Chayei Sarah- A Prince of God. Remembering Rabbi Jonathan Sacks

We had opportunity this past week during the Parsha shiur to learn together some of the Torah writing of Rabbi Sacks on the parsha.  And even though Shabbos is not a time for sadness or eulogizing, I could not let the first Shabbos that we gather together go by without reflecting further on Rabbi Sacks.

There is one pasuk from the Parsha that many are quoting this week in reflecting on Rabbi Sacks and his enormous legacy.  At the beginning of the Parsha as Avraham is negotiating with the b’nei Chet (the Chet clan) to purchase a burial plot for Sarah, the initial reaction of the b’nei Chet is to refuse Avraham’s offer. 

שְׁמָעֵ֣נוּ ׀ אֲדֹנִ֗י נְשִׂ֨יא אֱלֹקִ֤ים אַתָּה֙ בְּתוֹכֵ֔נוּ בְּמִבְחַ֣ר קְבָרֵ֔ינוּ קְבֹ֖ר אֶת־מֵתֶ֑ךָ אִ֣ישׁ מִמֶּ֔נּוּ אֶת־קִבְר֛וֹ לֹֽא־יִכְלֶ֥ה מִמְּךָ֖ מִקְּבֹ֥ר מֵתֶֽךָ׃

“Hear us, my lord: you are the elect of God among us. Bury your dead in the choicest of our burial places; none of us will withhold his burial place from you for burying your dead.” (Gen. 23:6)

What is the meaning of this phase – נשיא אלקים?

The Rashbam writes that the phrase is used as a response to Avraham’s initial petition in which he proclaims himself to be a גר ותושב – a resident and an alien (Gen. 23:4) –

גֵּר־וְתוֹשָׁ֥ב אָנֹכִ֖י עִמָּכֶ֑ם תְּנ֨וּ לִ֤י אֲחֻזַּת־קֶ֙בֶר֙ עִמָּכֶ֔ם וְאֶקְבְּרָ֥ה מֵתִ֖י מִלְּפָנָֽי׃

“I am a resident alien among you; sell me a burial site among you, that I may remove my dead for burial.”

They tell Avraham that he is wrong to think that he is of the lowly status of a resident and an alien.  They, and others, see him as a Prince of God.

Rav Hirsch similarly explains that Avraham was deeply respected by b’nei Chet.  But he offers an interesting twist:

Although an alien, by his God-directed and godly activities amongst them for so many years he had gained such a high reputation as a נשיא אלקים in their midst, that, in truth he need not buy a piece of land to find a permanent grave for his wife… Everyone would consider it such an honor to know that a Sarah, the wife of Abraham, was lying buried in his property, that not only would he not refuse to allow Sarah to be buried there, but that this grave would also remain untouched for all time…

In other words, Avraham’s elevated status as נשיא אלקים was not the opposite of his perceived status as גר ותושב but was the direct result of his being גר ותושב.  As Rav Hirsch tells it Avraham was utterly different from B’nei Chet and everyone else living in Canaan.  As we have discussed on several occasions, Avraham is the first person in the Torah to be called עברי.  In the Midrash Rabbah (Breishit Rabbah 42:8) Rabbi Yehuda explains the significance:

רבי יהודה אומר כל העולם כולו מעבר אחד והוא מעבר אחד

R. Yehudah – all the world was on one side and he stood alone on the other.

Rabbi Sacks elaborates in his introduction to the Koren Yom Kippur Machzor:

To be a Jew is not to go with the flow, to be like everyone else, to follow the path of least resistance, to worship the conventional wisdom of the age.  To the contrary, to be a Jew is to have the courage to live in a way that is not the way of everyone.  Each time we eat, drink, pray or go to work, we are conscious of the demands our faith makes on us, to live God’s will and be one of His ambassadors to the world.  Judaism always has been, perhaps always will be, counter-cultural…The sages said that Abraham was called haIvri because all the world was on one side and Abraham on the other.  To be a Jew is to swim against the current, challenging the idols of the age whatever the idol, whatever the age.

And Rabbi Hirsch asserts that it is specifically this characteristic of Avraham that earned him the respect of those around him and the title נשיא אלקים.

As someone able to offer an authentic and unapologetic presentation of Judaism to the broader world, Rabbi Sacks certainly followed in Avraham’s model.

Rav Hirsch’s understanding offers a wonderful segue into one of Rabbi Sacks’ core teachings about Judaism.  In his book The Dignity of Difference he writes that one of, if not the most radical innovations of Judaism is that it is a particularist monotheism, which he explains to mean “It believes in one God but not in one exclusive path to salvation.  The God of the Israelites is the God of all mankind, but the demands made of the Israelites are not asked of all mankind.”  It is taken for granted that Hashem is not only the God of Israel.  Rabbi Sacks’ powerful explanation is as follows:

God, the creator of humanity, having made a convent with all humanity, then turns to one people and commands it to be different, teaching humanity to make space for difference.  God may at times be found in human other, the one not like us.  Biblical monotheism is not the idea that there is one God, and therefore one gateway to His presence.  Tot the contrary, it is the the idea that the unity of God is to be found in the diversity of creation.  (Dignity of Difference, 53). 

I shared one of my favorite Rabbi Sacks teachings this past Rosh Hashanah.  Commenting on the midrash that compares Avraham to a traveler who comes upon a palace on fire and asked “is it possible that this palace lacks a person to look after it?”  At which point the owner of the castle reveals himself to the traveler, or in the analogy God reveals himself to Avraham.  The point of the Midrash for Rabbi Sacks is not to demonstrate how Avraham came to believe in God.  Rather it is to show us that Avraham asked the question “Is it possible that the castle lacks a person to look after it?”  “Faith,” writes Rabbi Sacks is born not in the answer but in the question, not in harmony but in dissonance.”  (I cannot help but note that this week we also lost Alec Trebek who would certainly appreciate the answer in the form of a question.)lRabbi Sacks did not shy away from asking difficult questions and tackling complicated issues.  The secret to this was shared by his daughter Gila in an extremely moving and powerful eulogy for her father.  She said that in talking with a colleague who, in the context of COVID asserted there are some problems in the world that are solvable and some that are not solvable.  The hard thing is knowing which is which and whether COVID is a solvable problem to be tackled head on or an unsolvable problem to be managed but never solved.  Gila Sacks did not accept the premise of her colleague’s framing of the issue.  In her mind every problem can be solved.  Some are harder than others, but fundamentally problems can be solved.  And this she realized was the core lesson and belief that her father had given her. 

Rabbi Sacks was a giant in the Orthodox and a voice that our community and the whole world desperately needed.  I have no doubt that we will continue to soak in his Torah and find inspiration from his beautiful writings, videos and podcast.  He truly taught us what it meant to be a נשיא אלקים.  I encourage everyone to study his writings on the parsha or one of his books.  I promise you will not be disappointed.