In this week’s Torah portion, God tells Abram to leave for an unknown land, promising that in return God will make of him a great nation, bless him and more. In doing so, Abram becomes the first Jew, and the history of our faith and our people begins.
Genesis Rabbah teaches that Abram was the first person God had even spoken to since Noah, so we can surmise that Abram must have been something special, indeed.
Only, wait. What exactly is it that makes Abram so special? In this parasha alone, Abram acts in ways that appear morally ambiguous at best. He pretends his wife, Sarai, is his sister when they meet Pharaoh “so that it will go well for him,” and while Abram eventually walks away with riches, it’s unclear whether Sarai was left unscathed.
ADVERTISEMENT
A short time later, Abram gets their maidservant Hagar pregnant, and when Sarai becomes jealous, Abram washes his hands of it and allows Hagar to be exiled into the wilderness.
It’s perhaps not surprising that Jewish tradition created reasons beyond the Torah text to explain what made Abram a worthy patriarch. There’s the midrash about his father, Terach, being an idol maker, in which only Abram had the smarts to know that idols were nothing more than statues. Multiple sources, from Jubilees to the Mishnah to Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer, talk about the many trials that Abram underwent to prove his worth.
In my favorite midrash, from Bereshit Rabbah, Abram’s thinking is compared to a man who sees a palace in flames, searching for its owner, and from that realizes that the world cannot exist without a Guide to look after it.
ADVERTISEMENT
Yet all of these teachings seem to overlook the simple truth of the Torah text, which is that we actually have no idea why Abram was chosen. It takes a whole lot of rabbinic creativity to make him appear an unflawed, worthy person.
Maybe that’s the lesson after all. One of my favorite lifelong learners, Sarijane Freiman z”l, always found such joy and comfort in the imperfection of our patriarchs and matriarchs. In her mind, the honesty with which the Torah presents the failings and weaknesses of our ancestors is itself an inspiration.
It teaches us that any one of us could be an Abram, any one of us could be called for greatness and a sacred journey. If God called to such a flawed person as Abram to be the first Jew, perhaps we, too, who are flawed can move beyond our failings to do something very special indeed.
May each of us, despite our imperfections, find a way to continue on Abram’s path to faith and to lives of meaning.
Rabbi Amy Feder serves Congregation Temple Israel and is a past president of the St. Louis Rabbinical and Cantorial Association, which coordinates the d’var Torah for the Jewish Light.
