What did Avraham really give his Pilagshim

(6) And to the sons of the concubines of Abraham gave Abraham riches and moveable property as gifts, and sent them away from Izhak his son while he (yet) lived; and they went and dwelt eastward in the land of the orient.

He gave them money

נתן אברהם מתנות, “Avraham had already given gifts.” According to the Talmud in tractate Sanhedrin folio 91, these “gifts” were the ability to utter the names of the holy name of the Lord without thereby incurring severe harm. Even nowadays, according to our author, the Moslems who are trained in theology are able to do this without coming to any harm thereby. It was difficult for Rabbi Moses to understand how Avraham a great and devout man could possibly have taught the holy Name of the Lord to wicked people. In view of this problem, Rabbi Yaakov, son of Rabbi Nachman, interpreted that line in the Talmud differently by saying that the word טומאה used in the Talmud there refers to the names of certain demons. The names of these demons are associated with the evil spirits making their homes in certain ruins, or certain cemeteries as described by the Talmud in tractate Chagigah folio 3. This is alluded to by the fact that the spelling of the word “matanot” is spelled as if it were a singular, the letter ו having been omitted. As spelled in the Torah here, the numerical value of the letters in the words נתן אברהם מתנת equals the numerical value of למדם להשביע השדים. [I have not quite figured this out. At any rate, the idea is that Avraham taught these sons of his how, when they used the names of deities when swearing an oath, they could do it in such a way as not to be guilty of violating the third of the Ten Commandments. To The reader who is interested in pursuing this further I suggest that he turns to the commentary on Sanhedrin 91 by Rabbi Reuven Margolies, page 136 מרגליות הים. Ed.]

נתן אברהם מתנות, “Avraham gave substantial gifts;” [in lieu of a share in his estate. Ed.] Our sages (in Sanhedrin 91 understand the word מתנות as referring to the names of different types of pagan deities, i.e. he taught them how to protect themselves against curses uttered in the name of such “deities.” Our author, quoting another source believes that we must understand this as what is taught in Sanhedrin 65, הלן בבית הקברות כדי שתשרה עליו רוח טומאה, “if someone spends the night in a cemetery in order to endear himself to the demon whose domain this is, he is guilty of violating the commandment no to seek advice from the dead.” (Deuteronomy 18,1) The fact that the word מתנות is spelled defectively, (without the letter ו before the final letter) lends support to this interpretation, as the way it is written the numerical value of the word 890) מתנת) is equal to the numerical value of the combined words למדם להשביע השדים, “he taught them how to swear by the demons in order to neutralise their power.”[According to this editor’s arithmetic the numerical value of למדם להשביע השדים totals only 854. The whole subject is wrapped in mystery. The interested reader is referred to the Torah Shleymah by Rabbi Menachem Kasher of blessed memory, who on page 996 of his commentary on this parshah has a great deal more to say about it. Ed.]