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Parshat Chayei Sarah

By: SFW Students & Alumna
Chani Schonbrun, SFW ’04-‘05

Nechama Leibowitz has a whole discussion in this week's parsha about why the Torah gave us a whole detailed description of the business transaction that took place between Avraham and Efron.What was the point of this description? After all, the Torah doesn’t usually go into the details of human everyday lives.

In Bereishit Rabbah it says that Ma’arat Hamachpeila is one of the 3 places that we clearly bought, with a transaction detailed in the Torah, and that therefore non-Jews cannot argue that we stole (the other 2 places are the land of the Beit Hamikdash and the land where Yosef is buried). And so, according to this midrash, the transaction is recorded to give our ownership legitimacy.

The Ibn Ezra gives two additional reasons. First, to underscore the importance of the land, demonstrating that Avraham went to a great deal of trouble to find a place to bury Sara in Eretz Yisrael, which serves to teach us that even after death, you can’t “be” anywhere else. (I should note that the Ramban finds difficulty with this argument because Avraham had no other country in which to bury Sarah, so this really can’t be used to demonstrate the centrality of Eretz Yisrael.)

The Ibn Ezra’s second reason is that this parsha is recorded to confirm to Avraham Hashem’s promise that he will inherit the land, coming on the heels of multiple promises of greatness and inheritance. From his initial position as a stranger in the land, Avraham was slated to rise to become a prince.

However, the Chizkuni is somewhat bothered by this, given the nature of Avraham’s interaction with Efron and his people. Avraham isn’t acting particularly princely. He bows down to all of them – it appears more like he is begging and not particularly majestic.

Because of this, it is difficult to view this parsha as demonstrative of Hashem’s promise of sovereignty. Instead, perhaps we should look at the words of Chazal, who say that this was one of the ten trials, nisyonot, of Avraham, and when dealing with the world of nisyonot, the greater the difference between promise and fulfillment, between vision and reality, the greater the nisayon.

The Medrash explains that the lesson from this detailed business transaction is anavah, humility. Hashem promised Avraham that he and his children would inherit the land, and now, Avraham can’t even find a decent burial plot for Sarah that isn’t overpriced. Nevertheless, we do not see Avraham complaining, and his faith in Hashem and in the promises he received never falters. With all this, Avraham doesn’t show any resentment towards Bnei Cheit, and instead interacts with them with humility, humbling himself before them. Hashem sees this characteristic and says: "You humbled yourself, in the end I will raise you up to be a Nasi over them."

This comes to show us how even in the most frustrating of situations, we have to learn to keep our cool. When things don’t go exactly as planned or we don’t get exactly what we believe we deserve, we need to be able to take a step back, keep our bitachon strong, and maintain our good middot towards other people, even those who we may feel are below us.

Shabbat Shalom.