Rabbi Farkas writes that Abraham has just experienced two very dark events; his son Isaac has left him, and they never meet again, and his wife Sarah has died alone. And yet, the Torah tells us that the LORD blessed Abraham in all things. He cites Rabbi Sacks, who wrote that God does not do it all; we are responsible as well.
Rabbi Greene considers the problem of someone you know who is struggling, but you don’t know what to do to help them. There is a tension between what you think might help, and what they think they need. Then again, they may not even know. We can have the best of intentions, yet do things that do not help at all.
Isaac is quiet, introspective, and meditative. In fact, the Sages attributed his afternoon meditation to prayer. However, the Talmud is not concerned with the nature of meditation, as much as it is with the halakhah of prayer. Rabbi Sacks observes that there were two types of leaders at the time – patriarchs and prophets; no priests yet. Everyone prayed differently, and each prayer was unique.
Rachel Travis considers the madras, wherein a young Abraham questions his father’s faith in the carved and molded idols. Abraham is a rebel. Yet in the Torah, Abraham is 75 when God speaks to him for the first time, with an incredible challenge and promise.
Rabbi Barenblat blogs on whether or not God should have created humanity. The question is challenging; most of our perception of reality is in opposing views. She questions why the need for polarization?
God speaks the incredible words to Abraham, “go forth to the land that I will show you”, yet the Torah tells us very little about Abraham, other than his deeds. His few identified attributes—gentle, kind, gracious—don’t generally relate to the founder of a new faith.
Rabbi Strimber is concerned with the conflict between the years that Noach spent anticipating the flood and building the ark, and the other fact that Noach did not believe that the flood would ever happened. This fact is understood because he didn’t enter the ark until the very last minute. The conflict is resolved by considering actual human nature; we can understand something on an intellectual level, without that reality touching our consciousness.
Rabbi Sacks observes that the Tower of Babel narrative is only 9 verses, yet its historicity is interesting. The ziggurat, which is what the Tower was, represented the ancient Mesopotamian city states, where humans first settled. The buildings were remarkable for their design, size, and building materials.
Raemia Luchins writes about the complexity of the phrase “The earth had become corrupt before Hashem, and the earth was filled with chamas”. It seems simple, but it is actually describing a world “whose internal warning systems have stopped functioning.” In other words, the corruption came about gradually, reflecting cracks in the society.
Dr. Moster considers the complexity of the grammar: b’reishit may refer to “in the beginning”, or “from the beginning”, or “the beginning”, depending on different historical translations into Aramaic or English. What is the true meaning of the prefix “b”?