Taste of Limmud
Lech Lecha
We are introduced to Abraham who is told to go to Canaan. In a packed parshah, a battle between kings is described, Abraham is honoured by a separate king - Malki Tzedek - and Abraham encounters God and they make a covenant. It also describes Ishmael's birth and the difficulties Sarah has in giving birth. It ends with Abraham circumcising all the men in his family.
Abraham, the first Jew - Why? - Daniel Goldfarb
Daniel Goldfarb, rabbi and lawyer, has been teaching at Limmud since 2000. He is Director of the Conservative Yeshiva in Jerusalem, where people of all ages and stages experience the pleasure and excitement of studying classical Jewish texts.
With Parshat Lech Lecha, the Torah narrows focus, to the genesis of the Jewish people. Avraham Avinu now takes center stage. It's worth asking why God chose Avraham to be the first Jew.
Avraham was a monotheist. The Midrash tells how he broke his father's idols and we read this week that he "built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord." (Gen 12:8). But it's far from clear that he was the first monotheist. Back in the time of Enosh, the son of Seth (our common link back to Adam and Eve), people "began (huchal) to invoke the Lord by name" (4:26). Rashi interprets huchal negatively, "profane" (from chilul), thus preserving the monotheism copyright for Avraham, but other classic commentators - Ibn Ezra, Sforno and Onkelos - interpret the word favorably (Onkelos: "in his day people began to pray in the name of the Lord"). And Noah also "built an altar to the Lord" (8:20) on which he brought burnt offerings, a form of worship well known in the Torah.
There's a good chance that Avraham was the first humanitarian. Whereas Noah did nothing and said nothing to protest the destruction of the world when told of the impending flood, Abraham brazenly challenges God not to kill the innocent in Sdom (18:22+). Abraham takes his household to battle to rescue Lot, the first instance of pidyon shvuyim (redeeming captives) (14:14+), and he treats the slaves of the kings he liberated as "people," not as rechush ("property"), which was the prevailing custom amongst the neighboring peoples (compare 14:11 with 14:16).
nd Abraham is certainly the only person for whom the Torah uses the word chinuch (education) : "...and he mustered chanichav ("his retainers/trained men"), the ones born in his house" (14:14). Rashi explains: "he educated them l'mitsvot (in the commandments)." And it was probably not the first time he did this. At God's command Avraham leaves Haran with his wife, Sarai, his nephew, Lot, "v'et hanefesh asher asu b'charan" ("and the persons/souls they had acquired/made in Haran" [12:5]). Onkelos translates this as "the souls they brought into the realm of the Torah," and Rashi brings the Midrash that Abraham converted the men and Sara the women. The Chizkuni, a commentator from 13th France, goes one step further. He says about this phrase ("the souls they made in Haran") - kan matchil matan Torah, the Giving of the Torah starts here. Not with Moshe at Sinai, but with Avraham, the mechanech (educator), back in Haran.
So what's so special about Avraham? He was the first person who took the words of Pirkei Avot 1:2 seriously. " Al shlosha dvarim ha'olam omed," Shimon HaTsadik tells us: "On three things the world stands," and Abraham engaged in them all. Al HaTorah - he educated people l'Torah v'mitsvot ; al HaAvodah (on serving God) - he built altars and called on the name of the Lord; v'al Gemilut Hasadim (and on helping people) - he acted to save those in danger and he fought to have even slaves considered as persons, not property. Not a bad reason that Avraham is considered the first Jew.