You can ignore a letter, you can duck a phone call, but you can’t play ostrich with a summons and complaint. If you do, the marshals may come and get you or they may enter a judgment by default against you.
The courts derive their authority to compel you to appear before them, to adjudicate the dispute , and to enforce their judgment from the sovereign power of the state that established them. Even the rabbinical courts of Israel that have jurisdiction over marriage and divorce derive their authority over the litigants, their jurisdiction over the subject matter, and their powers of enforcement from the Knesset, the sovereign power of the state of Israel.
Many contemporary Jews living outside of Israel might treat a summons from the bet din, the Jewish court of law in the Diaspora, like a letter that can be ignored. Apart from its powers of excommunication –cherem – the Diaspora bet din, unless empowered by the courts of the sovereign state, has little else with which to compel submission to its jurisdiction.
This, of course was not the case during the long period of Jewish history stretching from the days of Moses to about 360 CE. During this time, the Jewish courts of law derived their power from the Torah, the Highest Authority.
The Torah establishes the three branches of government in a single sentence: Shoftim veshotrim titen lechah bechol she’arecha” – “Appoint for yourselves judges and police in all your settlements.”
God is the Supreme Legislature, shoftim is the judiciary, and shotrim is the executive branch. This Torah-approved judiciary has jurisdiction “bechol sha’arecha,” over all the people of Israel.
From its temporary digs in the desert to its lofty chamber built into the north wall of the Temple to its modest accommodation in Tiberias, the Sanhedrin reigned as the supreme legal authority in the land. It had all the trappings of power until it was eventually broken up in the fourth century CE.
The Sanhedrin (from the two Greek words, syn, meaning, together and hedra, meaning seats,) was the Supreme Court of Israel. The Sanhedrin’s charter was to safeguard the Oral Law from violation by means of protective legislation, to interpret its meaning, and to decide questions of Torah law.
The original Sanhedrin consisted of seventy-one judges. Seventy of them were appointed by Moses, who was the president of the first Sanhedrin. The minimum quorum necessary for a binding decision of the Sanhedrin was seventy-one, although, often, other sages without voting power were permitted to participate in the deliberations leading up to the vote.
The Sanhedrin would sit in a semi-circle, with all members able to see each other and the testifying witnesses. The president, the nasi, sat in the center. The av bet din, the vice president of the court, sat next to him, together with the rest of the judges seated in the order of their judicial capabilities.
The members of the Sanhedrin had to be men of good reputation with expert Torah knowledge. They had to be men of wisdom and humility with a hatred for misuse of financial power, sinat mammon, and with a love for truth and mankind. They also had to be familiar with the knowledge of science and other religions, even the teachings of idolatry so as to be able to render decisions involving these matters. Each member of the Sanhedrin, in order to qualify, had to receive ordination, semichah, from the court.
This semichah was the authentic ordination given by Moses to the members of his Sanhedrin and passed on from generation to generation until the Sanhedrin was disbanded. What we call semicha today is not the true semichah described above. Rather, it is a certification that the member of the bet din is proficient in certain areas of Torah law and has the permission of his teachers to render decisions.
The Sanhedrin, also known as the Great Sanhedrin or the Bet Din Hagadol, the Supreme Court, appointed minor Sanhedrins of twenty-three judges each in every major city of Israel. These minor Sanhedrins had jurisdiction over all matters, including regular cases involving capital punishment, which were not subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Great Sanhedrin.
The Great Sanhedrin had exclusive jurisdiction over matters of national interest. Examples of these include the appointment of a king or high priest, the declaration of war (other than the wars of Joshua), the annexation of territory to the Temple or to Jerusalem, judging an entire tribe, an apostate city, a rebellious leader, a false prophet, and a high priest when accused of a capital offense.
The Great Sanhedrin had jurisdiction over unusual cases such as the trial of the woman accused by her husband of adultery, sotah, as well as cases of unsolved murder, eglah arufah, when the victim is found between two cities.
Built as it was half inside and half outside the Temple wall, the Sanhedrin would render real time decisions in connection with all Temple, matters. Finally, the Sanhedrin was the court of last resort for any question of law that other courts could not answer.
If the Sanhedrin holds the key to our sovereign past, it also holds the key to our sovereign future. The Messiah can only be confirmed by a Sanhedrin with authentic semichah. Accordingly, the Messiah’s red carpet will be the reconstitution of the Great Sanhedrin.