A Little Justice

Just to pick up on where we left off: The theme of משפט (justice) is found earlier in B'reishit 18. God is about to destroy S'dom and Amora and decides He ought to let Avraham know about his decision. It is interesting how the word משפט is used there and it has implications for understanding back in Exodus.

Consider, though, the question of how would Avraham known about concepts of justice, how did he use those concepts in his argument with God and how did God understand Avraham's relationship to justice (you can address these questions by reading Genesis 18).

Once you have some direction there, consider that Moshe may have already known about the basics or more of a justice system which was passed down to him from many generations prior, even before he would have received the Torah.

Unfortunately, because it is nearly Shabbat, I will have to leave the rest of  my comments until next week. Just recovering from being a bit out of sorts.