True Leaders: Nachshon, and Martin Luther King
The world is full of people who aspire to positions of power and authority. There are very few completely uncontested positions of political power and authority in the United States, but the kind of leadership for which one must compete is only one kind of leadership. Many of the people in our country or in our lives who have most deeply and successfully exercised leadership were actually not competing or racing with anyone. In fact, they held roles that no one else wanted. One Torah passage that focuses on different models of leadership is the passage from the Book of Exodus describing the events leading up to the Splitting of the Red Sea (Parashat Beshalach, to be read in Jewish communities around the world on January 26). Of course, Moses is the most prominent leader in this Torah portion. Interestingly, however, discussions of leadership in this Torah portion rarely focu