I was invited back to St Matthew's on Sunday were I stoke on Genesis 18. It was fun and I do enjoy these interactions with other faiths that share text. I hope that you will enjoy this. While this isn't exactly what I said...it is the theme. DVDs of both talks are available at St. Matthews if you are interested in them.
Good morning. I am glad to return here this
week and hope last week’s exploration was fun.
Today we talk on a narrative that takes us into the connection between
God and Abraham and Sarah. Before we
get into it I want to talk a little bit about commandments, in Hebrew mitzvot.
We all know of the 10 etched in stone at Sinai and in fact we read about
that yesterday in synagogues around the world, but does anyone know how many
commandments were found by the Rabbis in the Torah? Guesses?
613…so where are the located? We
find them right here. In the 2nd
century, as the Rabbis were writing down the Oral law, they found 613
commandments. Now since we are Jews,
not everyone agrees to which are the 613 and which a subsections of a bigger
commandments, but like wizards, infinite are the arguments of Rabbis. But right in this little piece of text we
find 3 examples of behavior that lend themselves to ways to live and be a
better person.
The opening line begins with God visiting
Abraham…Abraham was sitting in the heat of the day recovering from circumcision
that took place in the last chapter of the Torah. God’s visit, which is unusual as it is the
first time God, simply appears. Like a
friend. We glean from this the mitzvah
of bikkur cholim, visiting the
sick. Visiting the sick is included in
the category of Gemilut Hasadim,
"the giving of loving kindness", but is singled out by the rabbis as
something special. It is said that one visits the sick they help move the
person toward recovery. Visiting the
sick is an act one does out of the kindness of their heart and cannot be
remunerated for it, even indirectly. It
is an act of Godliness in the world, as we mimic the actions of God in the
story.
However the story quickly changes and Abraham
sees 3 men (or angels) walking toward his tent.
We will learn later that two of these angels will move on to Sodom where
they will visit with Lot. They do not
appear divine at all but simply travelers, this is important as we see
Abraham’s actions. At that moment the
recovering Abraham springs into action.
He RUNS to them, he HASTENS into the tent to tell Sarah to make cakes,
then RAN to his servant to fetch a nice calf who himself HASTENS prepare
it. Then he waits on them under the
tree. Remember too that he does this for
strangers when he was just chatting with God on his stoop. This
act of kindness to strangers again leads us to another commandment hakhnasat orchim (literally the “bringing
in of strangers”). Hakhnasat orchim, another of the acts of loving kindness is
important and we call this hospitality.
Abraham and Sarah, it is said, were masters of this practice, so much so
that Jewish legend teaches us their tent opened in every direction to welcome
all from wherever they came from.
Hospitality becomes important to the Jewish people later when they
become the strangers in a strange land.
It is funny, at this meal that is prepared, Abraham serves the angels
curds and milk (cottage cheese) and meat of the calf. Today many will quickly see this is a non-Kosher meal by
today’s standards. While this appears to
us to be a big breach, it is easily explained by Torah commentators. However
it does give us a chance to point to the fact that more people know about the
separation of milk and meat which comes from a twice repeated line of Torah
than the complexity of our obligation to do hakhnasat
orchim which is explicitly mentioned 36 times in the Torah. It is interesting that often we can forget
where the emphasis in the Torah was as to what we should be doing. But clearly Abraham and Sarah, though both
had problems, are good role models for us as God was in the first verse. Though not perfect, neither are we, and that
makes it easier for us to see it is possible to reach out to the stranger or do
great things for the sake of heaven.
The last couple of lines we read today have
something completely different. You see
the angels had a task with Abraham, to
tell him that he and Sarah would have a child.
Sarah overhears the conversation. She “laughs to herself, saying, ‘Now
that I am withered, am I to have enjoyment – with my husband so old?’” The term ednah
is translated as enjoyment but that is the PG version. It really has a more adult connotation and
means abundant moisture. The Torah is
clear the Sarah was past the age of child birth so the slam on Abraham from
Sarah was unnecessary and one might say petty.
But think about, they were very very old and married very young. You know people who have been married a long
time that dig at their spouses, often as a relief of some hidden tension, but
truly from love. But what happens next
is the real lesson. In the very next
verse, God reports her laughter to Abraham. But he tells Abraham that when
Sarah laughed, she said: ‘Shall l in truth bear a child, old as I am?’” God leaves out the part about what Sarah said
about Abraham. A lie of omission? Maybe.
The Rabbis clearly notice this. God,
sparing hurt feelings of Abraham, leaves out the part of the story that would
be hurtful to him. In doing so, God
models behavior that we might want to emulate. The commentators have taken from
this an important value that trumps many others. It is called
Shalom Bayit or peace in the
home. In the Babylonian Talmud the discussion of
this leads those to say one might tell an untruth for the sake of peace. This is not to say that we don’t value the
truth, in fact it is quite important and mentioned several times in the
tradition. In the next few lines after God’s omission even Sarah is rebuked for
lying about laughing. But what is more important is the fact that
the Torah is a book of heart, of feeling.
So often when people think of the commandments
in the Torah they think of the legalism of Judaism. They think of what it the correct thing to
do. With 613 commandments and the
subsequent offshoots of each, just living one’s life must be difficult. One can live their lives in constant worry of
doing something wrong. “Did I chose the
right blessing for what I just ate?”
“Did I make sure I said the prayer at the right time?” “Did I honor my
parents enough?” Oddly, we can see
ourselves being hamstrung by the overwhelming nature of Halacha, or Jewish
law. But Halacha means the Way. It is a path, a direction. The Torah is our guide. While legalism has always been part of the
Jewish tradition so has the commentary or the Oral Law, the explanation of what
it means to live within the guidelines of Torah. You see that played out in the scripture
narrative. Throughout history the Jewish
people have struggled with the language and law of Torah. But in the end the Bible is a book that
should be used not to make us less human, but to express our humanity. Every one of our Biblical Patriarchs and
Matriarchs are flawed. Abraham, while
father of great nations, brought both of his sons to near death. Sarah, was mean to Hagar and Ishmael and even
here laughs at her husband’s age and lies.
Even the great Moses stuttered and failed God at Miribah and Miriam made
fun of Moses’ wife because she was not of their tribe. But what we learn from them is not to be
perfect but to be human. In three very
short sections composing less than 15 verses of text we learn the importance of
visiting the sick, hospitality, and of keeping peace in the family, gleaned
from the ancient text by writers throughout the centuries. That is what is meant by the importance of
the law. While the letter of the law is
instructive, the spirit and the heart of the law are more important. It is what makes us remember more about
feeding a hungry stranger and less about how long to wait between eating curds
and milk and the fatted calf.
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