The verse states (Exodus 18:22): "Every great thing shall they bring to you." But what does "great" mean in this context? The Mekhilta identifies two possible readings and uses a later verse to decide between them.
The straightforward reading: "great things" means major legal cases — difficult, complex disputes that the lower judges cannot resolve. These formidable matters would be escalated to Moses, while minor, routine cases would be handled by the appointed officers themselves. This is a system of judicial triage, where the complexity of the case determines which court hears it.
But the Mekhilta raises an alternative reading. Perhaps "great" refers not to the difficulty of the case but to the status of the litigants. "The matters of the great men" — meaning disputes involving prominent, wealthy, or powerful people — would come to Moses, while "the matters of ordinary men" would be judged by the lower courts. Under this reading, the judicial system would be organized by the social rank of the parties, not by the complexity of the law.
The Mekhilta rejects this second interpretation decisively. The proof comes from a later verse (Exodus 18:26): "The hard thing they brought to Moses." The Torah uses the word "hard," not "great" in the sense of important people. This confirms that the standard was the difficulty of the legal question, not the prominence of the person asking it. In God's judicial system, the case of a poor man with a complex claim reaches Moses just as readily as the case of a prince.