Friday, November 10, 2023

What appears, in the opening verses of this week’s parasha, Chayei Sarah, to describe a routine real estate transaction, turns out to be a statement of religious significance for us and our connection to Eretz Yisrael, our Biblical homeland.

The passage concerns Abraham who, having just become a widower (at the ripe old age of 137) with the death of Sarah (not far behind, at 127), must negotiate the purchase of a suitable burial plot from the local landowners, a people known as the Hittites, who trace their origins to what today is Turkey.

By the earliest period of Israelite history–we’re talking about 3,500 years ago, give or take–the Hittites had already become a dominant Near Eastern civilization, ruling over large swaths of the territory of today’s Middle East, including Canaan, or what we think of as Eretz Yisrael, the Biblical Land of Israel.

The passage describes a detailed negotiation between the bereaved Abraham and a man named Ephron, son of Tzohar, the designated representative of the Hittites.  After exchanging formalities and explaining Abraham’s unfortunate circumstances, extensive bargaining ensues around the terms under which a burial plot may be purchased.

The language of their negotiation is polite, even obsequious, filled with formal entreaties and honorific titles.  

Abraham begins modestly:  גֵּר־וְתוֹשָׁ֥ב אָנֹכִ֖י עִמָּכֶ֑ם — “I am a stranger and sojourner among you.”  No mention of his wealth, his storied exploits, his Divine election, or his and Sarah’s status as patriarch and matriarch of a fledgling nation.  For the purpose of buying land, he’s just a “stranger and a sojourner.”  

The Hittites reply:  “Hear us, my lord!  You are the elect of God among us.”  From there, the negotiation proceeds like a ritualistic dance, right down to the way Abraham bows before the landowning citizens of the Hittite nation.  When they finally agree upon a figure, the price is steep and each shekel carefully counted.

After twenty verses–the entire 23rd chapter of Genesis!–the episode concludes on a perfunctory note, with Abraham officially acquiring the Cave of Machpelah in what is today the West Bank city of Hebron, as a permanent burial site for Sarah (and, later, for Abraham himself, and their posterity).  It is, to this day, a sacred site of pilgrimage for religious Jews (and a frequent hotbed of unrest between Palestinians and Haredi Jews who reside in Hebron).  

This kind of elaborate negotiation may in fact be familiar to anyone who’s ever bought anything in the bustling souks and bazaars of the Middle East.  My friend and teacher Rabbi Les Gutterman once shared a story originally told by Rabbi Mordechai Waxman (of blessed memory), who had

visited Athens where he was invited out to dinner.  On the way, he saw a vendor selling flowers and so he stopped to buy some for his hosts.  He asked how much they were and the vendor said, “Twenty-six drachmas.”  He started to reach into his pocket and take out the money when the vendor said, “No, no, no.  You don’t understand how it is done.  I am supposed to say, ‘Twenty-six drachmas’ and you are supposed to say, ‘No way.  The most I will give you for these poor flowers is five drachmas.’  And I am supposed to say, ‘You are taking bread away from my children, but I will come down to twenty-three drachmas.’  And you are supposed to say, ‘No way.  The most I will give you for such poor, half-wilted flowers is ten drachmas.’  And I am supposed to say, ‘You are a merciless negotiator and these flowers really cost me much, much more than this, but I will give them to you for eighteen drachmas.’  And so we are supposed to go back and forth until we finally agree on thirteen drachmas.’

Rabbi Waxman said that he stood corrected and started to pay the thirteen drachmas.  The man said, “No, thank you.  From my students, I don’t take money.” And he gave him the flowers for free.

So, back to Abraham and the delicate matter of buying a burial plot.  Why such painstaking detail?  Why such length?  Why such formality?  Does the passage exist merely to to convey helpful tips for the next time we find ourselves bargaining in the Middle East?  Are we, like Rabbi Waxman, just hapless students in the marketplace of life, with Torah our humble guidebook, filled with practical wisdom for the naïve traveler?  Or is there more to it?

This evening I’d like to offer a couple of takeaways from this passage which illuminate its importance: first, in Jewish history, and second, in the Jewish psyche.  

The first takeaway comes from Avraham Ibn Ezra, the great 12th Century Spanish Sage.  He said that the thrust of this passage is “to make known the special status of Eretz Yisrael, surpassing all other lands, both for the living and the dead, as well as to fulfill God’s promise of a permanent inheritance for Abraham [and his posterity].”  

Ibn Ezra speaks to the centrality of Eretz Yisrael in Jewish life, Jewish history, and Jewish memory, a statement made all the more powerful–and ironic–given that Ibn Ezra, like generations of Jews before and after him, lived and worked exclusively in the Diaspora.  But even in Jewish dispersion–perhaps all the more so in Jewish dispersion–Israel has played a central role in our spiritual lives, both, as Ibn Ezra himself notes, for the living, and the dead.  

Even nowadays, Jews around the world make plans to be buried in Israel.  Here at WRT, we have, over the years, assisted a number of congregants with this request for their loved ones.  In fact, one estimate has it that over 60% of El Al planes carry a dead body to be buried in Eretz Yisrael.  

An article published a little over two weeks ago in the New York Times highlighted “seven Jewish New Yorkers whose lifelong desires were being fulfilled. They were in seven coffins in the cargo hold of an El Al flight to Israel, where they would be buried.”  Some Jews cling to an old belief that the soil of Eretz Yisrael absolves one of earthly sin–which is why, even here, outside Israel, many are buried with a satchel of soil from the Holy Land in the casket, or sprinkled in the grave.  Others simply view burial in Eretz Yisrael as a final homecoming. 

Because that’s what Israel is for the Jew:  Home.  Even for those of us who have never lived there, even if we’ve never even visited.  

Today, our home is under siege, and not just from Hamas.  Even after 75 years of internationally recognized statehood, Israel’s legitimacy is being challenged like never before.  I, like you, am sick and tired of inflammatory and derogatory claims hurled by anti-Israel activists in the public square, on college campuses, on social media, all part of a concerted effort to delegitimize the legitimate homeland of the Jewish People.  

Words like “settler colonialism,” in particular, get under my skin.  “Settler colonialism” is a smear intended to depict Israel as a society illegitimately established by European imperialists seeking to displace or dominate an indigenous population, when in actuality Zionism began as an anti-colonialist liberation movement seeking to bring a displaced indigenous population back home after 2,000 years of forced exile.  

In fact, in Israel’s pre-State years, Jewish patrons like Baron Edmond de Rothschild, emulating Abraham, purchased land in Eretz Yisrael directly from the Ottoman Empire (that is, before the Ottomans began banning land purchases by Jews and Christians alike). The vaunted Jewish National Fund got its start with land purchases from the Ottoman Empire.   

Later, Zionism would become a great force against British colonialism, throwing off the shackles of imperial rule to establish independent statehood in 1948.  So you can understand why the portrayal of Zionism as a “settler-colonialist” movement sets my teeth on edge.  

First and foremost, the episode at the outset of the parasha, in which Abraham acquires a burial plot in Eretz Yisrael, is intended to establish the legitimate claim of our people to this land.  He pays for the territory fair and square.  It passes to him and his posterity from its original owners without conditions and without contest.  The Torah wants to underscore that our people had a legal and inviolable claim to this place.  

And this leads us to the second takeaway, which is about the Jewish psyche, observable in how Abraham introduces himself at the outset of the parasha.  גֵּר־וְתוֹשָׁ֥ב אָנֹכִ֖י עִמָּכֶ֑ם, he says:  “I am a stranger and sojourner among you.”

In one of his celebrated public lectures, the great 20th Century Modern Orthodox Rabbi, scholar, and author, Rav Joseph Ber Soloveitchik, unpacked the paradox of Abraham’s dual title:  גֵּר־וְתוֹשָׁ֥ב in Hebrew.  He translates ger as stranger, but toshav he understands not merely as a “sojourner” but as a “resident.”  This is a totally valid translation.  Soloveitchik said:  

Avraham’s definition of his dual status, we believe, describes with profound accuracy the historical position of the Jew who resides in a predominantly non-Jewish society. He was the resident [תושב-toshav], like other inhabitants of Canaan, sharing with them a concern for the welfare of society, digging wells and contributing to the progress of the country in loyalty to its government and institutions. Here, Avraham was clearly a fellow citizen, a patriot among compatriots, joining others in advancing the common welfare.

However, there was another aspect, the spiritual, in which Avraham regarded himself as a stranger [גר-ger]….  His was a different faith and he was governed by perceptions, truths, and observances which set him apart from the larger faith community. In this regard, Avraham and his descendants would always remain “strangers” (Reflections of the Rav, Chapter 16, emphasis mine).

Through Rav Soloveitchik’s observation, we see how our passage reveals a deeper truth about Jews and Jewish identity throughout the ages… especially, now, in the post-1948 era of Jewish Statehood, of Jewish sovereignty and Jewish self-determination.  

For the vast majority of Jewish history we have lived, at best, like Abraham:  dual-status Jews, part resident, part alien.  For much of our history we could not obtain citizenship in the many far-flung lands and empires in which we put down roots.  In such cases, we adhered to the Talmudic dictum דינא דמלכותא דינא (dina d’malkhuta dina), “The law of the land is the law,” a statement of intent to become law-abiding citizens wherever we found ourselves, contributing, as Soloveitchik observes, “to the progress of the country in loyalty to its government and institutions,” including here in America.  Following the law of the land as a matter of Jewish principle also provided us with a preemptive response to the oft-leveled antisemitic charge of “dual loyalties.”  

Given the appalling rise in antisemitism right here, right now, in reaction to Israel’s defensive war against Hamas, many of us feel acutely aware of that part of the Jewish condition known as ger: the stranger, the foreigner.  It accounts for why so many of us feel particularly abandoned and alone at this time, and, yes, betrayed.  We think:  “How can you treat me this way when I, and my parents, and my grandparents, and even perhaps my great-grandparents, were all born in this country and have been nothing less than exemplary, loyal, patriotic, citizens?”  How, indeed. 

In the Torah, the words “ger v’toshav,” “stranger and resident,” are written with a maqaf, a hyphen, between them, underscoring that for the Jew, our two identities are inextricably linked: at some level, we are always strangers, even when we have resided in a place for a very long time, abiding by the law and contributing to the social welfare.  We have never been able to shed our identity as “strangers” in the eyes of others, even when we no longer see it ourselves.  

1948 was supposed to have changed that.  This, then, is the true meaning of Israel: that we would have a place where we can be toshav and no longer ger:  a place to call home.  A place that would change not only Jewish history but also the Jewish psyche.  A home: not just for the dead but for the living, for the living, thriving Jew; for the living, thriving Jewish people.  1948 severed the hyphen between ger and toshav and allowed us to live out the destiny to which Abraham only alluded, the destiny to which God had called him:

Lhiyot am chofshi b’artzeinu

Eretz Tzion vYerushalayim

“To be a free people in our land:

The land of Zion and Jerusalem.”

Shabbat Shalom