Genesis - Cycle One - 1801-2224 - VaYerah

Who is Abraham? This is a question scholars have asked for centuries. Of course, he’s the husband of Sarah, an excellent warrior. We say he’s our father. He almost sacrifices his son. We honor him for it.

My question is why. Why do we act the way we do? As for Abraham, he’s been Abraham for millennium. We’re the ones who choose to include him in our prayers, study him, and write books about him. Therefore, I think the better question is, who are we? Or as one man might ask, who am I?

I am here.

Here is my name. Here is all I know. Here is how I define myself, see myself, relate to the rest of the world.

Here I am.

But before we look at ourselves, let’s try and take Abraham out of Abraham. Let’s take out his camels, goats and tents, his family dramas that include incest and possible prostitution, the feasts, the slaves, the women, even Sarah and Hagar. It’s not easy. It’s like trying to take our car, our house, our job, our music, our video games and favorite football team out of us. But let’s get back to Abraham. Stripped of all masks, what we see is his yearning. We see the dance to create the perfect merge with the divine. Just watch as he bargains with God about Sodom. It’s a dance of words. How often have we bargained with God? Abraham’s struggles are not about one man. They are about us, about the moment to moment touch of breath in our hearts, the silence, the solid golden center of our beings, the reflection of God in our eyes, the kiss of one sound, one vibration on our lips. They are about every glance and bolt of lightning that twirls us closer to love, about the clear and clean boundaries, about that perfect fit with the world.

Perfect fit? Those times are rare and filled with light. We become drunk with light. We want to horde it. And we often do when get frightened. It’s natural. Here’s a scenario: We have money and the economy falls apart. What do we do? We pull back, pull in. We keep our light. We keep our tears. The light dries. The tears dry. The tears become salt. When light dries it too becomes salt. The light creeps into our things. The salt creeps into our things. We stop sharing. We stop merging. We stagnate. We become bitter. We lose touch with joy. We dim.

Next, let’s see Abraham as a piece within all of us. Abraham prays and builds altars. We pray and offer blessings. Abraham reflects the light right back to the divine. We reflect as well. Look at all we receive in return, even angels at our doorstep (Rashi). Abraham creates boundaries to keep the flow moving. The Abraham in us says the more you give the more you bring in. The Abraham in us knows to keep struggling for that perfect merge with God. And he knows that once found, clinging to it only turns it into salt. The Abraham in us never stops doing the work. There’s a rhythm to sacrifice like our inhale and exhale, like creation, like our seasons, our week, our Shabbat, our holidays. The rhythm builds on itself. It’s a shining amazing tornado. We can get lost in it and that might not be a bad thing. The challenge of Abraham is to keep the tornado on this earth, to keep the rhythm in everything we do, in the details.

Finally let’s look at another type of merge, that of man and woman. True love is certainly divine and the gift is obvious; a child. The child is the light that results from the perfect fit, the gift that makes us drunk with love. So there goes Abraham, love drunk and half insane, spinning in his sacred tornado, off with the firewood and his son Isaac. He knows that such greatness must be offered up to the divine.

Sacrifices happen often. Sometimes we sacrifice our work for our family or our community; our connection with others to help them merge or settle disputes. Sometimes we just know we have to. The sacrifice of a life though cannot satisfy its intention.

This is because our bodies serve as vehicles of light, not as containers with closed lids. We cannot possibly hold that which God deserves from having made us in His image, let alone offer it. Therefore, we can do better. We can do better than offer up a life held in the chains of one moment. So obviously, the Abraham in us has a few things to learn. And yes, that’s one point of the story but the larger point is here we are. The larger point is we don’t need to hesitate even for a moment. Our tiniest sparks, our tiniest actions, no matter the judgment of others, can be reflected up in gratitude. We are always gifted with that perfect opportunity.

In the end, Isaac lives. He is born from Abraham and Sarah and then from Abraham and God. In the end, who are we? We are all born in joy and pain from the Abraham within us, always being sacrificed, always doing the sacrificing. This is who we are.

So, may we say over and over…here I am. May we look not only at our creator but at Abraham deep within our hearts. May we act with wisdom and instinct when it is time to make a sacrifice…and time to learn from the ram in the thicket. May we love our community and our family. May we help to create the perfect merge and may we laugh and dance as the light whirls all around us and sends us into the radiance of divine love.