A Stained Legacy
Parshat Vayeira
November 3, 2017
Here’s what happens in this week’s parsha…
Angels visit Abraham (as host) and predict Sarah will have a child.
Abraham argues with God over the destruction of Sodom
Lot with the angels in Sodom and its destruction.
Lot’s daughters become pregnant through Lot.
Abimelech takes Sarah as a concubine and is cursed by God; Abraham helps lift the curse.
Sarah has Isaac—then sends Hagar and Ishmael away.
God saves Hagar and Ishmael.
Abimelech and Abraham make a treaty in Beersheba.
Abraham is told to sacrifice Isaac—then not to.
We learn of Abrahams brother’s children (and Isaac’s future in-laws).
In just four chapters of Genesis we have 10 stories, many of which most of you know; we, of course read the story of the “binding of Isaac,” Abraham’s attempt to sacrifice Isaac, every Rosh Hashanah. And in traditional synagogues they read the story of Ishmael and Hagar’s banishment and God’s salvation every Rosh Hashanah. We know the story of Sodom and Gomorrah being destroyed and the pillar of salt which is Lot’s wife being left behind; many of us also know of Abrahams arguing with God to save the city if just 50, then 45, then 40… just 10 righteous men can be found there. What we might be less familiar with are the 2 stories of Abimelech: the first a direct parallel to last week’s Parsha where Sarah is taken by the Pharaoh of Egypt, who is then plagued because Sarah is actually Abraham’s wife. Here too, Abraham and Sarah say she is his sister, and so Abimelech takes her as a concubine; God intercedes, and Sarah is returned to Abraham. In the second half of the Abimelech story Abraham and Abimelech make a treaty, first to be kind to each other; and then over the ownership of a well.
I’m trying to see what these stories have in common. Right now, what I see is a combination of sex and power. Abimelech is known to abuse his position of power by taking other men’s wives. So, Abraham and Sarah use the potential of sex with Abimelech to exert power over him. Having had the experience earlier in Egypt, Abraham and Sarah know that God will intervene and ultimately Abimelech will see Abraham as a powerful person worthy of being an ally and not a rival. This leads to freedom for Abraham and Sarah to live in Abimelech’s land and prosper without interference.
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Today all over the news we hear stories of how sex has been used to exert power. Currently this abuse of power is causing a rash of shared experiences (with the #metoo campaign), firing of powerful people whose behavior had previously been excused, and the rewriting of many rulebooks in HR departments. Will our culture finally change? Will all people learn not to abuse their positions of power? Or will there be a backlash where #metoo has gone too far and now it is just an anti-man campaign? And what do we do with the legacy of the abusers? Obviously, the legacy from a history book standpoint must also include this heinous behavior, but what of their art, their creations? Should every actor, stagehand and direct not receive royalties as we all cut Harvey Weinstein out of our movie consumption? Should the writings of authors, or the music of musicians be burned because the author behaved badly? Who are the enablers, but also who will be the victims of our righteous vitriol?
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Abraham teaches us the being human is very complicated, that using power in the world is very complicated. And part of our Jewish legacy is knowing that we have complicated ancestors. We have almost no examples of good parenting in the Torah, and in our parsha this week Abraham manages to fail both of his sons in the most unequivocally extreme way. For Both Ishmael and Isaac, Abraham believes the right decision for his children, his children who he has been promised will number the stars in the heavens; Abraham believes he should be responsible for their deaths. First, he banishes Ishmael to the desert without enough food or water; then he attempts to sacrifice Isaac on an alter to God. Yet we revere Abraham. As modern Jews we believe one of the strengths of our Torah is the fact that our ancestors’ imperfections help us connect with them. Would we still be reading about Abraham nearly 5000 years after his story began if he’d been perfect, some ideologue we could never strive to be like? We continue to connect because if someone as imperfect as Abraham was able to connect with God, then perhaps we stand a chance too.
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So where does that leave me with our imperfect, disgraced cultural icons? Truthfully, I don’t know. I believe the actions they took, the abuse of power which clearly ran so rampantly and so openly, must be condemned in the strongest terms. People must lose their jobs, it must be made clear that it will not be tolerated from anyone, man or woman; gay or straight.
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But so too must we never write people off. Judaism believes in t’shuvah, repentance. We believe that God forgives our failings even when we have little merit (as Avinu Malkeinu states). It is much easier to say those actions make you bad, they make you garbage, you deserve the disgrace you receive. But this act of Schadenfreude might come back to bite us. Are we so perfect? Is there no dirty laundry we would wish not to be judged by? Do we not hope that like Abraham the legacy we leave our children will be greater than only the worst thing we ever did? I certainly hope my children learn much more from me than to lose your temper because I didn’t get enough sleep. (which I’m sure is hardly the worst parenting mistake I will make, but a regular one nonetheless).
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Repentance requires action, it requires acknowledgement of wrong doing, it requires in-person apologies to all you have wronged. It also requires no excuses. For those who the news has recently brought to light, surely the road to repentance will be long; but I hope that they travel it. If they show that they are striving to be better, to understand power dynamics and to respect all people’s right to their own bodies, if they choose to change and choose to be better, I hope we will not punish them for life.