Toldot
Genesis 25:19-28:9
Précis: The introductory phrase to this parasha is “These are the generations (“toldot”) of Isaac.” What follows is the birth of the twins, Esau and Jacob. Their childhood is omitted from narrative, and we know only that Jacob was a quiet man while Esau was a cunning hunter, that their mother Rebecca preferred Jacob, and that Isaac preferred Esau. We then have the story of the sale of the birthright by Esau to Jacob for a bowl of porridge. A famine takes place, and Isaac journeys to the land of the Philistines where he claims that his wife Rebecca is actually his sister (as Abraham did with Sarah in Lech Lecha) and again, the woman escapes unharmed. The story then turns to the “great deception” where Jacob pretends to be Esau in order to obtain the primary blessing from his father Isaac. Esau hates Jacob and threatens him; Rebecca urges Jacob to escape to her family in Haran, to where he sets off at the conclusion of the parasha.
Gen. 25:22 “And the children struggled together within her; and she said: 'If it be so, wherefore do I live?' And she went to inquire of God.”
From a literary perspective, the Bible is a remarkable work, having the power to convey rich detail in a concise manner. On a thematic level, the parasha introduces us to the essential core of Jacob’s life: struggle. He struggles with Esau in the womb (as noted in the cited verse), is the object of struggle between his parents (Isaac preferring Esau, Rebecca preferring Jacob). He struggles with Esau (and perhaps with his father) over the blessing, with his father-in-law over his marriages, with an angel when his name is changed to Israel, again with Esau upon his return home, and with his sons over their jealousy of Joseph. His struggles culminate when, after his reunion with the long-lost Joseph, Jacob encounters Pharaoh in Egypt, telling the Egyptian king that “‘The days of the years of my sojourning are a hundred and thirty years. Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life” (Gen. 47:8-9).
The concept of struggle, of course, has become the central metaphor of Jewish existence. Jacob’s second name, “Yisrael,” has been translated as “struggle with God” and our experience, both temporally and spiritually over the centuries, can be defined by struggle. Struggle, of course, continues today for Jews in Israel and around the world. Some of the current struggles have their roots in ancient times (some point to Esau as the progenitor of Edom, a traditional enemy of the Jewish People; others note that Ishmael, Jacob’s half-uncle, was the father of the Arab nation). Other struggles within the Jewish world have a more recent genesis.
Spiritually, the Jewish People have had to face the dislocation of the Babylonian Exile, where we “wept by the waters.” The destruction of the Second Temple created the struggle for continuity which found its expression in Mishna, Talmud, and rabbinic Judaism. In later times, the spiritual struggle was manifest in the epic challenges of denominationalism (Reform, Conservative, Orthodox), and today, the Jewish spiritual struggle seems to have adopted the same kind of partisan extremism which dominates American political discourse.
While, in Jacob’s words, one may view the Jewish “life” as “few and evil,” I submit that we can take heart and hope from the fact that we have survived the struggles of millennia, and remain confident in our ability to overcome the challenges we face today, and will inevitably face tomorrow. Judaism as a belief is profoundly hopeful, based at its spiritual core on the Covenant between the Jewish People and the Creator, and based on the knowledge that each of us has within us not only a spark of the Divine, but also the ability to continue the struggle begun so long ago.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Friday, October 29, 2010
Kavod Ha-Met - Honoring the Dead
Chayye Sara
Genesis 23:1-25:18
Précis: The parasha begins with the counting of the life of Sarah (chayye Sara) - and with her death. It continues with a detailed description of the negotiation for and purchase of the cave of Machpela by Abraham for a family burial site. Abraham orders his servant to go to Abraham’s ancestral home to obtain a wife for Isaac, and after a series of fulfilled signs, the servant finds Rebecca. Rebecca returns with the servant; she and Isaac meet, fall in love at first sight, and become man and wife. The parasha ends with the death of Abraham, and his burial by Isaac and Ishmael in the family burial cave.
Genesis 23:2-18 “Abraham arose from beside his dead, and spoke to the Hittites, saying, ‘I am a resident among you; sell me a burial site…’ And the Hittites replied, ‘Hear us, my lord…bury your dead in the choicest burial spot; none will withhold his burial place from you’…And Abraham bowed low…and said to them… ‘Let Ephron sell me the cave of Machpela…for the full price, as a burial site.’ Ephron...answered Abraham… ‘No, my lord, hear me: I give you the field and the cave…’ Then Abraham spoke…saying ‘Let me pay the price of the land; accept it from me’…And Ephron replied… ‘A piece of land worth 400 shekels - what is that between you and me? Go and bury your dead.’ Abraham accepted Ephron’s terms, and Abraham paid out the money…”
Since the dawn of time, burying the dead has been a widespread human ritual. What motivated our ancestors to bury their dead? We can assume that it had symbolic meaning to them (a hope for resurrection? a return to the womb of Mother Earth?). Without question, one motivation was to create a way for the living to remember the dead.
The negotiation for a burial plot set forth in these verses ties burial with the ownership of land. While we know very little about Jewish burial rituals before the era of Rabbinic Judaism, we do know from this story and others in the Bible (Rachel, Jacob, Joseph, et al.) that it was important for individuals to be buried in ancestral lands. As a result of the Babylonian and subsequent exiles, it became impossible for Jews to be buried with their ancestors, and so this story became a template for subsequent Jewish purchases of burial plots. Abraham was a “resident” in a land not his; his descendants seeking to purchase burial property would be faced with the same issues he faced.
What do we learn from this story First, that the grave site land needs to be purchased, and not merely accepted as a gift. Clear title and ownership is important. Second, the fact that the local citizens also used special land to bury their dead shows that Abraham was acting out a ritual which was common among those with whom he lived. Similarly, Jews throughout history adopted some of the customs of the surrounding people (the use of ossuaries in Second Temple times; wooden coffins; grave stones and markers, etc.).
Throughout our history in the Diaspora, Jews have purchased land for cemeteries whenever we were able (and permitted) to do so. Among the first items on the Jewish agenda when establishing a new community was the creation of a burial society (for both chevre kadisha and the purchase of burial land). When Jews were expelled from a state or a principality, history records that the cemeteries were among the property sold off with other Jewish possessions. Desecration of Jewish cemeteries became a symbol of one faith’s "victory" over another – whether Christians or Muslims were the ones doing the desecration, and whether it took place in the 10th century or in the 20th century.
While, like Abraham, we have tried to find secure and tranquil places to bury our dead, we have learned that buying grave sites gives neither the living nor the dead any real security. There is really no "eternal rest." If the purpose of burial rituals, as suggested at the outset, is to remember, then we now face an additional challenge: the dispersion of families across the country and around the world. It's rare, these days, that several generations of a family remain in the same location. This heightened mobility means that unlike Abraham, the responsibility for maintenance of Jewish burial sites - part of "kavod ha-met" - is not a familial responsibility alone but increasingly a communal one. Whether we are “Jewish professionals” or just members of the Jewish community, the care for the dead and for their burial places is an ancient mitzvah we must continue to observe.
Genesis 23:1-25:18
Précis: The parasha begins with the counting of the life of Sarah (chayye Sara) - and with her death. It continues with a detailed description of the negotiation for and purchase of the cave of Machpela by Abraham for a family burial site. Abraham orders his servant to go to Abraham’s ancestral home to obtain a wife for Isaac, and after a series of fulfilled signs, the servant finds Rebecca. Rebecca returns with the servant; she and Isaac meet, fall in love at first sight, and become man and wife. The parasha ends with the death of Abraham, and his burial by Isaac and Ishmael in the family burial cave.
Genesis 23:2-18 “Abraham arose from beside his dead, and spoke to the Hittites, saying, ‘I am a resident among you; sell me a burial site…’ And the Hittites replied, ‘Hear us, my lord…bury your dead in the choicest burial spot; none will withhold his burial place from you’…And Abraham bowed low…and said to them… ‘Let Ephron sell me the cave of Machpela…for the full price, as a burial site.’ Ephron...answered Abraham… ‘No, my lord, hear me: I give you the field and the cave…’ Then Abraham spoke…saying ‘Let me pay the price of the land; accept it from me’…And Ephron replied… ‘A piece of land worth 400 shekels - what is that between you and me? Go and bury your dead.’ Abraham accepted Ephron’s terms, and Abraham paid out the money…”
Since the dawn of time, burying the dead has been a widespread human ritual. What motivated our ancestors to bury their dead? We can assume that it had symbolic meaning to them (a hope for resurrection? a return to the womb of Mother Earth?). Without question, one motivation was to create a way for the living to remember the dead.
The negotiation for a burial plot set forth in these verses ties burial with the ownership of land. While we know very little about Jewish burial rituals before the era of Rabbinic Judaism, we do know from this story and others in the Bible (Rachel, Jacob, Joseph, et al.) that it was important for individuals to be buried in ancestral lands. As a result of the Babylonian and subsequent exiles, it became impossible for Jews to be buried with their ancestors, and so this story became a template for subsequent Jewish purchases of burial plots. Abraham was a “resident” in a land not his; his descendants seeking to purchase burial property would be faced with the same issues he faced.
What do we learn from this story First, that the grave site land needs to be purchased, and not merely accepted as a gift. Clear title and ownership is important. Second, the fact that the local citizens also used special land to bury their dead shows that Abraham was acting out a ritual which was common among those with whom he lived. Similarly, Jews throughout history adopted some of the customs of the surrounding people (the use of ossuaries in Second Temple times; wooden coffins; grave stones and markers, etc.).
Throughout our history in the Diaspora, Jews have purchased land for cemeteries whenever we were able (and permitted) to do so. Among the first items on the Jewish agenda when establishing a new community was the creation of a burial society (for both chevre kadisha and the purchase of burial land). When Jews were expelled from a state or a principality, history records that the cemeteries were among the property sold off with other Jewish possessions. Desecration of Jewish cemeteries became a symbol of one faith’s "victory" over another – whether Christians or Muslims were the ones doing the desecration, and whether it took place in the 10th century or in the 20th century.
While, like Abraham, we have tried to find secure and tranquil places to bury our dead, we have learned that buying grave sites gives neither the living nor the dead any real security. There is really no "eternal rest." If the purpose of burial rituals, as suggested at the outset, is to remember, then we now face an additional challenge: the dispersion of families across the country and around the world. It's rare, these days, that several generations of a family remain in the same location. This heightened mobility means that unlike Abraham, the responsibility for maintenance of Jewish burial sites - part of "kavod ha-met" - is not a familial responsibility alone but increasingly a communal one. Whether we are “Jewish professionals” or just members of the Jewish community, the care for the dead and for their burial places is an ancient mitzvah we must continue to observe.
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