Va-Yera Genesis 18:1-22:24

Abraham’s intercession 18:23-18:33
God informs Abraham of his intention to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah (and by implication, the other three towns mentioned in Genesis 14). Abraham tries to talk God out of it but fails. Abraham’s argument is doomed to failure because it is based on the false premise that people can be divided into two groups “the innocent” and “the guilty” instead of all people being innocent about some things some of the time and guilty about some things some of the time.

The sin of Sodom 19:4-11
In the flood story it is the members of the divine court who seek to mate with humans. In the story of Sodom, humans who seek to mate with the divine. Intercourse between human and divine is symbolic of the sin to transgress the boundaries between heaven and earth. The story of Babel can also be interpreted as a transgression between heaven and earth in sexual terms since the tower can be thought of as a giant phallus designed to pierce the firmament. The sociopolitical meaning of the transgression for the Babylonian exiles is given in chapter 14, where Sodom and the other cities of the plain use military force to rebel against King Chedorlaomer instead of relying on God for their deliverance.

The connection of Sodom with homosexuality is an accidental consequence of the sexism of the Torah that prevented God’s messengers from being portrayed as female. The frequent reference to judging in the story indicates that the transgression is that the people usurped God’s role and insisted on playing the judge and not leaving vengeance for God.

Lot’s intercession 19:18-22
Lot is told to flee into the hills but Lot tells God that he can’t flee that far as fast as he needs to and asks that the destruction not go as far as the tiny town of Zoar so that he can flee there. Lot’s request is granted and God saves the town of Zoar, which was intended for destruction with the other cities of the plain. Lot’s successful intercession was a request for mercy while Abraham’s failed intercession was a demand for justice.

Abraham sells Sarah into sexual slavery and Isaac’s conception 20:1-21:8
This is a repeat of the first sexual slavery story but this time we learn that Abraham has been doing this to Sarah ever since he has left his father house. Is this story placed immediately before the announcement of Sarah’s conception of Isaac for a reason? Ishmael was conceived by Hagar shortly after Sarah gave her to Abraham to be his concubine. Now Isaac is conceived by Sarah shortly after Abraham sells her to Abimelech to be his concubine.

Expulsion of Hagar and Abraham’s covenant with Abimelch 21.9-34
The first part of this story is a repeat of the first Hagar expulsion story. Sarah’s plea: “The son of a slave shall not share in the inheritance,” is masterful biblical irony.
The second part concerns Abraham’s dispute with Abimilech. We are told in the Ishmael story that “God was with the boy and he grew up.” Abimelech says to Abraham “God is with you in everything you do.” Both stories feature a well. What message is intended by the shared elements of these two stories?

The Akedah 22:1-19
Does this story exemplify the conflict within Abraham for his desire for biological progeny and his covenant with God to be the spiritual and moral progenitor of all people who respect the boundaries between heaven and earth and treat all humanity as their kin?

Rebekah 22:20-24
The Torah portions have been divided so that the focus of next week’s portion is first mentioned at the end of the previous weeks’ portion (although next week’s is an exception.) B’reishit goes from creation to Noah. Noah goes from Noah to Abram and Sarai. Lekh L’kha goes from Abram and Sarai to Abraham and Sarah. And Va-Year goes from Abraham and Sarah to Rebekah. The central character in the generation following Abraham and Sarah is Rebekah not Isaac.

Lekh Lekha, Go Forth, Genesis 12:1-17:27

Be a Blessing 12:1-3
This portion opens with God telling Abram that his name will be made great if he goes forth as God directs. This is similar to what the makers of Babel sought. Why is it OK for Abram but not OK for Babel?

The people of Babel sought to transcend the boundaries between heaven and earth and usurp God’s role, to both bless and curse in God’s name. In rabbinic tradition the rulers of Babel are so intent on building the tower that they ruthlessly exploit workers to build it and they order work to continue even as workers fall to their death. In God’s call to Abram, God blesses, and tells Abram to be a blessing but the only cursing is done by God. Abram is to go forth (from the geographic area close to Babel) and found a community that respects the boundaries set by God but transcends those set by people unjustly. Abram is called to have reverence for life and leave vengeance to God.

No assignment of land is in this blessing. Abram is not told by God to go to Canaan.

I will assign this land to your offspring 12:4-9
Abram goes to Canaan to live and work. And God at this point tells Abram “I will assign this land to your offspring.”

Abram’s offspring are assigned the land where they are living and working, but they are not given it to own. God owns the land. People are stewards of it, to rule it the same way that the sun is told to rule in the creation narrative, by providing light and sustenance for living things. This is consistent with the prophetic view that Jewish control of the land was taken away by God because the Jewish ruling class was not acting differently than any other.

God assigns us to be a blessing anywhere we live and work together as a blessing. This is the origin of the classical Reform practice of calling its congregations Temples wherever they might be. There is no way to Jerusalem. Jerusalem is the way.

Who is Abram’s offspring? The Jerusalem Talmud says that Abram is the forefather of all righteous individuals. Righteous individuals are those who rely on God as their shield, who leave vengeance and cursing to God, and trust that by doing what is right, righteousness will prevail.

Lastly, the Torah could be subtly telling us that Abram is a descendent of Canaan as well as Shem through a combination of patrilineal and matrilineal descent. Abram’s father Terah is described as being native to both Ur and Haran (both lands settled by descendents of Ham, with Haran in particular settled by descendents from Canaan). Terah also names one of his sons after Haran. Although we are not given the matrilineal genealogies it is very likely that Abram is and his biological descendents are more Canaanite than S(h)emite. For all we know Sarai could be entirely Canaanite.

God’s purpose of calling Abram to go forth, could be to subvert and transform the curse of Noah. In Abram’s family and his offspring, Canaan and Shem are intermingled. The curse to be a slave of slaves is a curse that we will enslave ourselves. Ultimately we are called first to look at our own conduct and work to insure that we are not enslaving each other before we accuse the conduct of others. The Torah will tell us later that Abram’s great-grand-son, Joseph, was instrumental in introducing the institution of national slavery into Egypt.

In Egypt 12:10-20
Immediately after we learn of the calling forth of Abram and his offspring, we are shown how Abram himself falls short of expectations. Ramban comments “Know that our father Abraham inadvertently committed a great sin by placing his virtuous wife in a compromising situation because of his fear of being killed. He should have trusted in God.” Abram calling Sarai his sister links Abram to Cain. One can picture God asking Abram, after Abram has sold Sarai into sexual slavery, “Where is your sister Sarai?” and Abram answering “I do not know. Am I my sister’s keeper.”

Sarai’s sexual enslavement in Egypt foreshadows the enslavement of the Jews. The biblical linkage of the exploitation of women by men (including Jewish men) and the exploitation of Jews by non-Jews is also prevalent in Esther, where the sexual enslavement of all of the virgins in the Kingdom foreshadows the planned murder of the Jews.

At the end of the story when God rescues Sarai and they return to Cannan, Abram is far wealthier than he was before he went to Egypt. The Torah does not associate wealth with righteousness.

Back in Canaan 13:1-18
God does not call Abram from Egypt to live in Canaan. It is only after the choice is made (this time by Lot and not by Abram himself but the point is that God is not making the choice) about where Abram is to live and work that God decides that Abram needs some reminding about what he has been called to go forth to do. “All the land that you see, I give it to you, and to your offspring, for the ages.” Abram and his offspring are called forth to care for the land so as to benefit all who live there and also all who are to live there in ages to come. And again, offspring here means all who follow in the ways of righteousness.

Lot’s Rescue 14:1-24
This story of Abram at war to rescue Lot is set in a narrative where nowhere else is Abram described as a military leader. Although there is some military imagery associated with Abram in the story (Abram is said to have 318 retainers) the intention appears to be, like the crossing of the Sea of Reeds, the Story of Deborah, and the holy war tradition in Judges, that Abram is clearly not militarily capable of doing what is described and that God is responsible for “delivering the foe into Abram’s hands.” Rabbinic tradition takes this idea even further and asserts that the “318 retainers” was actually just one person, Abram’s servant Eliezer, whose name, if assigned numerical equivalents, totals 318. God is the warrior, not Abram or his “retainers.”

Is notable that in this story Abram is described as being covenant allies with an Amorite and the Priest King Melchizedeck of Salem (Jerusalem) appears to be in as close a relationship with God as Abram. Clearly the offspring of Abram refers to anybody who strives to walk in the way of righteousness.

It is ironic that Abram does not want to appear beholden to the king of Sodom for anything while he had no problem taking wealth from the Pharaoh of Egypt, even though that wealth is a constant reminder to Sarai of Abram’s betrayal.

Abram’s Dream Visions 15:1-20
Abram first dream vision is God’s promise to grant Abram’s personal desire for a biological son that will be his heir and party to the covenant.

The second dream vision is Abram’s second reminder of the covenant which applies to all biological and non-biological offspring of Abram.

In this vision we are given a hint of the essential connection between the exodus from Egypt, and the covenant. Abram’s offspring are those, who when oppressed, do not resort to violence, but leave judgment for God.

Hagar, forerunner of Moses 16:1-16
Sarai, knowing of Abram’s dissatisfaction with being just a spiritual and moral progenitor, and Abram’s insistence for a biological son, and aware that Abram could divorce her for being barren (the fact that he has sold her into sexual slavery at least once is most certainly on her mind. His wealth and reason for it is a constant reminder to her.) feels forced to provide Abram with a son through her slave Hagar. Abram gleefully accepts, and blinded by the power inequities between husband and wife, is not even aware that this was not Sarai’s free choice. The Torah has warned once before, in the story of Lamech, of the generation of the flood, of the immorality of a man having multiple wives.

Hagar becomes pregnant. There is a power struggle between Sarai and Hagar and Hagar flees into the wilderness.

Hagar story invokes Egypt, slavery, affliction, fleeing, water, wilderness, God speaking, a new name of God, God’s call to go back, and seeing God face to face. Our communities are composed of hierarchies of oppression exemplified in Abram’s family by free men over free women and free women over slaves. However the Torah subverts this hierarchy by comparing a fugitive slave woman, the lowest in the hierarchy, to Moses, the greatest leader and prophet in the Torah.

Covenant 17:1-8
God is revealed to Abram with a name of possibly Canaanite origin. God repeats the terms of the covenant again. We are in constant need to be reminded of our obligations since the temptations of the world blind and deafen us. The covenant is symbolized by God adding to and completing Abram’s and Sarai’s names (making their names great) to become Abraham and Sarah. We walk in God’s presence when we realize that we are not expected to do everything ourselves. We are expected to be a blessing and we are expected to leave vengeance to God. God grants this covenant with Abraham and his spiritual and moral offspring knowing that it will be continuously broken by those who transcend the boundaries between heaven and earth, usurp God’s role, and insist on making names for themselves. “Kings will go out from you.”

Circumcision 17:9-14
Circumcision was common practice in Canaan, but apparently was not practiced by Abraham and his family up to that point. It is now reinterpreted as part of the covenant. The social implication of God requiring Abraham to adopt a cultural practice of a people that he doesn’t like and whose kindredness he denies (we will find this out later when Abraham seeks a wife for Isaac.) is incredibly significant. The covenant enjoins us to both respect the boundaries that God has made between heaven and earth and to cut away the boundaries that people have made between themselves. Deuteronomy uses “circumcision of the heart” as a synonym for commitment to the ethical conduct required of those who are party to the covenant.

The Chosen 17:15-27
God blesses Sarah with the promise of a biological son, Isaac. When we strip away both the racism of the text and the racism we read into the text, we can see that the essential difference between Isaac’s and Ishmael’s line is the particular story of enslavement and exodus, prophesized in Abraham’s dream, written in the Torah, and explicated by the prophets. The Mosaic covenant is told within the context of a particular peoples’ history, legends, and sacred literature, but we know that all other peoples, including those who draw their line from Ishmael, have had similar experiences in their histories, legends, and sacred literature from which we can draw the same lessons of reverence, for life, and leaving vengeance for God. The covenant, although in each culture and religion phrased in different words, customs, rituals, and texts, is available to all.