And he said, "Whose daughter are you? Please tell me. Is there place for us for lodging in your father's house?"(Bereishit 24:23)

 

For lodging: lodging [lin] means one night’s lodging. - lin is a noun. But she replied, laloon, meaning many lodgings. [That you can sleep by us for many nights.]

(Rashi ad loc)

 

And she said to him, "Both straw and fodder are plentiful with us; [there is] also a place to lodge." He only asked for lodgings but her answer also mentioned straw and hay. It should also be understood that she said laloon in her answer - referring to lodgings for many nights - while he only needed one night's lodgings. It should further be understood that she knew her father and brother were stingy towards guests and that she had no authority regarding their [home and property]. It seems to me that she hinted to him with her words that they did not take in guests as good-hearted people do, who take guests into their homes for a while, leaving themselves and their household members cramped for space for a night or two for the guest's sake. Rather, Bethuel ran an inn for travelers, with rooms ready for lodging, and straw and hay available for the camels - for all of which the guests paid money. Eliezer had asked whether there was room to sleep in her father's house for one night, meaning that they would be taken in out of hospitality. She answered saying they had much straw and hay, as well as a place to sleep several nights, in the manner of innkeepers who do it for money. So it appears to me.

(Ktav Sofer Bereishit 24:25)

 

The Silence following the Akedah

as a Model for Intergenerational Transmission

Yaron Schur

The story of Akedat Yitzhak [the Binding of Isaac] is usually exploited for the clarification of the relationship between humans and God. This time I chose to focus on the relationships within Abraham's family following this foundational event. Beyond the human-God relationship, which is severely tested by the Akedah, something serious also occurs within the small family consisting of Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac, and it leaves its mark on future generations. Following the Akedah, all lines of communication close down in the family and the relationships between its members are grievously harmed.

We are given a description of Abraham's activities following the Akedah: And Abraham returned to his young men, and they arose and went together to Beersheva; and Abraham remained in Beersheva (Bereishit 22:19). This language is very different from the account of the journey to the Akedah; there the phrase and the two walked together appears twice (22:6;8) and Rashi points out the differences between the two instances: the first time Isaac did not yet realize to what fate he was being taken, while in the second instance he continued to accompany his father "with equanimity" - consensually and with a feeling of self-sacrifice - even though he knew that "he was going to be slaughtered." After the Akedah Abraham walks together with his youths, but Isaac is not mentioned! Furthermore, there is no record of any further conversations between Isaac and Abraham. Abraham is the only patriarch of the nation who does not bless his son before dying. As Prof. Asa Kasher wrote (Sippurei Reishit p. 310): "He who reaches out to the knife to slaughter his son has slaughtered his love for his son in his heart, even if the son is not actually slaughtered!... To put it succinctly: He has no love for his son."

Sarah, the mother of the family appears nowhere in the chapter. While she had often taken the initiative during the course of her life together with Abraham, now her opinion is not sought and her voice is unheard. Following the Akedah, Abraham returns to Beersheva, while Sarah dies in Kiryat Arba, which is Hebron. Rashi follows the midrash in attributing her death to the shock of the Akedah (23:2, s.v. to eulogize Sarah and to bewail her): "The account of Sarah’s demise was juxtaposed to the binding of Isaac because as a result of the news of the “binding,” that her son was prepared for slaughter and was almost slaughtered, her soul flew out of her, and she died" (Judaica Press translation). Thus Rashi explains why Abraham and Sarah lived in different towns (only for a short time, since Sarah died immediately after the Akedah). There is an alternative plain reading of Scripture according to which Abraham did not return to the place his wife lived after the Akedah and they remained separated until her death. The Akedah kept Abraham from returning home, and Sarah died without any family members by her side.

Scripture tells us what happened immediately after Sarah's death: ...and Abraham came to eulogize Sarah and to bewail her. And Abraham arose from before his dead (23:2-3). The failure to mention Isaac is salient here. Isaac goes unmentioned throughout the long story about his mother's death and burial that begins parashat Chaiye Sarah. Scripture only relates conversations between Isaac and Abraham on their way to the Akedah; the silence following the Akedah sounds worse than the silence preceding it. Apparently, Isaac is missing from chapter 23 because it is difficult for him to be with his father after the Akedah. Their names will appear together again only in the account of Abraham's own burial. Prof. Barton Wissotzky writes (Sippurei Reishit p. 309) that "This gives some testimony to the horror the father caused his son to experience." In an untitled poem, Yehudah Amichai writes that "Isaac will never laugh again" (Op. cit. p. 331).

It is interesting that Prof. Mordechai Rotenberg chooses the story of the Akedah as a positive model for relations between fathers and sons. In his book Rewriting the Self: Psychotherapy and Midrash, Rotenberg claims that intergenerational models are based upon myths involving traumas. In contrast to the standard Christian model in which the son kills the father, Rotenberg gives us the Akedah model, which allows for communication between father and son. The fact that Isaac emerged alive from the Akedah teaches us that the intergenerational transition was achieved without violence but rather via dialogue. The father stopped himself a moment before killing his son. The point of this deliverance was to ensure Isaac would not abandon faith in the biblical promise, "Even when a sharp sword rests upon one's neck" (Berakhot 10a), as Rotenberg quotes from the Talmud. It is possible for the heritage to be transmitted from father to son even when relations between them are difficult, even when the father does not transmit what the son wants. Rotenberg's description of intergenerational transition illustrates the older generation's profound difficulty in transmitting its heritage to the younger generation. The father is in need of very powerful means - even setting out to kill his son and stopping at the last moment - in order to bring the son to continue in his path. In the Akedah's model of intergenerational transition the father is dominant and the son agrees to continue in his father's path.

In his book, Rotenberg describes a second model of intergeneration transition, one which he opposes. This model is based upon the story of Oedipus, in which the son kills the father; it describes a situation of constant conflict between the generations, a conflict that cannot be ended peacefully. The young man thinks he must reign instead of the old king. He seeks to destroy the father's cultural heritage and replace it with his own. He is driven by the idea that the world belongs to the young and that they intend to take over the world and install their culture as quickly as possible. There is a profound conflict between generations, and the young refuse to accept their elders' world. Rotenberg quotes the American sociologist Peter Berger in this connection: "Many Americans seemingly spend years of their life...retelling over and over again (to themselves and to others) the story of what they have been and what they have become... and in this process killing their parents in a sacrificial ritual of the mind" (p. 106). The younger generation lacks patience to wait for its parents to leave stage in a natural fashion. They also lack interest to accept their parents' heritage. When reality is in flux, children feel that they possess better solutions which should be put into practice immediately.

The Akedah model of intergenerational relations is concerned with the relations between Abraham and Isaac. Scripture emphasizes the transmission of heritage to the next generation. Abraham is concerned for the future of his son and of his heritage which is to be transmitted to Isaac. Following Abraham's death, God blesses Isaac directly and hands over the promise to him, making him his father's heir. Abraham saw to the continuation of his descendants by sending his chief servant to find Isaac a wife. Concerning the words after these matters (Bereishit 22:20), Rashi writes: "When he returned from Mount Moriah, Abraham was thinking and saying, 'Had my son been slaughtered, he would have died without children. I should have married him to a woman of the daughters of Aner, Eshkol, or Mamre.' The Holy One, blessed be He, announced to him that Rebecca, his mate, had been born, and that is the meaning of after these matters, i.e., after the thoughts of the matter that came about as a result of the Akedah" (based on Judaica Press translation). Abraham's actions allowed Isaac to find love; Isaac is the only person in Scripture of whom it is said that he loved his wife after marrying her.

The biblical narrative following the Akedah describes the steep price paid by families and individuals for inculcating the parental heritage in younger generations. The trauma of the Akedah allowed for continuity but also prevented intimacy or dialogue within Abraham's family; they were replaced by a lasting silence. Abraham's absolute commitment to his faith exacted a continuing price; it made communication between family members difficult. However, Isaac's path was influenced by his father's. He took his father's heritage upon himself as a foundational element in his life. The transmission of heritage finds expression in Rotenberg's dialogical model, which relates to the pressure applied by Abraham in order to powerfully transmit the significant themes of his life and his uncompromising faith to future generations.

If the Akedah is, indeed, a paradigm for intergenerational ties, we must also relate to the difficulties suffered by Abraham's family after the Akedah as the price paid by Jewish families for the inculcation of their heritage. They must contend with the constant pressure of fathers upon sons, and for them the Akedah represents the model for action whose goal is the transmission of the heritage at any cost. The Akedah illustrates the notion that the inculcation of an idea can also come at the price of sacrificing one's humanity.

Prof. Yaron Schur teaches in the Hebrew University and in the Lander Institute.

 

 

His loving-kindness and His truth

What love is in feelings, hessed - loving-kindness - is in deeds, love translated into action. Truth is, to a certain extent, a restricting, or at lease a limiting addition. Hessed v'emet - loving-kindness and truth is an act of love where the love does not run too close to overlooking the truth. Human love is blind. It is inclined to accede to the wishes of the beloved one without considering the true worth of these wishes. God's love is hessed v'emet, it only grants such wishes in which the truth is conserved, which truly does lead to happiness. Thus with Jacob, the care for his burial in general is an act of hessed, the limitation, the observing the condition but not in Egypt, is the emet. So, too, what the spies were to do by Rehab was a hessed v'emet, a conditional act of kindness. Truth is the spice, which guards the loving-kindness, so that he not lose with his own hands the main ingredient: the truth.

So perhaps here too. To see their children married is the dearest wish of parents. If they try to accomplish it at all costs, without consideration of the true essentials (if it is not with a girl with an Abrahamitic disposition, well then we will take one from Aner, Eshkol, or Mamreh, or from Aram) then they are endeavoring to do hessed without emet. But Abraham wanted only hessed together with emet, and both were granted to him by God.

(Rabbi S. R. Hirsch, Bereishit 24:27, translated by Isaac Levy)

 

You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the Land of Egypt. Do not wrong him with words, and do not oppress him... strangers are beloved, for everywhere He calls them as He calls Israel: the Children of Israel were called servants, as is written For it is to Me that the Israelites are servants and the strangers were called servants, as is written, To love the name of the Lord, to be servants unto Him ...The Children of Israel were called "friends," as is written, And you, Israel, Jacob my servant, etc., the seed of Abraham My friend and the strangers were also termed "friends," as is written, And befriends the stranger ...Abraham called himself an alien, as is written, I am a resident alien among you; David called himself an alien, as is written, I am an alien in the land and For we are sojourners with You, mere transients like our fathers, our day on earth is like a shadow, with nothing in prospect, and it is written For like all my forebears I am an alien, resident with You. Beloved are aliens, for Abraham circumcised [himself] at the age of ninety nine years; had he done so at age twenty or thirty, aliens would have been able to convert only if younger than thirty, therefore the Omnipresent passed [the time] with him until he reached ninety nine years, so as not to lock the door before the coming converts, and in order to reward for the days and years, including reward for doing His bidding, as is written, The Lord was pleased, because of his righteousness, to render the Torah great and glorious.

(Mekhilta, Parashat Mishpatim, Massekhet Nezikin,18)

 

Is It Permissible to Criticize the Actions of Tzaddikim?

Rabbi Shmuel bar Nahmani said in the name of Rabbi Yohanan: Three made improper requests, two were answered properly, and one was answered improperly - Eliezer servant of Abraham, and Saul son of Kish, and Jephthah the Gileadite. Eliezer, servant of Abraham, as is written (Bereishit 24) May it be that the maiden to whom I say: Pray lower your pitcher etc. Even if she were to be crippled, even blind!? Nonetheless, he was answered properly, and Rebecca appeared.

(Taanit 4a)

 

One may not practice divination as do the idolaters, as is written You are not to practice divination. What is divination? For example, those who say, "Because my bread fell from my mouth or my staff from my hand, I will not go to such and such a place today because if I do go, I will not succeed in my affairs" or "Because a fox passed on my right, I will not leave my house today, for if I go out a scoundrel will harm me." Or those who hear a bird chirp and say: "It will be so and not so," "It will be advantageous to so and bad to do otherwise," and those who say "Slaughter this chicken who crowed at night", "Slaughter this hen who crowed like a rooster," and so one who devises omens for himself, "If such and such will happen to me, I will do so and so, and I will not be harmed," or "I will not do as Eliezer servant of Abraham," and all similar cases, all this is forbidden, and whoever acts in accordance with any of the above, is to be flogged.

(RaMBaM, Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot Avoda Zara 11:4)

 

Critique (of above RaMBaM) by RA'aVaD: "...and so one who devises omens for himself, "If such and such will happen to me..." Avraham (RA'aVaD) said: This is a great mistake. This is permissible, yea, permissible. It is possible that he (RaMBaM) was misled by what he read "Every divination which is not like that of Eliezer and Jonathan is not considered divination," and he construed this as constituting a prohibition, but such is not the case. This is what was meant: One should not depend on this, and how could he attribute this sin to such tzaddikim?! If they were present, they would have conducted a pulsa d'nura [fiery lashes] against him.

 

The Burial of Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, Abraham and Keturah-Hagar as the Closing of a Circle

Isaac had just come back from the vicinity of Beer-lahai-roi - For he had gone to bring Hagar to his father Abraham, so that he should wed her.

(Rashi, Bereishit 24:62, as per Bereishit Rabbah)

 

From the vicinity of Beer-lahai-roi... and he took Rebecca as his wife, and he loved her, and thus found comfort after his mother's death... Abraham took another wife, whose name was Keturah

In the opinion of Rabbi Yehuda (Bereishit Rabbah 61:4), Keturah was Hagar, the very same woman that Sarah, in her time, had brought to Abraham. How pure and humane was this attitude in the eyes of our Sages, even though the denouement was unfortunate and saddening. Isaac, they said, went to the well in the desert, and brought Hagar from there to Abraham; he himself brought his "stepmother". And he had so loved his mother! And he went there, even though he had not yet been comforted over the loss of his mother! Be these words understood as historical fact or as an instructive derasha, in either case we learn about the weltanschauung which characterized our sages. In contrast to them, how much has our generation declined; tension - if not outright hatred - exists between adult progeny and their fathers as a result of second marriage!

(Rabbi S.R.Hirsch, Bereishit 25:1)

 

...The midrash says that after the demise of his mother Sara, Isaac went to return his stepmother to his father. He went to Be'er-lahai-roi to bring Hagar, who had been banished by his mother, to return her to his father and to correct the injustice. Aggadic narrative is replete with praise of Hagar, who is identified with Keturah: "Why is she called Keturah? Because her actions were as pleasing as incense (ketoret)". This flowery explication testifies to the degree which our great thinkers reflected upon the actions of our fathers, noting every blemish and fault they had, and considered their repair. The generations have much to learn from this. It is wrong to idealize all that occurred; we should see things as they were, trying to understand them, judging them and pondering their rectification.

(Y. Leibowitz: He'arot LeParshiyot HaShavu'a, p. 23)

 

 

 

 

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