Parashat Hayei Sara: A Blessing for our Nation

The story is told of a schnorer who used to go around town collecting tzedaka from house after house. Once, he came to the house of a wealthy man who was known by all to be a strict miser. “I don’t give to a soul,” he told the schnorer. “And I have no intention of making an exception in your case.”

Undeterred, the schnorer responded, “Well in that case, even though you will not help a poor man I will leave you with a prayer: ‘May God treat you as God treated Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.’”

The wealthy man was speechless. He was touched by the sincerity of the words. He had never received such a blessing before. His heart softened; he pulled out his purse and gave the man 20 kopek. “Tell me,” he said,” as the schnorer was about to leave, “why did you bless me even after I was so mean to you?”

“Bless you? Who blessed you,” answered the schnorer. “I was only hoping that you’d be a wanderer like Abraham, blind like Isaac and break your hip like Jacob.”

Despite the schnorer’s tactic, to be blessed like Avraham is indeed a special blessing. We should only be so lucky.

In our parasha (our Torah reading) this morning, is a half a verse. Located in between the story of Sarah’s burial and Isaac’s shidduh, we encounter a timeless reminder how to live and what it means to give a blessing. At first unremarkable, these five words express our personal hopes and challenge us to consider our communal obligation.

“V’adonai berakh et Avraham bakol. And God blessed Avraham with everything.” Initially we are struck by the unqualified statement: “God blessed Abraham with everything.” “With everything.” Really? Abraham knew tzurus in his life: He left his homeland and faced strife in his household; he lost touch with both of his sons and buried his wife. How can the Torah say, “Adonai berach Avraham bakol. God blessed Abraham with everything?”

Perhaps, with the medieval Spanish commentator Ibn Ezra, we understand the blessing to refer to Abraham’s age and his bank account. “God blessed him with length of days and wealth “b’orekh yamim v’osher.” And are not these blessings we all seek?

The story is told of Shlomo who was walking through a forest pondering life. In that instant, he felt so close to God that he felt if he spoke God would listen. So he asked, “God, are you listening?”
And God replied, “Yes!”

Shlomo continued to walk and ponder. Then he looked towards the sky and said, “God, what is a million years to you?” God replied, “Shlomo, a second to me is like a million years to you.”

Shlomo continued to walk and to ponder. Then he looked to the sky again and said, “God, what is a million dollars to you?” And God replied, “Shlomo, it means almost nothing to me. A penny to Me is like a million dollars to you.”

Shlomo continued to walk and pondered a bit and then looked up to the sky and said, “God, can I have a million dollars?”

“Sure,” God said, “in a second.”

Abraham had wealth and length of days. But in the mind of the Kedushat Levi, that is not the essence of our phrase nor the key to a life of blessing. Instead, the 18th century Hasidic master, Levi Yitzhak, taught: do not read the Hebrew, God blessed Abraham with “everything” rather with “everyone.”

According to Levi Yitzkak of Beredechev, a righteous person like Abraham would never be satisfied if he alone was blessed by God. No, to be blessed, God must bless the entire community. “Ksherotzim l’varekh et hatzadik, m’varkhim et haklal lulo… Habrakha hayta bazeh sheberakh et hakol.” For Abraham, the blessing was that everyone was blessed. And thus the opposite is also true: Until all of us are blessed, none of us truly are.

This is a classic trope in Jewish thought. At the end of a wedding, we break a glass because our joy is not complete. It is fractured as long as others live without love and joy. During the Passover seder, we remove drops of wine from our cups because our blessings in life are reduced knowing that others do not share in our fortune.

Smart and honorable people differ on how to realize this ideal. But on this much we can agree: if some are poor we are all impoverished; if some are wanting, we are all deficient. This is the message of Abraham’s blessing. And interestingly, it is a lesson codified in Jewish law.

The Talmud rules that when it comes to blessings, even if I have previously fulfilled the commandment for myself, I can recite the blessing for another. Ordinarily, reciting a blessing twice would be considered a blessing in vein. But because another’s blessing is my responsibility, I can recite it twice. Commenting on this lesson, the Ritva, the medieval Rabbi of Seville wrote, “when it comes to blessings, all Israel are like a single person. There is no I and You. There is instead a collective We.”

Twelve centuries earlier, this notion was first articulated. Living just after the destruction of the Jewish state, Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai redefined what it meant to be a nation without a shared a territory or autonomy. “The Jewish people,” he said, “are like a single body and a single soul. If one is injured, they all feel the pain.” The implication is that when not united politically, we are none-the-less to be united and involved in each others lives. In such a state, the commandment “you shall love your neighbor as yourself” is inevitable because your neighbor is part of yourself; or rather, you and your neighbor are both part of a larger self, the collective soul of the Jewish people, the soul of Adam.

In the first eleven chapters of the Torah, however, the picture is very different. Adam passed the blame saying, “it’s not my fault. It’s hers.” Cain said, “I can do what ever I want.” Noah acted as if he was responsible for his life alone.” For the generation of Babel, it was self promotion at any cost. And what was the result? Adam lost paradise. Cain was condemned to wander. Noah declined into drunkenness. And Babel was scattered. Then there is Abraham, Abraham who feed the desert travelers, who fought to free Lot, who argued with God about Sodom. Abraham answered the question, “Am I my brothers keeper” in words and deeds.

When we first are introduced to Abraham, God says, “avrekhekha… v’nivrkhu b’kha kol mishaphot adama, I will bless you. And through you, shall all of the families of the earth be blessed.” And now in our parasha, in Abraham’s senior years, the lesson is repeated, the parentheses are closed. It is not enough to receive God’s blessings. Blessings are meant to be shared. “Vayivarekh et Avraham bakol.” With these words, we finally, fully understand the election of Abraham. And imbedded in them is a charge to Abraham’s descendants.

Far be it from me give a lecture on the history of political thought. But England’s Chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sacks in his tour de force, The Ethics of Responsibility, picks up this theme as he reminds us of the unique contribution to this discourse made by the Hebrew Bible.

The thrust of modern political thought, Sacks teaches, from the 17th century onward with thinkers like Hobbes, Lockes, Rousseu was on the social contract. Individuals transfer some of their rights to a central body such as a legislature in return for protection from enemies from without and lawlessness from within. The genius of the Hebrew Bible is to place that social contract that creates a State alongside a social covenant that creates a society. The Jewish people enacted its social contract in the days of Samuel when it voted for a monarchy. It entered its social covenant several centuries earlier beginning with Abraham and culminating at Mt Sinai. Israel was not yet a State. It had not even entered its land. But from Abraham on, Israel was destined to become a people bound by the principle of shared responsibility.

The message of the Bible for the politics of the contemporary West, Sacks concludes, is that it is not enough to have a State. You need a society, a common belonging that comes from a sense that we are strangers and yet neighbors; that society is not a hotel where we receive services in exchange for money but a home to which we feel attached. That requires covenantal not just contractual politics.

Few of us are like the schnorer who gives out curses disguised as blessings. But many of us fail to see just how blessed we really are. How many of us fail to imagine just how much we can do?

If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are more blessed that the million who will not survive the week

If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the agony of torture, the pangs of starvation, you are more blessed than 500 million people of the world.

If you have food in the fridge, clothes on you back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep, you are more blessed than 75% of the people in the world.

AIDS in Africa, earthquake in Haiti, tsunami in Indonesia. Famine. Genocide. And on and on. All are important but they are so far away. “Why should I care?” I think to myself. From Adam, the father of humanity, we learn “we are a single body, a single soul.” From Abraham we are inspired and obligated to respond.

But what can I do? Margate Meed famously once said, “Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. In fact, it is the only thing that ever has.” She’s right of course. Just look at Abraham.

When we reflect on our lives we know, we are so blessed. But today our blessing remains incomplete. We await tomorrow’s opportunities and possibilities.

Late on Tuesday night we will hear the refrain repeated often, “And may God bless the United States of America.” I pray that the kavanna, the intent behind those words, reflects the wisdom of Abraham. “Habrakha t’heyeh sheyivarech et hakol.” We pray for blessings beyond our party, beyond our State, even beyond our Nation. We pray for blessings for rich and poor, for citizen and stranger, Jew and gentile, Israeli and Palestinian, child and adult, gay and straight, man and woman. For only when we are all included in that blessing, will we all truly be blessed.