Drash – Vayeira

Rabbi Jeffrey Kamins OAM

Emanuel Synagogue, Sydney

To walk in God’s way

Through the stories about Avraham Avinu, our father Abraham, we learn what it means to be called to a covenant with God, to walk in God’s ways.  We have received these stories from our ancestors, told from generation to generation for thousands of years.  It is upon us, as recipients of this narrative from the past, to make it meaningful for those to whom we transmit it for the generations to come.  There is so much to learn from this rich and complex story, our foundational story as Jews.  In last week’s parasha we learned that Avraham has been called to go to a new land and start a new nation. Our tradition teaches that this was God’s way of showing that humanity needed moral exemplars leadership to move beyond its selfish and violent tendencies.

The first two portions of the Torah provide the background to the call to Avraham.  Bereshit begins with the disobedience of Adam and Eve and concludes with the statement that God saw “how great was man’s wickedness on earth, and how every plan devised by his mind was nothing but evil all the time.”  The next parasha, Noach, presents God as relenting somewhat, promising never to destroy humanity again despite its wickedness.  There has been some improvement in the human condition: while Adam did not follow God’s command; Noah did, but without further thought or application (for example, never questioning God or speaking to God in any manner or on any matter). While these stories may not be historically accurate accounts of how humans evolved, when we first encounter Avram in last week’s parasha we are in a familiar world – one of violence, greed and apathy.

That background gives us understanding of how we understand the story of Avraham, taken to be the founder of our people.  He has come to be an exemplar, one who will make a difference, one charged at the end of last week’s teaching to “walk in God’s ways and be blameless” (Genesis 17:1)  That is still our charge as Jews today, but what it means to “walk in God’s ways” leaves much room for interpretation, exploration and application. Each of us will have our understanding of what it means metaphorically “to walk in God’s ways.  Observing Avraham’s behaviour provides us a guide as to what action we, his descendants, are called.

Avraham is a man of faith and action, a complex character of strength.  He is a champion of justice, willing to fight when no other course of action is available (establishing the mitzvah of redemption of hostages), and in this week’s story challenging God over the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, arguing that the innocent must not be swept away with the guilty with the famous phrase of “shall not the judge of all the earth judge justly?” (Genesis 18:25).

But he is also a man of compromise (willing to divide the promised land with his nephew Lot when their respective shepherds quarrel over land rights) and generosity.  His actions at the beginning of this week’s parasha establish the, the standard by which we are meant to look after strangers and guests, the mitzvah known as “hachnasat orchim”.  Accordingly, Avraham, the champion of justice, is associated with the sefira of chessed, or lovingkindness.  Avraham’s “walking with God” models how we should too in our time – we must live  by the core principles of  justice and lovingkindness.

Avraham entered the world stage ten generations after the flood. Hundreds of generations later, in tumultuous and disastrous times of our own, the charge to him  “to walk in God’s ways” is even more imperative for us.