This morning, as we celebrate Gabriella becoming Bat Mitzvah, I realise that the Berle family may have discovered a rather unexpected family minhag.

When Francesca became Bat Mitzvah, the country was preparing to choose a new Prime Minister. And now, as Gabriella becomes Bat Mitzvah, here we are again. I am not sure whether this counts as coincidence, pattern, or something the Cabinet Secretary should be informed about before the next family simcha.

But jokes aside, it is quite remarkable. Because once again, a Berle Bat Mitzvah falls at a moment when the country is asking what kind of leadership it needs. And once again, Parashat Balak offers us a surprisingly sharp lens through which to ask that question.

As we heard Gabriella read so beautifully from the Torah, at the end of Parashat Balak, rather than basking in the glory of Balaam’s blessing — Mah tovu ohaleicha Yaakov, mishkenoteicha Yisrael — “How good are your tents, O Jacob, your dwelling places, O Israel” — the Israelite community has become unstable. Into that instability steps Pinchas.

Like Korach, though in a very different way, Pinchas places himself at the centre of a moment of communal crisis. He does not consult Moses to ask what the law requires, or whether anyone else sees the situation differently. He takes a spear, acts alone, and becomes convinced that his violence is not violence at all, but salvation.

And that is precisely what makes the story so dangerous.

Because every age has its Pinchas temptation: the temptation to believe that what a frightened community really needs is one decisive person, one pure voice, one individual who says: I alone understand the danger. I alone have the courage to act. I alone can save you.

What is remarkable is that the rabbis did not simply celebrate Pinchas. They inherited a Torah text that seems to praise him. But they were deeply uncomfortable with what he represents.

The Mishnah preserves the possibility of zealotry, but the Talmud surrounds it with warnings. If someone comes to ask whether they should act like Pinchas, the answer is not: yes, go ahead. The answer is: we do not instruct people to do this. And the Jerusalem Talmud is even sharper: Pinchas acted not with the agreement of the sages.

That is an extraordinary rabbinic move. The rabbis look at a biblical hero and say: be very careful. Do not turn this into a model. Do not build a society in which individuals appoint themselves judge, jury, and redeemer. Do not mistake certainty for righteousness.

And Gabriella, this is a particularly important lesson on the day you become Bat Mitzvah. Becoming Bat Mitzvah is not about becoming certain of everything. It is not about discovering that you now have all the answers. It is about taking your place in a tradition of learning, questioning, listening, arguing, and growing.

Jewish maturity is not zealotry. Jewish maturity is responsibility.

It means knowing when to speak, and also when to listen. It means having strong values, but not imagining that our values free us from humility. It means caring deeply about justice, but also caring about the process by which justice is pursued.

And this lesson feels especially urgent this week.

As the country waits to see who will replace Prime Minister Starmer, we find ourselves once again asking what kind of leadership we need. Now, there are plenty of opportunities in newspapers, on the radio, or on TV to hear what people think will or should happen.

Instead of adding to the speculation, let me focus for a moment on the moral questions about leadership that I hope will inform the decisions ahead.

In anxious times, people often long for a leader who will stride ahead, cut through the noise, ignore the doubters, and promise simple answers to complicated problems. There is something seductive about that kind of certainty. It can feel reassuring. It can feel like clarity.

But Jewish tradition teaches us to be suspicious of the leader who cannot bear debate. Suspicious of the leader who treats disagreement as disloyalty. Suspicious of the leader who claims to embody the will of the people while refusing to hear the many different voices that make up the people.

The rabbis did not imagine good leadership as one person with a spear. They imagined it as argument for the sake of heaven. They imagined it as courts, councils, teachers, students, majorities and minorities. They preserved dissenting opinions even when those opinions did not become law, because a community that forgets its minority voices becomes morally smaller.

The Jewish alternative to zealotry is debate and courage.

And here, I think, the Jewish poet and feminist thinker Adrienne Rich offers us a vital addition to one of Judaism’s most famous teachings. In Pirkei Avot, Hillel asks three questions: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?” Adrienne Rich added a fourth question: “And if not with others, how?”

That question is the perfect response to Pinchas. Because Pinchas acts without others. He acts without consultation, without conversation, without community. His is the way of the solitary saviour.

But Jewish life is built on a different model. Not: if not me alone, who? But: if not with others, how?

It takes courage to seek consensus when shouting would be easier. It takes courage to listen to minority voices when a majority wants to move on. It takes courage to lead without pretending to be the sole saviour. It takes courage to say: I have convictions, but I am not the whole truth. I have responsibility, but I am not the whole people.

That is why the rabbinic response to Pinchas matters so much. They do not erase him from the tradition. They do something more subtle and more powerful: they contain him. They make sure that his story cannot be used too easily by every future zealot who believes that their anger is holy.

So, this morning, as we celebrate Gabriella becoming Bat Mitzvah, and as we look at a country entering a new chapter of leadership, Parashat Balak offers us a warning and a prayer.

The warning is this: beware the person who claims that only they can save us.

And the prayer is this: may we be blessed with leaders, in our country and in our communities, who know how to listen; who seek wisdom beyond themselves; who understand that debate is not an obstacle to leadership but one of its foundations; who protect the dignity of those who disagree; and who remember that the work of building a just society is never the work of one zealot with a spear, but of a whole people walking, arguing, listening, and striving together.

Ken yehi ratzon — may this be God’s will.

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