Shoftim

At the beginning of our Parsha Moshe tells us to appoint Judges & Officers throughout the land, שפטים ושטרים תתן לך בכל שעריך.

The commentators all ask why it says  תתן לך in the singular when it’s addressed to the whole nation. They answer that it teaches us that each one of us has to judge all of our actions to see if they conform to the Torah or not.

The אוצרות התורה adds that from the singular  תתן לך we also see that a person has to know that it’s only himself he must watch. There's no comparison to what someone else does. Each person is judged based on his own individual qualities, strengths & weaknesses; no two people are alike. What for one person is a mitzvah, could be a sin for the other. We can't look to see what the other is doing & justify our actions.

The בן איש חי explains that the Torah is hinting here that it’s incumbent on every one of us to appoint our own judges; the brain & the heart that rule over our limbs & our feelings to turn us to do good. One way for that to work is by always judging oneself & taking to heart what will come out of one’s sin. Recognize how low he can sink if he lets sin overcome him.

The next posuk also gives advice how to judge yourself: לא תטה משפט , don't pervert judgment, don't always judge yourself for good when going over your actions. On the contrary, if you find fault in your actions, embrace it & work on it to fix it. In that way, you will constantly improve yourself.

Learn from דוד המלך who, when נתן הנביא confronted him about his sin, even though he had good reasons. he answered " I sinned to Hashem". The Navi then said, Hashem will remove your sin. Dovid admitted his sin & was forgiven. Unlike שאול המלך, who when confronted by שמואל הנביא about not killing the king of Amalek, made up excuses justifying himself thereby losing everything. We can't deny or justify our sins; we need to acknowledge them & fix them.

The עלינו לשבח adds, that שפטים ושטרים תתן לך בכל שעריך.... לשבטיך is referring to an individual person’s troubles. The word  לשבטיך hints at troubles, as it says שבטך ומשענתך המה ינחמוני ,  to teach us that one has to examine himself to establish the cause of his troubles. This concept of determining from what sin these troubles came is exemplified by the following story.

There was a woman whose son was born with a serious birth defect & would never be normal. While the whole family took it very hard, when people would come to console her, she would say " I know why Hashem brought this hardship on me".

This woman had a playgroup for little children. One day, a woman came to enroll her son who had this same defect, but I wouldn't take the child. No matter how much the mother pleaded & cried that I take in her son, I just couldn't do it. Now Hashem has paid me back & has given me a son like that so that I would feel that woman's pain.  

This woman, instead of just assigning it to chance, saw the hand of Hashem & was able to realize her own wrongdoing & make changes. This is what the Torah teaches us here. We have to watch ourselves, find what we’re doing wrong & fix it.
If we could do that, we will be sure to triumph in the ultimate judgment in the heavenly court!