TORAH

SPARKS

 

Parashat Lekh lekha

November 11-12, 2016 11
Heshvan 5777

Annual (Genesis 12:1-17:27): Etz Hayim p.
69-93; Hertz p. 45-60

Triennial (Genesis 12:1-13:18): Etz Hayim p.
69-77; Hertz p. 45-50

Haftarah (Isaiah 40:27-41:16): Etz Hayim p.
94-98; Hertz p. 60-62

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Synagogue of Conservative Judaism

 

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Not Exactly What I was Taught in Yeshiva

Rabbi Moshe Levin, Congregation Ner Tamid, San
Francisco, in honor of his Bar Mitsva not so long ago (1954). This is excerpted
from longer commentary to the Parashah which can be obtained from http://nertamidsf.org/ or from Rabbi Levin (sfrebbe@sbcglobal.net).

 

Lekh Lekha is considered the
source of many of our fundamental beliefs about ourselves, our religion, and
our land. It is regarded as the birth of monotheism; our connection to the
land that became known as Eretz Yisra’el; a male’s identification through
circumcision; and the election of the Jews as the Chosen People.

 

But a careful reading of the
text demonstrates that such conclusions are not so simple. Avraham’s journey to
Canaan was not begun by him but by his deceased father; there are those
who claim that Avraham was still a polytheist who recognized other gods
and worshipped at their holy places. The statements about a Chosen People were
questioned even by Jewish scholars centuries ago, and many in our time find the
concept of a divinely-

ordained right to the Land at
odds with a desire to live in peace with Israel’s neighbors.

 

By the same token, we should
note with pride that Lekh Lekha portrays our patriarch as human, and the
circumstances surrounding his career as true-to- life, versus mythological.
Here Avraham is faced with a moral dilemma in offering his wife to a harem to
save himself from death (Do you remember “Sophie’s Choice?”). The
story of taking Hagar as a concubine to produce a son raises issues for us of
mistreatment in the household, of surrogate motherhood, of offspring from mixed
racial or ethnic parents, and of our treatment of those in lower classes. The
traditional commentators have taken Avraham and Sarah to task for these
actions. Nahmanides (Ramban, Spain 12th cent.) says Avraham committed a
grievous sin in offering his righteous wife lest he be killed. And Maimonides
says Sarah herself sinned in her abusive treatment of Hagar.

 

We are startled to see our
bearded, pious first Jew enter a nine-nation war as a competent military
leader who deals the enemy a decisive blow and returns not only his nephew but
indeed all hostages to their freedom. And, in a display of regal character, he
refuses to accept the spoils of victory so as not to allow anyone to claim that
his material success comes from another.

 

Finally, we are introduced to
circumcision as a covenantal ritual but we know that it is not necessarily
original to the Jews. The Muslim practice of circumcision at puberty is
often traced to Lekh Lekha since Ishmael, Hagar’s son, was circumcised at age
13. In fact, contemporary scholars trace it to pre-Abrahamic times. And
indeed today there is a marginal but passionate element in the Jewish community
that calls for its cessation, due to issues of infant rights and its similarity
to female circumcision, a practice the civilized world has already prohibited.

 

So…Lekh Lekha gives us much
to ponder. It enables us to realize that our most revered ancestors were human
and therefore imperfect. Yet it is only from such real figures in our history
that we can learn to face the challenges of real life. And how proud we can be
that the characters of those who birthed our nation are recorded in our sacred
texts somewhat unedited, not sanitized, so that the Torah shares with us their
humanity and fallibility and thus their example.

A Vort
for Parashat Lekh lekha

Rabbi Daniel Goldfarb, CY Faculty

 

On his return
from Egypt, Abraham went on his journeys – va’yelech l’ma’asav”

from the Negev to Beth-El (where he had pitched his tent
originally (Gen

13:3). Rashi
says that even though he left Egypt a wealthy man, en route home he stayed in
the same inns (simple, inexpensive) as he had when he went down to Egypt in
poverty. The Ketav Sofer says that this shows Abraham s modesty;
normally when people become rich they upgrade their homes and their life
styles. The Mateh Aharon notes that Avraham s goal was Beth El (house
of God)

success did not
uproot Abraham from the places of his past, either physical or spiritual.

 

Table
Talk

Vered
Hollander-Goldfarb, CY Faculty

 

In this Parasha we
begin to focus on Avram (Abram). He journeys with his wife Sarai (Sarah) to an
unknown land, is forced to leave it due to a famine, receives a promise from
God that he will become a great nation, all while desperately longing for a child.

 

1) Avram is instructed
by God to go to the land that I will show you (12:1-3.) What will he receive
from God? God says that Avram will be a blessing. What do you think that
means?

 

2) Avram is forced to
seek food for his household in Egypt because of a famine in Canaan. He fears
that the Egyptians will kill him in order to take his wife Sarah because of her
beauty. How does he try to solve the problem (12:11-20)? What happens to Sarai
and Avram? We don t hear Sarai s voice here at all. What do you think that she
might have been saying? Why?

 

3) God makes a
covenant with Avram (15:7-21) in which he is told that his offspring will be
foreigners in a land that is not theirs, and they will be enslaved. In the end
the nation that enslaved them will receive its judgment by God and the
offspring of Avram will return to the land [of Israel]. What do you think Avram
feels when he hears this? Why? Do you think that he shared this information
with his children and grandchildren? What would you do?

 

4) Sarai, thinking
that Avram might be able to conceive a child with a different woman, gives him
her handmaid, Hagar, as a wife. Hagar seems to conceive easily. What happens to
the relationship of Sarai and Hagar at this point (16:4-6)? This is not what
Sarai had envisioned, so why do you think that it came to this?

 

5) God changes the
names of Avram and Sarai to Avraham (17:4-8) and Sarah (17:15-16).
What is the significance of a name change? How do you think the idea of having
their names changed by God (and having a blessing attached to the name)
influenced Abraham and Sarah? What was each one blessed with?