Shalom everyone! Things have been great here in Israel. It's been relatively quiet; the major holidays have come and gone and now it's time for the long stretch of learning. Now is the time to buckle down and be persistent in the pursuit of goals, to constantly take a little baby step every day until you've covered good ground. I have a sizable amount of material to learn as my goal and a fairly good amount of time to accomplish it. Along with the extended period of time, however, comes feelings such as monotony, frustration, and, yes, even a bit of homesickness. It is because of this that I'd like to dedicate this weeks Torah blog to my Mother who's back in the States and who I miss tremendously; I find this to be a fairly fitting parsha since it deals with righteous Jewish mothers (Funny thing that it doesn't mention Jewish guilt! :-P)
This week's parsha is parshas Chaya Sarah, also known as "the life of Sarah". Sarah , as you might recall, is the wife of Abraham and mother of Isaac. She was always a constant support for her husband in all of his endeavours, as well as an incredibly caring mother to her son. We begin the parsha, however, with her death, an interesting way to start a parsha that seems, based on the title, to be all about her life! While this may seem like one big mix-up, if we take a closer, we will see how it couldn't a more fitting title. The bulk of the parsha deals with the search for a wife for Isaac; Sarah has just passed away and Abraham realizes that he too will not be around forever. It is because of this, coupled with the fact that Isaac is to be the next torchbearer of G-d's message, that Abraham feels it proper to send his servant, Eliezer, on a journey to find a woman for Isaac to marry. This is the meaning of this story on the simple level, yet on a deeper level, they were looking for the next Sarah, someone to continue on with her life's work, a woman holy and pure enough to be on the same level that the first matriarch was on.
If we take a closer look at different points in the story, we will be able to see the affects that Sarah's life had on the search for the next matriarch. Firstly, the way in which Eliezer found Isaac's future wife, Rebecca, tells a bit about Rebecca's pure character. In his journey, Eliezer finds a well where prays to G-d; he prays that if a maiden approaches the well and offers water for his camels, then she is the right wife for Isaac, a prayer that sees fulfillment. Her compassion for animals is telling of her status as a "rose among thorns"; Rebecca's family was coarse and still had some idolatrous practices, while Rebecca was a kind person and dedicated monotheist. A deeper interpretation of this shows how holy Rebecca truly was. Water is often a metaphor for Torah so that fact that she is portrayed as drawing water from a well, from the earth, indicates that she was able to find and draw Torah from the physicality of this world. This parallels one of the major traits of Sarah.
A second event that directly indicates a connection between Sarah and Rebecca is the marriage of Isaac to her. The verse says "Isaac brought her (Rebecca) into the tent of his mother, Sarah. He married Rebecca, and she became his wife, and he loved her. Isaac was then consoled for the loss of his mother." (Ber. 24:67) Rashi brings a commentary on the verse indicating that when Rebecca entered into the tent, she became the image of Sarah, his mother. Whether this is to be taken metaphorically or literally is besides the point. What matters most is what Rashi says next; there were certain miraculous that happened in/around the tent when Sarah was alive: a candle burned in the tent from Friday to Friday, a blessing was constantly in the dough for bread, and a cloud hung over the tent, a sign of Divine protection. When Sarah died, these miracles ceased and when Rebecca entered into the tent, they returned. This shows that Rebecca was indeed to right choice to carry on the role of Sarah, matriarch of the Jewish people. But what exactly made Sarah so righteous?
The first verse of the parsha reads as follows: "The lifetime of Sarah consisted of one hundred years, twenty years, and seven years. [These were] the years of Sarah's life." (Ber. 23:1) Here's the question: why not just say 127 years? Why spell it out with first the hundreds then the twenty and then the seven? Also, why repeat that these were the years of Sarah's life? Rashi brings a commentary on the verse to say that by ordering the numbers from highest to lowest, it shows that even when she was an old woman, Sarah appeared to have the beauty of youth both in the physical and the spiritual sense. He also says that by repeating "the years of Sarah's life", it indicates that all of her years were equally good. The Lubavitcher Rebbe comes with a wonderful chassidic interpretation on this Rashi. In Chassidic philosophy, hundred refers to the supra-rational (pleasure & will), twenty refers to intellect(there are two tens; ten corresponds to the intellect and there are two major faculties of intellect i.e. wisdom and understanding), and seven refers to the intellect (one corresponds to emotion and there are, all together, seven faculties of emotion i.e. kindness, severity, etc.) By spelling all of this out, the Rebbe comes to say that she had equally lived up to her supra-rational, intellectual, and emotional capabilities. To drive this point even further, "the years of Sarah's life" allegorically means that all of her soul-powers were permeated with what is called yechida, a certain level of the soul that connects to the transcendent consciousness of G-d.
That all being said, what is there to learn from this interpretation? Finite beings, like Sarah, can only affect their emotions, intellect, and will. When we give over our selfhood and ego to a loftier and transcendent self, then we step outside of ourselves and are in fact no longer limited by our boundaries and restrictions. However, before we can live on such a high level, we must first perfect our conscious soul-powers, practicing self-restraint, compassion, intelligence, understanding, and constantly striving to better ourselves. We may not be selfless by nature, yet by keeping the ultimate goal of selflessness in mind, everything we do has a great purpose, thrust, and affect on ourselves and on those around us. This, and much more, have we learned from our matriarchs past, a tradition of righteous Jewish mothers, a tradition that still goes on to the present. Have an inspired day.
With all my love,
Zach
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