PROTESTING AGAINST HASHEM

Torah reading—Genesis 18:1-20:24        

Haftarah—II Kings 4:1-37

When we study a haftarah, first we want to understand the theme of the prophetic passage. Next we want to understand how that theme relates to the theme of the Torah reading.  This week’s haftarah consists of two narratives from the life of Elisha, the prophet Elijah’s disciple and successor. The first tells how he enabled the widow of a prophetic disciple to rescue her children from being sold into bondage by creditors, and the second tells how he promised a childless woman she would have a son, and then resurrected the son after the child died.

                How does the first narrative relate to the events of this week’s Torah reading?  At first glance, it doesn’t; what does this have to do with the birth of Isaac, the expulsion of Hagar and Ishmael, the fall of Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham’s covenant with Abimelech, or the Binding of Isaac? (1)

                The answer relates to the way our Sages of blessed memory understood the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.  Last week we read that the plain of Sodom used to be extremely fertile.  This led the people of the cities to become prosperous but unforgivably greedy.  Rabbinic midrashim (2) describe the ways that the residents of Sodom and Gomorrah displayed utter contempt for the virtues of charity and hospitality.  But the Prophets repeatedly speak out for the needy, and nothing says a haftarah can only include a reading from one book; why did the Sages choose this narrative?               The key lies in the verb, “to cry.”

                 In the Torah Hashem informs Abraham that He is about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah for their corruption.  Hashem precedes the death sentence with the words, “The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is very great, for its sin is very serious.”  Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks, a major figure in the Orthodox Jewish movement, identifies the Hebrew Bible as the first “protest novel” in the history of the world.  Here Abraham actually haggles with the Creator of the Universe for the cities He wants to destroy.  Abraham’s words of protest are both courteous and bold:  “shall not the Judge of all the earth do justly?”  A biblical commentator named Arnold Zweig summarizes this interchange beautifully.  ”Do you think…that Hashem did not know that there were not even ten righteous men in Sodom?  But Hashem wanted our father Abraham to show whether he was a man or no; and didn’t he show himself a man!”  In our Haftarah, the widow “cries out” to the Prophet for help.  Selling the children of a destitute widow may have been permissible according to the letter of the law, but absolutely wicked according to its spirit.

                The account of the Binding of Isaac portrays Abraham’s utter steadfastness when told to offer up the very son that Hashem had promised would produce children beyond counting.  Yet it is also seen by every viewpoint in Jewish thought as a protest:  a protest against the practice of human sacrifice.  Jewish lore says nothing about Abraham’s internal mood on his way to the place Hashem would show him, but nothing prohibits imagining that he was filled with agony, either.  In fact, I find it hard to imagine anything crueler than a parent who feels no sadness or outrage at the prospect of losing a child.  The woman whose miraculously promised son dies is quite open with her grief and rage against Elisha, and perhaps against Hashem as well, and who can blame her?  So Elisha silently endures her protest, as silently as Abraham journeys to the altar, and then brings her son back from the dead.  I have to admit, though, I haven’t found an answer to one important question.  Why did the child have to die in the first place?

(1)    We have a hint at the outcome of this narrative in Hashem’s command, “raise him up for an offering,” not “slaughter him” or “sacrifice him.”  In Judaism we also see the lesson that Isaac’s acquiescence in being bound for a sacrifice shows that Hashem sees offering one’s life to Him is equivalent to laying it down.

(2)    Midrash (plural Midrashim):  a homily or exegesis, derived from the word for “To search.”  Midrashim are meant to impart a moral or psychological lesson suggested by the text, rather than an article of faith.