AND SHE HASTENED AND LOWERED HER PITCHER FROM UPON HER, AND SHE SAID, 'DRINK, AND I WILL ALSO WATER YOUR CAMELS.' SO I DRANK, AND SHE ALSO WATERED THE CAMELS.

(Bereishit 24:46)

 

One should not divine the future like an idolater, for it says, You shall not practice divination (VaYikra 19:26). What is divination? For example, those who say, "Since my bread fell from my mouth, or my staff fell from my hand, I will not go to such-and-such a place today, for if I go, my wishes will not be fulfilled"... and those who hear the bird chirp and say: "This will happen, and that will not," "it is good to do this thing and bad to do that thing"... and one who sets signs for himself [thinking], "If such and such happens to me, I will do this thing, and if it does not happen, I will not do it," as did Eliezer, Abraham's servant... all of these are prohibited, and anyone who performs a deed because of [the outcome] of one of these [forms of divination] is caned.

(RaMBaM Hilkhot Avodat Kokhavim 11:4)

 

RAVaD's Gloss: Abraham [ben David] said: This is a great error, for this ["one who sets signs for himself"] is certainly allowed, and perhaps he [RaMBaM] was misled by the formulation he saw [in Hullin 95b], "divination which is not like that of Eliezer and Jonathan is not divination." He thought that it was meant to define a prohibition, but that is not true. Rather, this is what it is saying: "It is not worth depending [on a method of divination], unless it is like that of Eliezer and Jonathan." How could he have attributed this transgression to such righteous men?!

 

Kesef Mishnah ad loc: RAVaD's words seem strange to me. It is clear that the Gemara was referring to a matter of prohibition. In any case, the matter must be explained because it is impossible that those righteous people could have been diviners.

I think that it should be explained thusly: The divination prohibited by the Torah occurs when somebody directs his acts in accordance with a sign that cannot logically cause benefit or loss in connection with some matter, such as when bread falls from someone's hand, or when a deer crosses someone's path. [Taking account of] these [signs] and of others similar to them is an Amorite practice. However, when certain signs have a logical connection with benefit or loss concerning some matter, the person who abides by those signs is not a diviner. All of the dealings with world work in this way; if someone says "If it rains, I will not set out on a journey, and if not I will set out" this is not a case of divination but rather the way of the world. Eliezer and Jonathan decided on their actions in this manner; Eliezer knew that a woman not fit for Isaac would not be matched up with him, so he took as a sign that if she be so comely in her deeds and perfect in her character that when he says to her give me a little water to drink she would answer him in a generous spirit, Drink, and I will also water your camels, he would know that Heaven had selected her for Isaac.

 

 

Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him - a Belated Reconciliation

Bosmat Hazon

A few verses at the end of the parasha which tell of Sarah's death complete the story of Abraham's life. The first monotheist, the man who answered the call Go forth!, the man whose life was made of strange and complicated episodes which gave rise to archetypes that would accompany the Jewish People throughout the generations - Our Father Abraham. Old and satisfied, Abraham was buried next to his wife Sarah:

And these are the days of the years of Abraham's life that he lived: one hundred years and seventy years and five years. And Abraham expired and died in a good old age, old and satisfied, and he was gathered to his people. And Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the Cave of Machpelah in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite, which faces Mamre, The field that Abraham had bought from the sons of Heth there Abraham and his wife Sarah were buried. (Bereishit 25:7-10)

This almost idyllic scene of Abraham's death and burial is surprising given Abraham's relationships with the characters involved in the episodes that precede his passing. The biblical text's narrative choice is such that the family unit serves within it as the basic and foundational unit of the nation. Unlike the stories of other faiths, this story is not concerned with miracles and enlightenment, but with human relationships. It speaks of a plain and foundational family empowered by a covenant with God; the family will only appear in the biblical text as a "royal family" at a much later stage.

Thus we see that the story of Bereishit focuses upon the relationships and covenants between persons and between persons and God. The eyes are the most important part of the body in the stories of Bereishit. Who sees whom? Who is seen and who is not seen? When and in what circumstances does a person raise his eyes to be shown something? The stories of Bereishit are greatly concerned with the possibility and impossibility of seeing and identifying the "other."

In the chapters preceding his death, Abraham establishes a relationship with Ketura (whom Rashi - following Bereishit Rabbah - identifies as Hagar) and produces with her sons who are given gifts and sent away before his death. He seems to be hardly the same person whose relationships with Isaac, Ishmael, Sarah and Hagar had been so emotionally charged. The urgency and powerful love that characterized his relationships with them take on a new aspect. The old ties were accompanied by flawed communication - perhaps one could say a total lack of communication - with those around him. There is no hint of any kind of dialogue between Abraham and Hagar or Ishmael following the latter's expulsion. That moment in the story also contains the last example to be found in the Bible of verbal communication between Abraham and Sarah. The last conversation between Abraham and Isaac occurs while they ascend Mount Moriah on their way to the Akedah:

And Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering, and he placed [it] upon his son Isaac, and he took into his hand the fire and the knife, and they both went together. And Isaac spoke to Abraham his father, and he said, "My father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." And he said, "Here are the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" And Abraham said, "God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son." And they both went together. (Bereishit 22:6-8)

Following the Akedah, we hear no further conversations between Abraham and Isaac. The only significant echo of their last conversation once again involves the faculty of sight. Abraham's answer to Isaac's final question inspires the name he gives to the place:

And Abraham named that place, The Lord will see, as it is said to this day: On the mountain, the Lord will be seen. (Bereishit 22:140)

The Book of Bereishit offers other examples of relationships and communication. For instance - although the familial relationship between Isaac and Rebecca is described as including disappointments and actions taken - both open and covert - by family members against each other, verbal communication is always reopened between them, they manage to talk again. They even bless each other. Rebecca and Jacob join forces to trick Isaac into blessing Jacob, but after the details of the rouse become known to him, Isaac speaks with Rebecca and blesses Jacob, this time directly and intentionally. Many years later, Jacob and Esau also converse again - they even fall upon each others' necks. The situation is different in Abraham's case. The discussions are so pointed and the situations so dramatic that they leave no way out. In his book Open, Closed, Open (Chana Bloch, translator, pp. 21-22), Yehudah Amichai writes:

Three sons had Abraham, not just two.

Three sons had Abraham: Yishma-El, Yitzhak and Yivkeh.

First came Yishma-El, "God will hear,"

Next came Yitzhak, "he will laugh,"

And the last was Yivkeh, "he will cry."

No one has ever heard of Yivkeh, for he was the youngest,

The son that Father loved best,

The son who was offered up on Mount Moriah.

Yishma-El was saved by his mother, Hagar,

Yitzhak was saved by the angel,

But Yivkeh no one saved.

When he was just a little boy, his father

Would call him tenderly, Yivkeh.

Yivkeleh, my sweet little Yivkie -

But he sacrificed him all the same.

The Torah says the ram, but it was Yivkeh.

Yishma-El never heard from God again,

Yitzhak never laughed again,

Sarah laughed only once, then laughed no more.

Three sons had Abraham,

Yishma, "will hear," Yitzhak, "will laugh," Yivkeh, "will cry."

Yishma-El, Yitzhak-El, Yivkeh-El.

God will hear, God will laugh, God will cry.

Amichai's poem points to the drama that was characteristic of Abraham's familial relationships. Amichai writes about totality; when God is an active party and constant interlocutor, it is almost impossible to imagine life not being dramatic and totalistic. However, despite his partnership with God, Abraham remains a human being and the members of his family remain human. They are in their own way great and unique people, but they are also people who need not only Abraham the "Father of the Nation," but also Abraham the personal father and personal husband. The mixing of the private with the public, of the small and personal with the powerful and foundational makes simple human communication - of the kind found in Rebecca

and Isaac's family - impossible. Silence stands in the background to Sarah's death, and many midrashim treat the lack of discussion between Sarah and Abraham before he set off to the Akedah, and how Sarah's death is described immediately afterwards. It is interesting to note that, taking up the midrashic (Bereishit Rabbah 60:14) identification of Ketura with Hagar, Rashi (Bereishit 24:62) gives Isaac credit for Hagar's return to Abraham after Sarah's death. The midrash that lends semantic content to the place name le'be'er lehai ro'i views Isaac's initiative as a kind of tikkun [repair] for the expulsion, a tikkun allowing for the reconciliation between Isaac, Ishmael, and Abraham.

Isaac and Ishmael each arrive to bury their father next to Sarah in the Me'arat Ha'Makhpeila. Scripture does not tell us how Ishmael came to hear of Abraham's death; it pays no attention to the important and fascinating moment of the brothers' reunion after so many years. For a moment it seems as if the idyllic situation is restored - Abraham is by Sarah's side, Isaac and Ishmael are together again. But Abraham is dead. Of course, he died satisfied and reached a ripe old age; but only after his death could genuine tranquility be possible. In his life, God was Abraham's active partner. The important, unique, and foundational covenant and the discourse between Abraham and God extracted a steep price from the individuals in his life. God's voice is stronger than that of his family's members; at the end of the day, it silences them. At the end, however, Isaac and Ishmael arrive together to bury their father. Ishmael and Isaac act together, they come to give their father their last respects - despite the difficulties they faced before him in his life. As with many moments in Abraham's life, I think that this moment, the moment of his burial, is no less foundational. The possibility to forgive and separate. The possibility of an encounter between Isaac and Ishmael after all those years. Perhaps it is worth learning not to wait until it is too late…

Bosmat Hazon is a theater director. Her first book, Mayim Hfuhim [Reversed Waters] was published by Hakkibutz HaMe'uhad last summer.

 

 

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

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

 

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 Rabba 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 Shimshon Rafael Hirsch, Bereishit 25:1)

 

...The midrash says that after the demise of his mother Sarah, Isaac went to return his stepmother to his father. He went to Beer-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 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 le'Parshiyot ha'Shavua, p. 23)

 

Human Beings are Equal and Judged by their Deeds

Also the sons of Adam, also the sons of Man: What does also the sons of Adam mean? These are the sons of Abraham, of whom it is written "the greatest person [adam] among the giants (Joshua 14:15), also - to include the sons of Ishmael and Keturah. Sons of man - these are the sons of Noah, of whom it is written: a righteous man (Bereishit 6: 9).

(Midrash Tehillim, 49)

 

And he will be like a planted tree - The Holy One Blessed be He took him and planted him in the Garden of Eden.

Another interpretation: That the Holy One Blessed be He planted him in the Land of Israel.

That gives its fruits in season - that is Ishmael.

And whose leaves shall not wilt- that is Isaac.

And everything he does succeeds - that is the sons of Keturah.

(Midrash Tehillim, 1)

 

 

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