In our Torah reading for this week, called parashat Toldot (תוֹלדת), we learn that Isaac and Rebekah had been married for twenty years but were still without an heir to carry on the family line… Finally their prayers were answered and Rebekah conceived, though not without complications. When Rebekah inquired of the LORD about her travail, God told her that she was carrying twins that would be heads of two rival nations, but the younger child would in fact become the promised heir of the chosen people.
Category: Hebrew Reading Lesson
Reading Hebrew exercises and practice verses
Chayei Sarah Shavuah Tov Podcast…
Our Torah reading for last week (i.e., Vayera) told how God was faithful to Abraham and Sarah by miraculously giving them a son (Isaac) in their old age. Nonetheless, Abraham faced his greatest test of all by being asked to offer up his promised child as a sacrifice on Mount Moriah, the place of the future Temple. On account of his willingness to obey, God promised He would multiply Abraham’s offspring as the stars of heaven and that in his seed (singular) all the nations of the earth would be blessed.
This week’s Torah portion is called Chayei Sarah (חיי שרה), the “life of Sarah,” though it begins (paradoxically) with the account of her death, and tells how the first great matriarch of the Jewish people was buried in the Cave of Machpelah in Hebron, a burial site which Abraham had purchased from Ephron the Hittite (Gen. 23:1-20). Since the account of Sarah’s death is given just after the account of the near-sacrifice of Isaac (i.e., the Akedah), some of the sages link the events together, suggesting that the shock of the loss of her beloved son at the hand of her husband was just too much for her to bear…
Torah of Sorrows…
The Scriptures are filled with desperate cries of the heart… “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?” (Psalm 13:1-2). “Make haste to help me, O LORD, my salvation!” (Psalm 38:22). “My soul melts away from sorrow; strengthen me according to your word” (Psalm 119:28). “Answer me quickly, O LORD! My spirit fails! Hide not your face from me, lest I be like those who go down to the pit” (Psalm 143:7). God know that “hope deferred makes the heart sick” (Prov. 13:12), so there can be no turning to God, no teshuvah, apart from the presence of real hope (תִּקְוָה). Indeed, as the Apostle Paul wrote: “We are saved by hope” (Rom. 8:24).
Parashat Noach Podcast….
Last week’s Torah portion (Bereshit) showed how the mutiny of Adam and Eve caused humanity to plunge into idolatrous chaos. The subsequent generations lost sight of the LORD and became progressively steeped in moral anarchy and bloodlust, so that “every intention of the thoughts of man’s heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5). After just nine generations, the LORD had grown so weary of humanity that he “regretted” (i.e., yinchem: יִּנָּחֶם) creating man and “his heart was grieved” (Gen. 6:6). However, God recognized Noach (from the godly line of Seth) as a tzaddik (צַדִּיק), a righteous man of faith, and graciously made provision to save him from the wrath to come….
- Genesis 6:9b Hebrew page (pdf)
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Parashat Noach Podcast:
Originally recorded Oct. 2018….
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The Dust of God… (podcast)
“Then the LORD God formed the man from dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7). We tend to think of dust in self-effacing terms; for example, repenting in “dust and ashes” expresses unworthiness and sinfulness. Yet the dust God used to form Adam was not worthless, but instead represented very fine particles of creation, a substance suspended midway between heaven and earth, almost a “spiritual matter.” This is suggested by the fact that God first intended man to be his image bearer and only then used dust as the material for that higher end. The sages note that regarding the creation of animals, God said, “Let the earth (eretz) bring forth according to their kinds” (Gen. 1:24), but regarding man he said, “Let us make him be’tzelmeinu – in our image (as a photograph), after our likeness” (Gen. 1:26). Therefore God brought forth the lower animals in groups, but he created Adam as the only one of its kind, the son of God and prince of God’s creation. God breathed into Adam nishmat chayim (נִשְׁמַת חַיִּים), “a living soul” (the word neshamah [נשָׁמָה] is used to describe life breathed into humans, not to animals). The LORD breathed “out of himself” to share his own spirit with mankind… Therefore your soul does not come from nature, but from God; your inner essence originates directly from the LORD. Yeshua breathes out and says to you, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:22).
The very first occurrence of the Name YHVH (יהוה) concerns the creation of Adam. When Adam first opened his eyes and human consciousness was born, he immediately understood that the LORD created all things, including himself. According to midrash, Adam’s first words were, יהוה מֶלֶךְ עוֹלָם וָעֶד / Adonai malakh olam va’ed: “The LORD is King for ever and ever” (Exod. 15:18). God then said, “Now the whole world will know that I am King,” and He was very pleased. This was the “tov me’od” (טוֹב מְאד) moment of creation, when God saw all that He had made “and found it very good” (Gen. 1:31).
See the graphic below as you listen to an audio podcast lesson on the Hebrew text of Genesis 1:26 and you consider what is meant by the “image and likeness” of God:
Learning from our Struggles…
“You do not know what spirit you are of…” (Luke 9:55). Yeshua’s words imply that each of us has the responsibility to know ourselves (γνῶθι σεαυτόν), and to learn to endure (and overcome) the natural motives and focus of our hearts. We discover the truth of our spiritual condition in the midst of our daily frustrations, as we experience conflict, opposition, and the inner groan that arises from pressure and disappointment. Spiritual growth means learning to transcend our negative reactions, to stop cursing our conflicts, and to awaken to the blessings that surround and pervade our way.
God’s grace enables us to open our eyes so that we may “choose life and live” (Deut. 30:19). Our daily struggle with sin reveals the contradiction between the ideals of our faith and the spontaneous reactions of our heart…. We live in between the “is” and the “ought,” the real and the ideal (though often we deny one or the other). The impulse to despair, to be angry, to complain and curse our experience can be transformed into an opportunity to pray, to ask God for help, and to refocus on what is real.
This is the “hidden blessing” (ברכת סוד) of our troubles. When we learn to surrender to God’s Presence, we can breathe in his peace and love, despite the grief we encounter over ourselves and others. When we come to the light, and do not deny the truth about our condition, we can honestly ask the LORD for healing (Heb. 4:16). When we seek for the good – and even bless the struggle – we express our trust that God will use our sorrow to help us grow and to bring beauty from our ashes (2 Cor. 7:10). Hashivenu! “Turn us back to you, O LORD, and we shall be turned…”
The Breath of Hope…
When Moses proclaimed the good news of God’s forthcoming redemption for Israel, the Torah states that the people could not listen because they were “short of breath” (Exod. 6:9). Interestingly, this phrase (i.e., mi’kotzer ru’ach: מִקּצֶר רוּחַ) can also mean “lacking in spirit,” as if in a paralyzed state of hopelessness. But how did the people become so downhearted? Had they forgotten the promise given to Abraham (Gen. 15:12-14)? Had they disregarded Joseph’s final words (Gen. 50:24-25)?
According to some of the sages, part of the reason for their “shortness of breath” (besides the cruel bondage and hard labor imposed on them, of course) was that the Israelites miscalculated the duration of their 400 year exile, and therefore they began to lose hope. When members of the tribe of Ephraim tried to escape from Egypt some 30 years before the time of the redemption, they were all killed by the Philistines, and many of the Israelites began to believe that they would remain as perpetual slaves (Shemot Rabbah, 20:11). They became “short of breath” and could no longer receive the message of the Holy Spirit…
The Shepherd’s Call…
A message of teshuvah from our Lord: “What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray” (Matt. 18:12-13). Though it involves sorrow, and the pain of being lost, repentance is ultimately about finding joy, and when we return to God, we have reason to rejoice. The Good Shepherd says, “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost. Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance” (Luke 15:6-7). The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost: “For thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I myself will search for my sheep and I will seek them out… I myself will be the Shepherd of my sheep, and I myself will make them lie down, declares the Lord GOD. I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the banished, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the sick…” (Ezek. 34:11,15-16).
Destiny of the Soul…
The Scriptures define “man” as the creation of God, a union of body and soul, that is, a unity of physical and spiritual elements, as it is written: “Then the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground (adamah: אֲדָמָה) and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (nishmat chayim: נִשְׁמַת חַיִּים), and the man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7). The miracle of creation means that God imparted his own neshimah (נְשִׁימָה), his own “breath,” to give life to the man, who was named “Adam.”
Note then that man was made in two distinct stages. First the LORD “formed” (יָצַר) his body (גוּף) from the “dust of the earth” (עָפָר מִן־הָאֲדָמָה), and then the LORD breathed (נָפַח) into this body a “soul” (נֶפֶשׁ ,נְשָׁמָה), that is, the consciousness that represents the self or the “I” that inhabits the body. This is sometimes called the “image of God” (צלם אלוהים), the “I am” of self-consciousness, the ability to reason and to make decisions, to discern intuitions of logic, to apprehend moral and aesthetic reality, to wonder and glory over the the beauty and greatness of the Divine Presence, and so on. The image of God means that man reflects (analogically) God’s very attributes and characteristics.
The Scriptures also refer to the soul of man as “ruach” (רוּחַ), generally meaning “breath” or wind (Psalm 78:39). The unity of the body and soul is called “nefesh chayah” (נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה), a “living being.” The body serves as a “habitation” for the soul as it lives in this world, and the separation of this unity, that is physical death, causes the body to return to the dust, though the soul continues to exist (Psalm 90:3; Eccl. 12:7).
According to “kabbalistic” (i.e., neoplatonic) interpretations of Judaism, the individual soul goes through distinct stages in its “journey” emanating from God and then returning back to God. The first stage is nebulous “preexistence,” or the soul before it enters a body while being suspended in the “treasury of souls”(הָאוֹצָר); the second stage is physical life, when the soul “falls” into the body and where it is actuated, imprisoned and tested in human form. The soul then works to remove the barriers to spiritual life in this world, and upon death of the body is released to either to Paradise (heaven) or to Gehenna (hell), but finally, the soul will have a share in the “world to come” (olam haba) after the resurrection of the dead. In some forms of kabbalah the soul is reincarnated until it attains success in its mission that was given before it “fell” to the realm of this world (olam ha’zeh). The final vision of the world to come is unified into one world that is inhabited by God in all fullness.
It should be noted that such a kabbalistic vision is not biblical, though it includes some biblical truths…. Let’s therefore review Scripture to get an understanding of the human soul and its ultimate end. So we begin at the beginning, where Torah clearly states that God created Adam as a union of body and soul. First Adam’s body was formed from the dust of the earth, and then Adam’s soul was imparted when God breathed it into his body (Gen. 2:7). Note that Adam’s body apart from his soul is not alive, and it is only after the soul is imparted to the body that man is called “nefesh chayah,” a living creature. So at the outset of creation God made Adam “for life” and worship in the paradise of Eden. That was the original ideal.
The Miracle of Teshuvah…
Have you ever considered what the “self” really is? Most people tend to think of it, I suppose, as a conscious and emotional “center” of experience that is distinct from others and that has a sense of continuity through time and place. However, the self (or soul) has the ability to “transcend” itself, that is, to become conscious of itself, and this sets up an inner “dialog” within that enables the self to examine its own thinking, or to regard itself in relation to itself…. In this connection Soren Kierkegaard wrote of two types of “despair,” by which he meant a condition of being wrongly related to your self. First, you can despair by rejecting (or denying) the self, and second, you can despair by elevating and exalting your self. In the first case the self is “lost” or abandoned by various forms of escapism; in the second case, the self is “idolized” and given god-like prerogative; in either case, however, the self is in despair because it is not grounded in the truth of reality, since there can be no true “self” apart from relationship with God who is the ground of all being…
This is connected with the task of cheshbon ha’nefesh (חֶשְׁבּוֹן הַנֶּפֶשׁ), or taking account of ourselves to do teshuvah (i.e., repent). Note that Kierkegaard understood the experience of the “self” as a conscious “synthesis” of the infinite/finite, the temporal/eternal, and freedom/necessity, all in relationship to God, who is the Source and End of self-conscious life. We will exist in a state of “despair” when we attempt to deny any one of these paradoxes and thereby choose to understand ourselves apart from relationship with God. We all stand at the “crossroads” of the eternal and the temporal, and we can only know ourselves for what we are when we surrender to God for each irrepeatable choice of our lives. Because of this, teshuvah (or “repentance”) is an ongoing activity of the heart – the “daily bread” and sustenance in the way of becoming whole before God.