פרשת חיי שרה תש"ד - עבד אברהם

And Abraham was old, well stricken in age; and the LORD had blessed Abraham in all things.

And the LORD hath blessed my master greatly; and he is become great; and He hath given him flocks and herds, and silver and gold, and men-servants and maid-servants, and camels and asses.

And the servant said unto him: ‘Peradventure the woman will not be willing to follow me unto this land; must I needs bring thy son back unto the land from whence thou camest?’

And I said unto my master: Peradventure the woman will not follow me.

The LORD, the God of heaven, who took me from my father’s house, and from the land of my nativity, and who spoke unto me, and who swore unto me, saying: Unto thy seed will I give this land; He will send His angel before thee, and thou shalt take a wife for my son from thence.

And he said unto me: The LORD, before whom I walk, will send His angel with thee, and prosper thy way; and thou shalt take a wife for my son of my kindred, and of my father’s house;

And the servant ran to meet her, and said: ‘Give me to drink, I pray thee, a little water of thy pitcher.’

And before I had done speaking to my heart, behold, Rebekah came forth with her pitcher on her shoulder; and she went down unto the fountain, and drew. And I said unto her: Let me drink, I pray thee.

This is what the LORD meant when He said: Where had He spoken this? In the statement (Exodus 29:43), “And there I will be met by the children of Israel and it (the Tabernacle) shall be sanctified by My glory (בכבודי).” Read not here בִכְבוֹדִי, “by My Glory” but בִּמְכֻבָּדַי, “through My honoured ones” (Zevachim 115b). Moses here said to Aaron: “My brother, Aaron! I knew that this House was to be sanctified by those who are beloved of the Omnipresent God and I thought it would be either through me or through thee; now I see that these (thy sons who have died) are greater than me and than thee!” (Leviticus Rabbah 12 2). these are [the words] of Rashi from a midrash of our Rabbis. But if so, its understanding would be [as if the words stated], "and I will be sanctified by My glory," such that I will be holy in the eyes of all of the people and of My honored ones." And [R. Ibn Ezra] also said, "'This is what God has told me' - God has already told me that He will manifest His holiness through those who are near Him — even if they must suffer for it, as in the passage 'You only have I known…' (Amos 3:2) [etc.," as in the citation above].Thus the verse means, “When I manifest myself in holiness among them, then I shall be glorified; and I shall be glorified in the face of all the people, and they shall fear Me.” But if so, it was told, but not written down [in the Torah] - that God informed him of His ways, that this trait of His is like this. And in my opinion, according to the plain-sense, there is no need for all this because God "said" God's decrees, and thoughts, and the matter of God's ways. And this "speech" is entirely "I said to myself," (Ecclesiastes 1:16) i.e. "I thought this." "This is the reason why Joshua had the circumcision performed." (Joshua 5:4) This is the matter of "because of the money." (Genesis 43:18) And so to, "and let her be a wife to your master’s son, as the LORD has spoken." (Genesis 24:51) And similarly, "He laid its foundations at the cost of Abiram his first-born, and set its gates in place at the cost of Segub his youngest, in accordance with the words that the LORD had spoken through Joshua son of Nun." (1 Kings 16:34) So behold, really Moses said in this verse was: "This is what the LORD meant when He said to Himself, through those near to Me I show Myself holy so that my holiness will not be ruined and I will gain glory before all the people so that they will behave respectfully in my Tabernacle. And the reason that Aaron was silent was that he was crying loudly and fell silent.

And the man looked stedfastly on her; holding his peace, to know whether the LORD had made his journey prosperous or not.

Wondering at her. He was amazed at her zeal.

Remained silent. He did not try to dissuade her from troubling herself. Waiting to determine. The way she performed her good deeds was to be the test.

Whether Ad-noy had made. If she acted out of pure kindness he would know that his mission was successful.

ושני צמידים על ידיה, according to the size that fitted her wrists; this is similar to Exodus 28,22 ועשית עלי החושן שרשות גבלות, “you shall construct around it plaited chains of beaten gold,” or Exodus 25,11 ועשית עליו זר זהב, “you shall construct around it a golden border.” In each of these instances the measurements of the chains or border had to fit the pricipal artifact.

And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking, that the man took a golden ring of half a shekel weight, and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold;

The passuk is missing the act. for it should have said "the man took a golden nose ring 'and placed it' on her nose and 2 bracelets, on her arms." Therefore I say the explanation of this passuk is "The man took a golden nose ring and 2 bracelets 'to be' upon her arms" and said to her "whose daughter are you?" Only then after she said to him "I am the daughter of Betuel" did he place the nose ring on her nose and the bracelets on her arms, as he said to Rivkah's family later. However, it omitted the giving here (v.22) [although mentioned there (v. 47) And so we find in many places in the Torah.

ואשאל...ואשם AND I ASKED HER ... AND I PUT THE RING —He changed the order of proceedings for in fact he had first given the presents and afterwards questioned her. But he did this in order that they should not catch him by his own words and say, "How could you give her anything when you did not yet know who she was!"

2. And God blessed Abraham [with everything] - this is to inform/explain to us about what is said in [the text in] front of us, that Abraham did not send his servant to take a wife [for Isaac] on account of lack of women in the Land of Canaan or because no one wanted to mate with him, because Abraham had been blessed with everything and the entire world desired to mate with Isaac, but because he only wanted a spouse for Isaac from his family. This is why Abraham's servant said: "And Adonai blessed my master very much and he has become wealthy." And it is for this reason that the text needed to explain first that God had blessed Abraham "with everything," as in a similar instance: "And Ham was the father of Canaan" (Genesis 9:18).

ישלח מלאכו, I know they will give you their daughter.

נקרא לנערה, to find out if she wants to delay her move to your master’s country by a year or ten months, or if she wants to go now as you have said.