Love for the Widow and Orphan as Proxy for Societal Health

Some of the most visually powerful verses in the portion of Mishpatim refer to the punishment of the one who mistreats the widow or orphan (Exodus 22: 21-23)

You shall not ill-treat any widow or orphan.

If you do mistreat them, I will heed their outcry as soon as they cry out to Me,

and My anger shall blaze forth and I will put you to the sword, and your own wives shall become widows and your children orphans.

 The question I would like to ask is why the sword is used as the symbol for retaliation against the one who has abused the orphan or the widow. There are many ways in which a person can be punished, hanging, starvation, conflagration. The "sword" is perhaps indicative of something deeper. The verse, likewise, could have said, "My anger shall blaze forth and I shall surely smite you," or something equally destructive in nature. I would like to suggest that the sword is a form of metonymy, the sword representative or reflective of something else. 

I believe we see a similar verse in the very same Torah portion in which a specific means of punishment is used. In the section discussing the land's conquest, the Torah states: "I shall send the hornet-swarm before you and it will drive away the Hivvite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite before you (Exodus 23:28)." It would seem here that the hornet-swarm represents the idea that no enemy warrior will be spared, the hornets, who can enter every crag, every crevice - and even the smallest of spaces, will find and sweep every enemy bunker, any hiding place they could conceive up. Hashem's miraculous conquest of the land will be so complete that no enemy will be left, in even the most concealed, covert hiding place. 

And here, as well, it would seem that the sword symbolizes destruction in its purest form. On a halachic level, death by sword is the punishment for one liable for the death penalty, but over and beyond that, what I think Hashem is teaching us - as resonates with the words of the prophets - is that society as a whole has no justification for its existence if it maltreats those who are the weakest, the young orphan, the elderly widow, bereft of protection, susceptible to the exploitation of usurers or anyone who would take advantage of her apparent weakness. And that's why, perhaps, the Talmud even teaches that halachically special status is accorded to the property and possessions of an orphan, special status granted to him so as to inure him from the abuses of society. The sword is analogous to destruction, and society, has engaged in an act of self-destruction if it doesn't protect those most vulnerable to the harmful hand of others. 

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