Focus on the Future

Parshas Chayei Sarah

Posted on October 31, 2018 (5779) By Rabbi Berel Wein | Series: Rabbi Wein | Level: Beginner

The loss of one’s beloved spouse, especially after many years and decades of marriage and shared life, is always a traumatic and shattering blow. Those of us, who unfortunately have also experienced this occurrence of Avraham’s life in our own lives can testify as to the emotional damage and even physical harm that this sad experience can occasion.

 

We see from the life of our father Jacob that even decades later he reminds his children and himself of the pain and suffering caused by the death of his beloved wife, Rachel. In essence, it seems that Jacob never again was the same person after the death of Rachel.

 

However, Avraham apparently dealt with the death of Sarah in a more stoic fashion. The Torah itself indicates this by inference, when it wrote concerning Avraham’s reaction to the tragedy by using a small letter kaf in its description of the grief and weeping of Avraham over the death of Sarah.

 

It is not that Avraham is less grieved at the loss of Sarah then Jacob was at the death of Rachel, It is rather that after all of the challenges and trials that Avraham had already endured, his attitude towards life and its vicissitudes was now always one of looking forward and never dwelling on the past.

 

Those who live exclusively in the past are doomed to self-pity and great emotional angst. This only causes a sense of victimhood and hopelessness. It reflects itself in every aspect of later life and stunts any further spiritual, social, personal or societal growth. The greatness of Avraham, as taught us by the Mishnah, was his resilience and continued spiritual and personal growth. Avraham constantly looked forward – ahead – and never dwelled on past misfortune.

 

I heard an outstanding speech delivered by George Deek, a Christian Arab who is a member of the Israeli Foreign Office. In telling the story of his life he describes how his family lived in Jaffa for many generations and how they fled to Lebanon during the 1948 War of Independence.

 

Sensing the filth and political manipulation of the refugees by the Arab powers, whose sole goal was the destruction of Israel and not in saving and resettling the refugees, his grandfather escaped Lebanon and somehow brought the family back to Jaffa and Israel, regained his job with the Israel Electric Company. He raised generations of successful professionals, all citizens of Israel.

 

He said that the Jewish refugees from Europe and the Moslem world attempted to forget their past and build a new future for themselves and their descendants when they arrived in israel. The Palestinian Arab refugees, under the misguided leadership of their spiritual and temporal heads, reveled instead in their past defeats, in their legend of nakba and, in the main, devoted themselves to attempting to destroy Israel rather than rehabilitating themselves.

 

That attitude and mindset has served them badly and cost them dearly. The past needs to be remembered and recalled, treasured and instructive to us. However, it is the future and what we make of it that ultimately determines our worth and our fate. That is one of the great lessons to be derived from the story of the life of our father Avraham.

 

Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Berel Wein

 

Sarah Lived the Good Life

Parshas Chayei Sarah

Posted on October 27, 2021 (5782) By Rabbi Berel Wein | Series: Rabbi Wein | Level: Beginner

The Torah records for us the years of the life of our mother Sarah. It is done in a lengthy fashion counting one hundred years, twenty years and then seven years, instead of merely stating that she lived for 127 years. Rashi, in his famous commentary, states that this teaches us that that all her years were good ones.

 

At first glance, this is difficult to understand and accept. In reviewing the life of our mother Sarah, we are aware of the difficulties, dangers and frustrations that marked her experiences in life. Always threatened to be taken and abused by powerful kings, a woman who is barren and longs for children, a wife who has a concubine living in her home and presents her with a stepchild who is uncontrollable, and one who is finally challenged by the fact that her only miraculous child is going to be sacrificed by his own father.

 

One could hardly conclude that she had a so-called good life. In fact, I would say that most people would not wish such a life experience upon themselves. Yet, we find this to be the pattern in the experiences of all our forefathers and mothers, with very difficult lives. Rashi will later comment that when Jacob wished to have a more peaceful and serene existence, only then did the dispute regarding Joseph and the brothers blossom and explode. Rashi explained there that Heaven somehow is saying that the reward for the righteous is in the eternal world, and that they are, so to speak, not entitled to a leisurely and tranquil life in this world. And yet, in our Parsha, Rashi states that all the years of our mother Sarah, her entire lifetime, can be summed up as a good life.

 

Over the ages, many thoughts and ideas have been devoted by our great commentators to try and explain this statement and attitude. One of the main ideas is that a person can have a good life only if he or she learns the secret of accepting life in its basic terms and as it occurs. Lofty expectations always bring about disappointment and frustration. Low expectations can allow us to overcome the unavoidable vicissitudes that inflict all human beings during one’s lifetime.

 

Sarah has no illusions about life and about the challenges that she will face, having embarked on the path of her husband Abraham and the founding of the Jewish people. She will view all the occurrences of her lifetime, even those that apparently are negative and dangerous, if not even tragic, with composure and fortitude. There is a higher goal that she is striving to achieve, and this goal is always present in her assessment of life.

 

No matter what occurs in life, it somehow can push her forward on that path towards her ultimate goal. This notion transforms everything that transpires in her life to point towards good and eternity. In her eyes, all her experiences in life had a purpose, a noble one, that transforms the fabric of her life, and enables her to become the mother of Israel for all generations.

 

Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Berel Wein