. The famous talmudic sage Rabbi Akiva went so far as to suggest that one should knock before entering one’s own home, lest another family member require privacy. Not only is physical intrusion prohibited, but also surveillance of private space was deemed to be a violation of privacy rights. Jewish tradition acknowledges that preventing crime may require discovery of confidential information, yet this exception is extremely limited. The Mishna teaches that even in capital cases, one is not permitted to conceal a witness for the purpose of spying. The Talmud identifies a category of “harm caused by seeing” (hezeq re’iyyah) when one’s privacy is violated by the prying eyes of another. In another example, from the middle ages, authority Rabbenu Gershom issued a decree in the 10^th Century that reading another’s mail was a punishable offense.

To illustrate the importance of privacy as a Jewish value, the Rabbis offer a striking interpretation of the verse from Numbers, “How fair are your tents, O Jacob, Your dwellings, O Israel!” In the Talmud, it is explained that the Israelites set up their tents so that the entrances did not face each other, thus protecting one another’s privacy, and making them worthy of praise..

Many aspects of the new laws such as the USA Patriot Act created in response to 9/11 are egregious violators of our right to privacy in ways that are not effective in enhancing our nation’s security, and set dangerous precedents for our country and its citizens.

It is true that set against all these privacy rights is the overriding Jewish principle of Pikuah Nefesh - saving a life. Nearly any commandment can be violated if the result is saving a human life. But the challenge we must face is to create a system of law that does not recklessly cross the boundary between the protection of our rights and the protection of our safety. Only then can we dwell safely and securely in our tents, protected as a community, protected as individuals.