Parshas Chayei Sarah

 

This week’s Parsha, Parshas Chayei Sarah, could be described as a parsha that is about death. After all, it begins with the death and burial of the matriarch and ends with the death and burial of the patriarch. (That may sound almost depressing, but it cannot be forgotten that in-between is the foundation of the next generation – the shidduch of Yitzchak and Rivka.) As significant as it is to have their passings and their burials recorded, the state of the world today bares a constant reminder of the other critical aspect of this parsha: the acquisition of a burial plot for Sarah.

 The details of the actual purchase of Marat Hamachpela are vital for the Jewish people to know and understand. Avraham’s specifically public negotiations and payment set the tone for all of his descendants. Even while Hashem had promised Avraham that his children and his children’s children, the myriad there would be for generations, would inherit the land, there were right ways and wrong ways to go about it. Avraham’s insistence on a clean purchase, on no solicitous gifts or false faced dealings such as those presented by Ephron the Hittite, reverberates through history and empowers us even today.

 It is interesting to note that Ephron the Hittite is recorded at both the beginning and the end of the parsha. The beginning, when the negotiations are recorded, make sense. Why, however, does the Torah repeat Ephron’s name when Yitzchak and Yishmael bring their father to his final resting place.  “His sons Yitzchak and Yishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron son of Zohar the Hittite, facing Mamre, the field that Abraham had bought from the Hittites; there Abraham was buried, and Sarah his wife (Bereishis 25:9-10).

 The obvious answer is that his name is attached here for clarification, so that no one will be confused about where Avraham was buried. That answer is just a bit too obvious because it would simply be redundant information. Bereishis 23 makes the purchase very clear by the burial of Sarah. We must, therefore, look deeper.

 The Midrash notes in Bereishis Rabbah 58 that Ephron was greedy. His persona is associated with Mishlei 28:22: “A greedy man rushes after wealth; and he does not know that diminishment will befall him.” His diminishment is noted in the Torah in that Pasuk 23:16 “diminished the letter vav from him.”  And while this specific short-form is noted at the end of the negotiations with Avraham, the negotiations in which Avraham demonstrated straight-forwardness and integrity, it should be noted that the short form is also used in the one reference to Ephron in perek chaf-hey. Avraham was willing to pay whatever price was necessary for Machpela, even the bloated evaluation of Ephron the Hittite. Thus stating the contrast between the two and legitimizing Avraham’s purchase of the cave.

 But this set of pasukim in Perek Chaf-Hey catch the commentators’ attention for other reasons. The pasuk states: “His sons Yitzchak and Yishmael...” Proper format, even according to today’s etiquette, is that the name of the elder child goes first. And while we know that Yitzchak was Avraham’s true heir, Yishmael was, nevertheless, his first-born son. A fair number of commentators, such as Rabbeinu Bahya and the Ramban determine from this pasuk that Yishmael has, by the time of his father’s funeral, done complete teshuva. This explanation means that not only did he repent of all his ways, but that he started following his father’s path.

 In doing teshuva, Yishmael needed to do more than just turn his life around. He had to overcome a possibly justifiable sense of righteous indignation at being seconded by a much younger brother. He had to put aside his jealousy at the bracha showered upon Yitzchak. He had to “see” that there was a designated path and accept it. Let’s be realistic, it probably was not an easy thing for him to do.

 Adding in the fact that Yishmael set his pride aside and acknowledged Yitzchak’s position at Machpela reminds us that Yishmael was fully cognizant of the legitimacy of the claim of Yitzchak’s descendants to the Promised Land. However, there is still a lingering question as the why it was necessary to repeat “the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron son of Zohar the Hittite, facing Mamre, the field that Avraham had bought from the Hittites.”

 We have all seen the maps of the Middle East. There are giant splashes of one color and a tiny sliver of another – a provocative reminder of the size of the claim the State of Israel has for a Jewish national holding compared to the size and number of Arab states. By stating this very specific location, the Torah is setting a reminder that we may claim only that which is ours and that we have no need for that which is others. The Jewish nation has no desire for anything more than its homeland, and the fact that it is our homeland – that Yitzchak’s descendants had precedence – was acknowledged and respected by Yishmael, the forefather of the Muslim people.

 Good Shabbas and Mazal Tov Eitan Kelly on you Bar Mitzvah this Shabbas.