Midrash madness
Sarah
When HaShem asked Avraham to sacrifice Yitzchak/Isaac, he left from Beersheva and returned to Beersheva.
Yet Sarah died in Chevron (Hebron). How and/or why did she end up in Chevron?
According to a midrash, she went to the Kever HaMachpela to pray that Adam and Chava/Eve, who were buried there, would intercede with HaShem on her son's behalf.
Huh?
What evidence do we have that Adam and Chava were buried in the Kever HaMachpela, which isn't even mentioned in the biblical text until after Sarah's death, when Avraham bought it as Sarah's burial place? What evidence do we have that Sarah even knew of its existence? Besides, what on earth were the rabbis thinking? What woman in her right mind, especially in those days, would have entered (what was then merely) a cave unaccompanied by any male member of her family and put herself at risk of being raped?
Yishmael/Ishmael
All he did was laugh at or mock his brother. Why must we whitewash Sarah, who was clearly simply trying to protect her own son's inheritance, by saying that Yishmael was expelled from the family because he was some kind of villain?
Esav/Esau
True, he traded his birthright for a bowl of soup, so we know that he was not exactly a role model for delaying gratification and planning for the future. But still, he was good to his father, hunting deer for the venison that Yitzchak/Isaac loved, and he even took another wife when he realized that the wives he'd already married displeased his parents. What did he do to deserve to be described as a rapist and murderer? I'd also be curious to know whether it occurred to any of the midrash-writers that Esav actually had a perfectly legitimate reason to bring 400 (presumably armed) men with him to his reunion with Yaakov/Jacob: Yaakov had already taken Esav's birthright and blessing, so why should Esav have trusted him not to come back for more?
Léah and Rachel
Get real, folks: This is the Torah's female sibling rivalry story. What's with all the stories about sisters helping sisters?
Léah had weak eyes from crying because she was supposedly chosen to marry Esav? No evidence.
On the other hand, the Torah's own text concerning the marriage night provides some evidence in favor of the midrash that Rachel gave Léah the secret signals that she and Yaakov had devised to ensure that Rachel was the one he was marrying: Somehow, Léah got all decked out as a bride and got married with no (recorded) protest from Rachel. (Another interesting question is how Yaakov managed to spend all night with the wrong woman and [allegedly] not realize it until morning, but that's straight from the text, not midrash.)
As far as I can see, though, the sisters, in competing for the love of their husband by making babies, were bitter rivals for as long as they were both alive. Otherwise, why on earth would Léah have given Yaakov her handmaid to use as a surrogate mother when Léah herself had already given birth to four children and Rachel herself hadn't born any children at all? And why would Léah have accused Rachel of having taken away her husband?
Sigh. Some midrashim create as many questions as they answer.
Monday, December 7, 2009 note:
Please click on "POST A COMMENT" to see all the comments. For reasons unknown, not all of the comments seem to be visible otherwise.
When HaShem asked Avraham to sacrifice Yitzchak/Isaac, he left from Beersheva and returned to Beersheva.
Yet Sarah died in Chevron (Hebron). How and/or why did she end up in Chevron?
According to a midrash, she went to the Kever HaMachpela to pray that Adam and Chava/Eve, who were buried there, would intercede with HaShem on her son's behalf.
Huh?
What evidence do we have that Adam and Chava were buried in the Kever HaMachpela, which isn't even mentioned in the biblical text until after Sarah's death, when Avraham bought it as Sarah's burial place? What evidence do we have that Sarah even knew of its existence? Besides, what on earth were the rabbis thinking? What woman in her right mind, especially in those days, would have entered (what was then merely) a cave unaccompanied by any male member of her family and put herself at risk of being raped?
Yishmael/Ishmael
All he did was laugh at or mock his brother. Why must we whitewash Sarah, who was clearly simply trying to protect her own son's inheritance, by saying that Yishmael was expelled from the family because he was some kind of villain?
Esav/Esau
True, he traded his birthright for a bowl of soup, so we know that he was not exactly a role model for delaying gratification and planning for the future. But still, he was good to his father, hunting deer for the venison that Yitzchak/Isaac loved, and he even took another wife when he realized that the wives he'd already married displeased his parents. What did he do to deserve to be described as a rapist and murderer? I'd also be curious to know whether it occurred to any of the midrash-writers that Esav actually had a perfectly legitimate reason to bring 400 (presumably armed) men with him to his reunion with Yaakov/Jacob: Yaakov had already taken Esav's birthright and blessing, so why should Esav have trusted him not to come back for more?
Léah and Rachel
Get real, folks: This is the Torah's female sibling rivalry story. What's with all the stories about sisters helping sisters?
Léah had weak eyes from crying because she was supposedly chosen to marry Esav? No evidence.
On the other hand, the Torah's own text concerning the marriage night provides some evidence in favor of the midrash that Rachel gave Léah the secret signals that she and Yaakov had devised to ensure that Rachel was the one he was marrying: Somehow, Léah got all decked out as a bride and got married with no (recorded) protest from Rachel. (Another interesting question is how Yaakov managed to spend all night with the wrong woman and [allegedly] not realize it until morning, but that's straight from the text, not midrash.)
As far as I can see, though, the sisters, in competing for the love of their husband by making babies, were bitter rivals for as long as they were both alive. Otherwise, why on earth would Léah have given Yaakov her handmaid to use as a surrogate mother when Léah herself had already given birth to four children and Rachel herself hadn't born any children at all? And why would Léah have accused Rachel of having taken away her husband?
Sigh. Some midrashim create as many questions as they answer.
Monday, December 7, 2009 note:
Please click on "POST A COMMENT" to see all the comments. For reasons unknown, not all of the comments seem to be visible otherwise.
posted by Shira Salamone at 7:11 AM
20 Comments:
"Léah had weak eyes from crying because she was supposedly chosen to marry Esav?"
Which part do you object to - That Leah was Esau's intended or that her eyes were weak from crying over it.
I DO think Leah is Esau's intended, it's not P'shat, but I don't think its drash either, I think it's remez.
The Blessing story is framed at its beginning with the bitterness Esau's wives caused and at the end with Esau's realization that he had done a "bad" by taking those wives. It hints that Isaac and Rebekah may have had someone in mind. Further, when Laban foists Leah off on Jacob, he chastises Jacob saying "we do not marry off the younger before the first born." I think the implication here is that when Jacob acquired the birthright, and Esau married local girls, Laban was left without a match for Leah, and thus gave her to Jacob. It occurs to me that Esau may have married the Canaanite women precisely because he forfeited his match to Jacob.
Reform BT, I think you and/or the rabbis are reading too much into the text. Neither Yitzchak nor Rivka/Rebecca seems to have made any suggestions to Esav regarding his choice(s) of wife *before* he married, which, to me, indicates that they did *not* have someone in mind. Otherwise, why didn't they send *him* to Rivka's family, too, prior to his (first) marriage?
"Reform BT, I think you and/or the rabbis are reading too much into the text."
From the traditionalist/Orthodox point of view, the midrash is not rabbis reading into the text and makeing stuff up, they are quoting an oral tradition of details to the story that were not included in the written Torah for the sake of brevity. There are certainly cases of alternate or contradictory midrashim, but in the case of Leah being intended for Esav, the consensus seems pretty universal. Your arugment that the Torah doesn't indicate this is a pretty weak argument. That's WHY we have the midrash, becaue the Torah didn't bother to write this detail. If you are going to constantly stress over what is in the written Torah only then you cross over from being Conservative to being a Karaite!
Shira,
I forgot to mention in my last comment:
Your question as to WHY they didn't send Esav off to marry into Lavan's family is an excellent one, and I have no answer to it.
I suggest asking a rabbi.
"From the traditionalist/Orthodox point of view, the midrash is not rabbis reading into the text and makeing stuff up, they are quoting an oral tradition of details to the story that were not included in the written Torah for the sake of brevity." You and I will have to agree to disagree on that point.
"If you are going to constantly stress over what is in the written Torah only then you cross over from being Conservative to being a Karaite!"
My rabbi's made the same accusation, but I'm not consistent enough to be a Karaite: I accept the kindling of lights before Shabbat and Yom Tov as a binding commandment even though I don't think there's even a hint of such a thing in the Torah sheh-BiCh'Tav/Written Law, and I wear tefillin--a rabbinic interpretation of a Torah verse--too.
Do you think that, if I post this again, it will actually appear?
""From the traditionalist/Orthodox point of view, the midrash is not rabbis reading into the text and makeing stuff up, they are quoting an oral tradition of details to the story that were not included in the written Torah for the sake of brevity." You and I will have to agree to disagree on that point.
"If you are going to constantly stress over what is in the written Torah only then you cross over from being Conservative to being a Karaite!"
My rabbi's made the same accusation, but I'm not consistent enough to be a Karaite: I accept the kindling of lights before Shabbat and Yom Tov as a binding commandment even though I don't think there's even a hint of such a thing in the Torah sheh-BiCh'Tav/Written Law, and I wear tefillin--a rabbinic interpretation of a Torah verse--too.
Mon Dec 07, 02:03:00 PM 2009
"Yishmael/Ishmael
All he did was laugh at or mock his brother"
According to Rashi (who I believe cites a midrash and/or gemara to back this up) says that the mocking means that Yishmael was engaged in in murder, premarital sex, and idolotry. There are also midrashim that say he would shoot arrows and Yitzhak and then say he was only joking; he didn't mean any harm.
tefillin--a rabbinic interpretation of a Torah verse--too.
Tefilin is not a Rabbinic interpretation, it is a commandment in the Torah. The Talmud makes this very clear and refutes the idea that the Rabbis "made up" teflin." If it is a rabbinic interpretation, how come there absolutely zero sources that say so? Which rabbis made this interpetation/invention and when? There are many places in the Talmud in which there are arguments back and forth as to whether something is a Torah commandment or rabbinic in origin and there is no such debate recorded regarding tefilin.
Anon, this is *exactly* what I'm complaining about--all the *text* says is that Yishmael was laughing/mocking, and from that, the rabbis deduce that he was a murderer, an idolator, and engaged in pre-marital sex?! If anyone else had come to similar conclusions about a different person, based on such similarly flimsy "evidence," the rabbis themselves would have accused him/her of lashon ha-ra/malacious gossip or motzi shem ra, which I think translates roughly as giving someone a bad reputation. What did Yishmael actually *do,* that he should be portrayed as hard-core criminal? Since when does mocking one's brother make one a murderer? That's a very serious charge, and if anyone thinks it's true, let them *prove* it, based on *evidence*! Otherwise, it's all just a whitewash for the benefit of Sarah's reputation. The rabbis were trying to justify her insistence on expelling Yishmael from the family. Why? She gave a very straightforward reason, right in the text: "He will not inherit with my son." What's so hard to understand about that? It may not be pretty, but it's very realistic. But instead of taking Sarah at her word, the rabbis insisted that Yishmael was a murderer. On the one hand, the rabbis say that Sarah was a prophet. On the other hand, they refuse to accept her word. You can't have it both ways, gentlemen.
"Tefilin is not a Rabbinic interpretation, it is a commandment in the Torah."
The Torah sheh-BiCh'Tav/Written Torah says, in no uncertain terms, "you will bind them as a sign on your hand, and they will be totafot (two Jews, three translations :) ) between your eyes." What the Torah does *not* say is what they're supposed to look like, or how or with what they're supposed to be made. So the *mitzvah* is, indeed, straight from the Torah sheh-BiCh'Tav/Written Torah, but the interpretation of that law--or the application thereof, if you prefer--is rabbinic.
Shira,
The Rabbis did not interpret the creation of teflin. God taught Moshe how to make them and this method was past down orally.
It would be ridiculous for the Torah to contain written instructions for how to make tefilin, how to perform shechita, etc, when the average person does not do these things and it would make the Torah the size of set a shas! Would you really want to layn "Yoreh Deah"?
Anon., the fact that you believe that all of Jewish law comes from HaShem's written or oral instructions to Moshe on Sinai, whereas I believe that much of what's now codified as Jewish law is based on rabbinical interpretation, is one of the reasons why you're Orthodox and I'm not. Neither of us is ever going to convince the other, so let's just agree to disagree respectfully.
Neither Yitzchak nor Rivka/Rebecca seems to have made any suggestions to Esav regarding his choice(s) of wife *before* he married, which, to me, indicates that they did *not* have someone in mind. Otherwise, why didn't they send *him* to Rivka's family, too, prior to his (first) marriage?
I can imagine a few reasons, none of which are pshat. Before I present them though I want to discuss the idea of midrash just a tad.
Midrash arises out of a desire to make sense of a problematic p'shat. This is why the rabbis engaged in it, it's why I engage, and frankly I don't think you can leave the p'shat alone - it's too problematic.
Texts do not mean in a vacuum. Meaning emerges in the encounter between the reader and the text. The rabbis brought to the table a desire to use Esau as an archetype for Roman/Christian oppression. That is why they seek to view him as a murderer and an idolater. We don't have that particular set of concerns and so we can ask ourselves what they were thinking. But it does not matter to me, because their explanations don't work for me.
Now to your questions, they cannot be answered without sailing away from the p'shat even if we take care to nonetheless remain moored to it. My belief, as I noted above, is that Esau understood himself to be relinquishing any rights he might have had as firstborn to Jacob, and therefore he sought his own matches without his parents' knowledge. He may have known that Leah was his betrothed, he may have simply trusted that his parents would have found him someone, but with the sale of the birthright, I think he understood himself to be forfeiting that.
Midrash is exegesis, not deductive reasoning. I'll try to go one by one and shed some light.
1. Sarah in Chevron. We don't have evidence that Adam and Chava were buried there. However, the midrash's approach is to say that if Avraham wanted to purchase this specific cave in order to bury his wife, himself, and his family going forward (achuzat olam - a permanent possession), he must have had a very good reason. He must have known it to be a very special place, a place where some other great person/people were buried. Since Noach most likely died in present-day Turkey, Adam and Chava wind up being your best bet.
Once you've got that far, it's easy to place Sarah there so she can die there and be buried there. This is how the Midrash works.
2. Yishamel. We don't whitewash Sarah, God does. The written text has God telling Avraham to listen to Sarah, whatever she says regarding this issue. Chazal are simply falling in line behind the written text here.
3. Esav. It is only in Mishanic times (also the beginning of Midrashic literature) that Esav begins to be compared to Rome. This makes Esav into a much worse character than he is in the text, because the rabbis retroject Roman cruelty and behavior onto Esav the Biblical character. Things only get worse when Herod, an Edomite, rules as king over Judaea, backed by the Romans.
Note that some positives about Esav do survive, including that he epitomizes honoring one's father in the rabbinic imaginations.
4. Leah & Rachel
As you point out, the story doesn't make sense without Rachel's acquiesence to the plot. As to how Yaakov could get the wrong woman and not know, it's quite possible that Yakov's total interactions with Rachel (and Leah) prior to the marriage was limited to seeing a totally veiled woman, and having almost no conversation with them whatsoever. In the dark after a wedding feast, he may truly not have known.
As for Leah, the idea that her eyes were weak from crying is only one opinion. The other opinion on Leah's eyes is that Rakhot should be translated as "beautiful". This works well with the veil concept in general, because Rachel is described as very beautiful, but only Leah's eyes are described that way - but given the likely dress of the period, the only visible feature of the bride might well have been her eyes - and Leah's eyes were as beautiful as Rachel's, enabling the ruse to last.
The midrash makes its interpretation not so much based on the Leah/Rachel story as on the Yakov/Esav story. By using this 'hook' in the text to connect Leah to Esav, the Midarsh suggests that Yakov not only takes Esav's ritual birthright, blessing, and inheritance of property, but even his intended wife (albeit accidentally). And since this wife produces all the important tribes besides Ephraim, it's all part of the larger story of Yakov's life, which is about the Divine hand working in mysterious ways to benefit Yakov, even when at first glance it appears like he is getting a raw deal.
"Midrash arises out of a desire to make sense of a problematic p'shat [literal meaning]. This is why the rabbis engaged in it,"
Agreed, Reform BT.
"the midrash's approach is to say that if Avraham wanted to purchase this specific cave in order to bury his wife, himself, and his family going forward (achuzat olam - a permanent possession), he must have had a very good reason."
Major assumption, Rejewvenator. I couldn't care less where I'm going to be buried. Sorry, I'm not buying this one.
"Once you've got that far, it's easy to place Sarah there so she can die there and be buried there. This is how the Midrash works."
That may be how Midrash works, but I still don't think it makes much sense. Again, we're working with pretty thin evidence to try to justify something that's already happened (namely, Sarah being in Chevron at the time of her death). I don't blame the rabbis for trying, though.
"2. Yishamel. We don't whitewash Sarah, God does. The written text has God telling Avraham to listen to Sarah, whatever she says regarding this issue. Chazal are simply falling in line behind the written text here."
That's an interesting point. So, in this case, the Torah gives us the honor of blaming G-d. :)
"3. Esav. It is only in Mishanic times (also the beginning of Midrashic literature) that Esav begins to be compared to Rome. This makes Esav into a much worse character than he is in the text, because the rabbis retroject Roman cruelty and behavior onto Esav the Biblical character."
I can understand that, but, personally, I think Amalek is a much better candidate for a charge of murder. It would make more sense for *him* to be the stand-in for Rome.
"Note that some positives about Esav do survive, including that he epitomizes honoring one's father in the rabbinic imaginations."
Thank goodness that something of Esav's goodness is remembered.
Your points about Leah and Rachel make sense.
I should probably behave myself and tell you my *own* theory concerning how Sarah came to die in Chevron: I think she was suffering from a classic case of Documentary Hypothesis, and the surgeon/Redactor left the seams exposed, as usual.
In plain English, I think that the story of Sarah dying in Chevron came from a different text than the story of Avraham returning to Beersheva after the Akeidah/near-sacrifice of Yitzchak/Isaac.
In plain English, I think that the story of Sarah dying in Chevron came from a different text than the story of Avraham returning to Beersheva after the Akeidah/near-sacrifice of Yitzchak/Isaac.
You know, I've never seen a problem here that would demand either a midrashic or a DH solution. I just assume that the arrative is episodic, and that nothing interesting enough to warrant spilling any ink happened to Abraham and Sarah until Sarah died. We are simply not told about when they moved to Hebron. What the midrash does in order to imagine that no time passes between the Akeidah and Sarah's death is painful to read. I will never believe Isaac was 37 at the Akeidah.
"We are simply not told about when they moved to Hebron."
Wow, it never occurred to me that the explanation might be that obvious. Thanks.
"What the midrash does in order to imagine that no time passes between the Akeidah and Sarah's death is painful to read. I will never believe Isaac was 37 at the Akeidah." I hadn't known of that major detail, either. The way the story is usually interpreted, Yitzchak/Isaac is married off almost before his mother's body has gotten cold. The text itself, however, makes him sound like a trusting child, asking first where the lamb for the sacrifice was, then calmly walking off to his own near-sacrifice as if he didn't understand the implications of his father's words, "G-d will provide the lamb."
Shira, YOU may not care where you'll be buried, but ancient Jews and Rabbinic Jews cared a great deal. It's important enough that the Torah tells us many stories about where people are buried (and how much they cared about it), including the stories of Avraham, Sarah, Yakov, Rachel, Yosef, and Moshe.
Another way to look at it is to bracket what Avraham may or may not have been looking for in a burial site. What matters is what the rabbis writing the Midrash thought Avraham should care about - which is usually just transferring what they care about onto Avraham. We know that the Rabbinic Jews of the Midrashic period cared a lot about burial, and valued being buried near holy ancestors. So they put that on Avraham too. You can't understand the Midrash unless you understand its underlying context and assumptions.
Regarding Amalek, it would have been highly impractical to make him the stand-in for Rome because of the halachic imperative to commit genocide against Amalek. Jews living in a Roman world would neither relate to that nor act on it. Also, b/c Esav is a foil to Yakov, by naming Esav Rome, the rabbis were also suggesting that when the Jews have the upper hand in the relationship, as promised, then they would be as powerful as Rome. You don't get that redemptive possibility in calling Rome Amalek.
"What matters is what the rabbis writing the Midrash thought Avraham should care about - which is usually just transferring what they care about onto Avraham. We know that the Rabbinic Jews of the Midrashic period cared a lot about burial, and valued being buried near holy ancestors."
*That* makes sense. So the fact that there's absolutely no evidence for the Kever HaMachpela being Adam and Chava's burial place is irrelevant--the rabbis just picked the only two "holy ancestors" that were available so early in Jewish history.
"Regarding Amalek, it would have been highly impractical to make him the stand-in for Rome because of the halachic imperative to commit genocide against Amalek. Jews living in a Roman world would neither relate to that nor act on it. Also, b/c Esav is a foil to Yakov, by naming Esav Rome, the rabbis were also suggesting that when the Jews have the upper hand in the relationship, as promised, then they would be as powerful as Rome."
That also makes sense. Thanks, Rejewvenator.
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