Chayei Sarah: Loving Kindness and Truth

We have said many times in this blog that God is the blessing because all blessings come from Him. This portion of the Torah is indeed about blessings. The lives of Sarah and Abraham are a blessing to humankind because their legacy is about loving kindness and truth.

“Blessed is the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His loving kindness and His truth from my master.” (Genesis 24:27)

They set up for humankind the ways and means in which God relates to His entire Creation. They lived by being and doing His ways and attributes. Let's recall that God is “abundant in loving kindness and truth” (Exodus 34:6) and “The world is built on loving kindness” (Psalms 89:2).

Thus we assimilate that everything that exists is an emanation of God, and sustained by His love. This is His blessing, the greatest Love of all. Thus we understand the meaning of “(...) and the Lord had blessed Abraham in everything.” (Genesis 24:1) because loving kindness and truth are God's blessings for us to become and manifest (see in this blog our commentary on Parshat Chayei Sarah: “Life as Divine Service” of October 24, 2010).

Our sages explain the meanings of the verses in the Torah related to God's blessings to our Patriarchs, “in everything” for Abraham, “from everything” for Isaac, and “with everything” for Jacob. God blesses us “in everything” when all we do is a blessing, meaning that our life is guided and directed to be and do goodness in what we discern, think, believe, feel, speak and do. This level of consciousness is personified by Abraham and Sarah.

We are blessed “from everything” when we are wise enough to turn whatever happens to us, either wrong or negative, into something good and positive for our benefit and the benefit of others. This awareness, represented by Isaac, requires the absolute belief and trust that everything serves a purpose we must direct to fulfill God's will.

We do it for our individual and collective well being. We must not understand this approach as making negative situations acceptable and permissible. All the way around. The idea is to correct and redirect negative actions into positive and uplifting steps towards goodness. We do something good from (out of) everything.

We are blessed by God “with everything” when we realize that what we are, have and do (all with which we can exist) come from Him. Hence we give because what we give comes from God's love, which is endless. This fundamental principle removes any belief or feeling of lack from our consciousness, and bring us to the highest awareness that we belong to God.

Once we fully assimilate this truth, we realize that we don't lack anything because what we are already contains all we need, want and desire, which is God's love. That with which we are, that with which we are made has everything that our imagination can't qualify or quantify. This utmost awareness is represented by Jacob.

We as Israel fulfill our destiny when we are totally aware of the scope of the ways God blesses us in everything, from everything, and with everything. Let's always keep this awareness in all levels of consciousness.

Again, the Torah reminds us not to tamper God's blessing, love as the material manifestation of His love, with anything different from His ways and attributes.

“And I [Abraham] will adjure you by the Lord, the God of the Heaven and the God of the Earth, that you will not take a wife for my son [Isaac] from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose midst I dwell.” (24:3).

Our sages also direct us not to pollute our essence and true identity with the negative traits and tendencies of the lower aspects of consciousness, represented by the Canaanite nations (see in this blog our commentary on Chayei Sarah: “The Jewish Identity” of November 13, 2011).

We must be clear, determined and inflexible on this issue as Sarah was when she asked Abraham to expel Hagar and her son Ismael from their home.

“Drive out this handmaid and her son, for the son of this handmaid shall not inherit with my son, with Isaac.” (21:10)

It's not enough to discern the differences between blessing and curse, positive and negative, right and wrong, false and true, loving ways and evil ways. We have to make the good choices to become the goodness of God's blessing. Likewise, it is not enough to know His will and commandments, as well as the prophecies in the Torah and the Hebrew Bible.

We must do everything in our reach to fulfill them all. This we learn throughout our history, including the episode cited in the haftarah for this portion.

There was the will of God to make Solomon the sole heir of king David, this as the promise made by David to his wife Batsheva, and also a prophecy by Nathan in this regard. There was a point in which this may not have happened. Therefore Batsheva and Nathan the Prophet did what was needed to fulfill God's will, David's promise, and Nathan's prophecy. King David also did his part.

“Indeed, as I [David] swore to you [Bat Sheva] by the Lord God of Israel saying, 'Surely Solomon, your son, shall reign after me and he shall sit on my throne in my stead' surely, so will I do this day.” (I Kings 1:30)

God gave us free will to make our choices. He gave us the options and references to choose from. He also gave us the instruction (His Torah and commandments) to make the right choices by choosing the blessings and not the curses. In the blessings we delight in the goodness of love's ways and attributes as the material manifestation of of God's love.

The blessings of love are our redemption, our true freedom from the curses of ego's fantasies and illusions, and negative trends and traits. Love is our common bond with God's love, and as long as we walk in His ways and attributes, there are no illusions that separate us from Him.

Chayei Sarah: The Jewish Identity

One of the most profound statements by Abraham recorded in the Torah is “I am a foreigner and a resident with you.” (Genesis 23:4). We have to understand it, not only as a gesture of Abraham's humbleness towards his neighbors, but as a characterization of the Jew based on his relationship with the Creator, in regards to the material world.

Our identity as Jews is broadly defined in the Torah as the Chosen People, and Abraham's neighbors recognized him as the seed of the great Nation whose mission is to be God's People.

“Hear us, my lord: You are a prince of God in our midst.” (23:6)

We must consider our identity, not only as a definition by the most important Testimony ever written, but as a meaning for us as Jews. Both “foreigner” and “resident” seem to complement each other in the context of living or dwelling in a particular place, but we must see them in relation to our identity defined according to our bond with God.

This bond consequently makes us foreigners in any place where God's Presence has not been totally revealed. We are foreigners in the sense that we are entitled, and commanded by Him, to create a place for Him to dwell in the material world.

In order to accomplish our mission and fulfill His Commandment, first we must become residents in the world. As the first Jew, Abraham was recognized by his neighboring nations as the man who was with God in their midst. This recognition is essential for us to assimilate the Jewish identity.

We know that we are God's people not only because the Torah says so, but because since our origins the nations also acknowledged it. They knew that we are foreigners and residents in their midst because, after all, we are the emissaries of God among them.

It sounds like we can be settlers in the land as long as we remain God's people in the eyes of the nations. This predicament makes us reflect thoroughly in the essence of the Jewish identity.

We indeed (as it is also for the rest of the non-Jewish mortals) are temporary residents in this world, but what makes us different is our mission to be the Light for the nations, a sacred Nation because our God is sacred, and a Nation of priests who sanctify His Name with their actions.

Our place is with God and this also means that, wherever we are, our lives are entitled to fulfill His will. We do this by making the world a better place for all, according to the ways the Torah instructs us to follow. For this mission God gives us the Promised Land.

We may be foreigners and residents in the midst of other nations, but we also have a land assigned to us. In this Land we are able to develop the full potential of our identity to fulfill our mission.

We have indicated in previous commentaries that the Promised Land, besides being a specific geographic location known as the land of Israel, also represents the individual and collective awareness of our connection with the One who gave us this Land. Possessing the and is the direct consequence of manifesting our identity as Jews.

The Torah states this fact, and also warns us countless times about the consequences of losing or despising our connection with God by the choices we make with the free will he gave us.

Our condition of foreigners and residents amid the nations also means that we do not become part of them and their ways, because our ways are defined by our relationship with God. We also have mentioned that the Canaanite nations represent negative traits and qualities that we have to conquer, defeat and subjugate in order to settle in the Promised Land.

The Torah and God's Commandments are the ways and means to overcome the potentially negative trends in human consciousness. When we accomplish this task, we are able to dwell in the awareness of God's Love, hence living in the Promised Land here in the material world.

Ultimately, our final destiny is with the Creator and we see our passage through this world as the time to fulfill the Covenant with Him. Though we know that our spiritual destiny is to dwell with Him, we also know that our lives on Earth are bound to our mission to reveal His Presence, and proclaim His Glory.

We do this by removing the illusions and fantasies of ego's materialistic desires, along with the negative traits that have kept humankind in darkness.

We are indeed strangers and aliens in the lands of negative thoughts, emotions, feelings, passions and instincts. But all these aspects of consciousness can also recognize the positive traits and the blessings that walk hand in hand with God's Love. If we Jews, the Abrahams of today, manifest our identity as emissaries of God's Love in order to awaken others to the awareness of Love's ways and attributes in the midst of material illusions, we will have accomplished our destiny as God's People.

Parshat Chayei Sarah: Life as Divine Service

“And the life of (chayei) Sarah was one hundred years and twenty years and seven years, the years of the life of Sarah.” (Genesis 23:1)

We understand through the wording of this verse something that seems obvious, that our years are our life. Indeed they are and from this we can learn that everything we do with our time, our life, is meaningful either to ourselves or to others.

It has to do with who we are and what we do including what we speak. Sarah and Abraham teach us an essential lesson when we learn that everything they did in their lives was truly meaningful. Let's keep in mind that loving ourselves, our fellow man and all Creation, bear fruits in this world because our Love awakens Love wherever and whenever is concealed in the darkness of ego's illusions. When we awaken Love in others is like harvesting the fruits because, as we have said many times, Love is the cause and the effect.

The Torah contains revealed and non-revealed aspects of God, and it is the book that teaches us God's Love in order to emulate Him by loving each other and His Creation. The Torah teaches us the source of life that God's Love is because He sustains everything, including life. This awareness made the lives of Sarah and Abraham a meaningful legacy for us.

The portion continues with Abraham's purchase of the burial site for Sarah as a future inheritance for the Jewish people. Abraham said: “I am a stranger and an inhabitant with you (…).” (23:4) because he knew quite well that he and his descendants will be strangers and also inhabitants with this world, transients who live to sanctify the Name of the Creator in the material world, as part of our mission to be the Light for the nations. Our true home is with the Creator and while we live in this world our home is the Land that He promised to our forefathers.

“(…) and the Lord blessed Abraham with everything.” (24:1)

The Love of God blesses us with everything when we walk in His ways. Interestingly, this verse is followed by the future engagement of the only son of Abraham and Sarah.

“(…) you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose midst I dwell. But you shall go to my land and to my birthplace, and you shall take a wife for my son, for Isaac.” (24:3-4)

Mystic sages teach that the entire journey of the messenger to bring a bride for Isaac is full of symbolic meanings. The messenger is not mentioned by name and for his endeavor “all the best of his master was in his hand” (24:10).

They compare this messenger to the Jewish Messiah who comes only with the best of what he has from his Master to redeem his People (Rebecca) from the darkness of the illusions of the world (represented by the wickedness of her parents and brother).

According to Rashi, in the verse “(…) the man took a golden nose ring, weighing half [a shekel], and two bracelets for her hands, weighing ten gold [shekels].” (24:22), the nose ring represents every Jew who is “half a shekel” (the other half is God with him) and the bracelets represent the two Tablets with the Ten Commandments.

“And Isaac brought her to the tent of Sarah his mother, and he took Rebecca, and she became his wife, and he loved her.” (24:67)

Our sages explain that after the Akeidah (Isaac's binding) the Creator didn't allow Abraham and Isaac to leave the Land that He promised for them and their descendants. Isaac was the perfect sacrificial offering and such as he had to remain in the holiness of the Promised Land.

In this context Isaac and Rebecca are the ideal combined qualities that encompass Israel's identity. One is the offering of all aspects, levels, and dimensions of life to the service of the Creator; and the other represents Love as the material manifestation of that service. Rebecca is the unconditional Love that is eager to leave behind ego's fantasies and illusions in order to embrace Divine service.

This willingness and unconditional devotion are not found in the peoples of the Canaanite nations which represent negative emotions such as pride, envy, anger, lust, indolence, greed, and cruelty.

Rebecca and Isaac were exactly the opposite as also Sarah and Abraham were. In this sense the years of our Patriarchs were as significant as their lives because they chose to walk in God's ways and attributes. They follow the One who creates everything and sustains everything with His infinite loving kindness.

Our Kings, Prophets and Sages reaffirm that, “The world stands on three things: on the Torah, on the service of God, and upon acts of loving kindness.” (Pirkei Avot 2:1), because “The world is built on loving kindness” (Psalms 89:2), hence “He has told you, O man, what is good! What does your God ask of you, that you do justice, love loving kindness, and walk humbly with your God.” (Micah 6:8)