Core Questions:
1. What are different ways we understand Avram as a character, frame his story, and rationalize his decision to go?
2. How do tragedy and triumph interplay in Avram’s narrative?
3. How are we best able to understand our decisions? In the moment or in retrospect?
1. Empowerment in Going
שיר בבוקר בבוקר
אמיר גלבע גידי קורן ושלומו ארצי
פתאום קם אדם בבוקר
ומרגיש כי הוא עם ומתחיל ללכת,
ולכל הנפגש בדרכו קורא הוא שלום.
דגנים עולים מול פניו מבין חריצי המדרכת.
וניחוחות לראשו מדיפים עצי אזדרכת.
הטללים רוססים והרים, ריבוא קרניים,
הם יולידו חופת שמש לכלולותיו.
פתאום קם אדם...
והוא צוחק גבורת דורות מן ההרים,
ונכלמות משתחוות המלחמות אפיים,
להוד אלף שנים מפכות במסתרים,
אלף שנים צעירות לפניו
כפלג צונן, כשיר רועים, כענף.
פתאום קם אדם...
Song of the Morning
Amir Gilboa, Gidi Koren, and Shlomo Artzi
(Translation: Marcos Roca)
Suddenly a man wakes up in the morning
He feels he is a people and begins to walk
And to all he meets on his way he calls out 'Shalom!'
Corn stalks are growing up behind him
Between the cracks in the sidewalks and lilac trees
Shower down rich fragance on his head
The dew drops are sparkling and the hills are a myriad of rays
They will give birth to a canopy of sunlight for his wedding
Suddenly a man wakes up in the morning...
And he laughs with the strength of generations in the mountains,
and the shamed wars bow down to the ground,
to the glory of a thousand years flowing forth from the hiding places,
a thousand young years in front of him
like a cold book, like a shepherd's song, like a branch.
Suddenly a man wakes up in the morning
He feels he is a people and begins to walk,
and he sees that the spring has returned
and the tree is turning green since last fall's treeshedding.
2. The Rewards of Going
Some examples of Avram's rewards in rabbinic imagination:
ר' הונא בשם ר' אחא יו"ד שנטל הקב"ה מאמנו שרה ניתן חציו על שרה וחציו על אברהם
Rabbi Huna said, quoting Rabbi Acha: "The letter yud which was removed from Sarai's name was divided into two letters; one hei was added to Abram and the other to Sarah."
Why does one yud become two hei? Think, numerology...
And keep in mind this notion of name change...
3. The Pains of Going
Avot Yeshurun -- an experimental Israeli poet who played with Yiddish and Arabic within his Hebrew -- provides another, perhaps more cynical, lens on what it means to go.
Avot Yeshurun (1904-1992)
הספרות העברית תערוך את התפילה
אבות ישורון
אדם קם בוקר אחד, עזב את ביתו, משפחתו, ארצו, שפתו, שמו – כן גם את השם הוא השליך – והלך ועשה לו ארץ אחרת, בית אחר, משפחה אחרת, שפה אחרת, שם אחר.
כל המכתבים, הבקשות, הגעגועים, התחנונים, כל הדרישות שהריצו אחריו להחזירו ממעשיו, ושתכליתם היתה אחת – להסב את הגלגל אחורנית – נפלו על אוזניים ערלות והתנפצו על לב אבן.
כל זה רבץ על כתפיים של איש אחד.
Hebrew Literature Will Lead the Service
Avot Yeshurun
(Translation: Rafi Ellenson)
A person wakes up one morning. He leaves his home, his family, his land, his language, his name - yes, he even abandoned his name - and went and made another land for themself. Another home, another family, another language, another name.
All the letters, the requests, the longings, the begging; all of the demands that followed him so he would renege from his actions had one purpose - to turn the wheel back. These fell on deaf ears and shattered on a heart made of stone.
All of this weighs on the shoulders of one man.
גוט פון אברום (מתוך שיר בקשר)
אבות ישורון
אֱלֹהִים שֶׁל אַבְרָהָם, אַתָּה שֶׁיּוֹדֵעַ שָׂפוֹת,
שֶׁדִּבַּרְתָּ עִם אִמִּי בְּשָׂפָה עַתִּיקָה בְּיִידִישׁ,
בְּצֵאתְכֶם בְּשַׁבָּת
בֵּין הַכּוֹכָבִים,
הָעִבְרִית שֶׁלִּי לֹא נְקִיָּה.
הָעִבְרִית שֶׁלִּי חַפּ לַפּ וּמְדַבֶּרֶת חַפְּלַפּוֹת וּשְׁטֻיּוֹת, כִּי לֹא מַסְפִּיקִיָּה.
אֲנִי זֶה יוֹצֵא בְּלַיְלָה בַּגִּנָּה בַּכִּכָּר וּבְדִיזֶנְגּוֹף בְּחֹשֶךְ מִלִּים
שֶׁאִי אֶפְשָׁר.
אַתָּה שֶׁשּׁוֹמֵעַ לָשׁוֹן בְּשִׁבְעִים תַּרְגּוּם,
בְּלַיְלָה בַּגִּנָּה וּבְכִכַּר דִּיזֶנְגּוֹף,
רְאֵה: “מַה קָּנִית?” “נַפְטָלִין בִּשְׁבִיל הָאֲרוֹנוֹת”.
“גַּם אֲנִי רוֹצָה”. שָׂפָה שֶׁל יָמֵינוּ. לְהַגִּיד לְךָ מָה? זֶה יֵשׁ בָּנוּ.
{...}
Got Fun Avrom
Avot Yeshurun
(Translation: Jonathan Chipman)
God of Abraham, you who know tongues
who spoke with my mother in ancient Yiddish,
when you went out on the Sabbath
among the stars.
My Hebrew is not clean
My Hebrew is makeshift, and speaks makeshift and silly things,
for it is not enough.
I am the one who goes out at night in the garden, in the
square, and in Dizengoff, in a darkness of words
that is impossible.
You, who hear speech in seventy translations
At night, in the garden, in the square, in Dizengoff.
See: "What did you buy?" "Moth balls for the closets."
"I also want." The tongue of our days.
To tell you what? That this is what we have.
A point of clarification - Got Fun Avrom - the poem's title - means "God of Abraham" in Yiddish.
What's the image of Abraham in this poem? What about the God of Abraham/Got Fun Avrom (Are those the same thing?)? Why and how does it matter to specify?
What tense(s) is (are) this poem in? How does that play with its meaning?
4. Beyond the Binary of Triumph and Tragedy in Going
Dr. Aviva Zornberg, The Beginning of Desire: Reflections on Genesis “For the first time, a journey is undertaken not as an act of exile and diminution...but as a response to a divine imperative that articulates and emphasizes displacement as its crucial experience.” (74)
(א) ויאמר ה׳ אל אברם לך לך א״י או״ט די״ט בלע״ז, פירוש בעוד שהיה תרח באור כשדים.
(1) ויאמר ה' אל אברם לך לך, The Lord said to Avram: “go for yourself, etc;” While Terach and Avram were still in Ur Casdim, G-d told Avram to leave his homeland. He did not specify his ultimate destination.
Note that the reference Chizkuni makes is to when Terach, Avram, Sarai, and the others went from Ur-Casdim to Haran. That is, the imperative of לך–לך is from when Avram was in Ur-Casdim because the journey was alone. It both differs from and complements Ramban's commentary below.
אל הארץ אשר אראך היה נודד והולך מגוי אל גוי ומממלכה אל עם אחר עד שבא אל ארץ כנען ואמר לו לזרעך אתן את הארץ הזאת אז נתקיים "אל הארץ אשר אראך" ואז נתעכב וישב בה ומה שאמר ויצאו ללכת ארצה כנען לא להתישב בה כי עדיין לא ידע כי על הארץ ההיא נצטוה אלא שאחז צדיק דרכו דרך ארץ כנען כי כן היה בדעתו ובדעת אביו גם מתחלה בצאתם מאור כשדים ומפני זה אמר ויהי כאשר התעו אותי אלהים מבית אבי (להלן כ יג) כי היה תועה כשה אובד ויתכן לומר כי אברהם מבראשונה ידע כי ארץ כנען היא נחלת ה' ובה יתן ה' חלקו והאמין כי "אל הארץ אשר אראך" ירמוז לו על ארץ כנען או על כולה או על אחת מכל הארצות האל ושם פניו אל כלל ארץ כנען כי שם הארץ אשר יראנו באמת:
"To the land that I shall show you": he wandered aimlessly from nation to nation and kingdom to kingdom, till he reached Canaan, when God told him, "To your seed I shall give this land" (12:7). This was the fulfillment of "to the land that I will show you," and therefore he settled there...Before that, he did not yet know that that land was the subject of the command...This is why he later said to Avimelekh, "God made me wander from my father's house" (20:13). For indeed, he wandered like a lost lamb.
5. Making the Decision to Go
Adrienne Rich
Prospective Immigrants Please Note
Either you will
go through this door
or you will not go through.
If you go through
there is always the risk
of remembering your name.
Things look at you doubly
and you must look back
and let them happen.
If you do not go through
it is possible
to live worthily
to maintain your attitudes
to hold your position
to die bravely
but much will blind you,
much will evade you,
at what cost who knows?
The door itself makes no promises.
It is only a door.
Further Questions for Consideration:
1. How do we understand Avram's decision? Can it only be judged b'diavad (in retrospect)?
2. This sheet mostly studies Avram outside of the context of Sarai or Lot or anyone else who accompanied him, ditto for the song פתאום קם אדם written in the singular, or talking about Avot Yeshurun coming to Mandatory Palestine alone. How does adding the others who joined Avram in this journey affect this conversation?
3. What are the moments in your life that have seemed tragic at one time and then later triumphant? What are the moments in your life that have seemed triumphant at one time and then later tragic? What moments have always been both?
4. How do names, titles, and language affect our behavior? What are names we were called as children that evoke warm feelings? Sad feelings? Pain? Joy? Nostalgia?