B'reshith/Genesis
CHAPTER 12
1. Then YHWH told Avram, "Proceed for yourself [lekh l'kha] from your land and your native culture and your father's household, and go to the land that I will show you.
Proceed for yourself: or, “Get yourself walking (away)”. Avram had come the first leg on his father's terms (possibly to visit the temple of a fertility goddess for Sarai's sake), but now he is called to act on his own and totally leave familiar territory. One obviously cannot get where he is going if he stays where he is, nor can he go anywhere without leaving something else behind, though the purpose is what we are walking toward, not what we are leaving. YHWH would not just “translate” him to that place; he had a responsibility to do this part. It is an awesome thing in itself that He would even speak to a man. Dead weights must be left behind, or we will not get very far. The rabbis say he was the son of an idolmaker who destroyed some idols when his father was gone, and then said that if they were what his father claimed they were, they ought to be able to repair themselves. We do not know for sure when he started inclining his ear to YHWH, but it is inclined, and YHWH sees in him something that he wants to use. Adam and Chawwah failed, so He did not start this new creation in the same way; he started with people who were more mature. These were very mature! His wife is so old that it appears she cannot have children; this is our beginning, showing that YHWH can do anything He wants. He changes the method so we cannot assume we know how He does things. Here it is as if someone had simply said, “Go to Florida and I will show you something when you get there.” What part of Florida? “Don’t worry; just go there!” Imagine a tourist brochure for “the land that I will show you”—it would be blank, with the only words in it being, “Lekh l’kha!” This is the way of a Hebrew, which means “one who crosses over”, not knowing what is on the other side. But if he does not take the risk and go, he will never find out. It is the Gentiles who always want to know what is around the corner; the way of the Hebrew is to go and find out when he gets there. Yes, some preparations are necessary—take your walking shoes, staff, and some water. But there is no way to find out what the Sabbath, or dwelling in a sukkah, is like until you do it. Avram was not told yet what to walk toward. But he was told what to leave behind. Your land: This is the easiest step; it is common for people to move from one physical place to another. Native culture: the term includes everything into which he was born—natural family, the deities they worshipped, the circumstances into which he was born, and everything he has in common with those who remain there. Unlike those who move from China but start a Chinatown where they go, he is to leave behind everything that defined him, and let YHWH make him into somebody else. Yet he had already left Ur long ago. In doing so, his route had to take him through Bavel, so he could leave its ways behind as well. Many of our traditions, like crosses, steeples, Christmas trees, and a trinity were pagan ideas that started all the way back with Nimrod and came down to Christianity through Mithraism, which worshipped the sun, hence Sunday. So we, like Avram, inherited the sin of trying to overthrow YHWH, and until we confess that our fathers have inherited lies and that we have perpetuated them, and kill off the idolatry latent within ourselves, we cannot say they are just a thing of the past. But now Haran has been his home for some time. His father had stopped short of his original goal and built a life here. He not only settled in Haran; he settled for Haran, when he had been intending to go further, like the Northern Kingdom, which had been called back home, but which found Rome more comfortable and settled there (for if one is part of Rome, he will not be persecuted by Rome). A “father’s house” is a Hebrew idiom for the authority one is under—and his covering. He must come out from under his father’s roof by leaving behind his old loyalties and his father’s ways. Thus far his heritage had only been carried to a new location. Haran, bearing the same name as his deceased son, may have seemed enough like home to Terakh. So his journey stopped, and so did Avram’s, until YHWH called. Haran means “crossroads”, a place of choices. Haran was attached to the moon god Sin, which is the root of Islam (hence the crescent symbol), though most Muslims do not realize this. So he could choose one of today’s most prevalent religions, or go back to the other. (Both acknowledge Avram as significant, yet neither brought him far enough. Sun and moon are not things to worship, but servants of the true Most High.) Or he could remain like his father and refuse to choose. (It is better to choose the path than to have it choose you.) Or he could move on to another stage of the journey. He had another land to leave behind. He had to be “born again” again, just like the moon, which goes through many renewals. He was called to go beyond where his father’s walk had taken him so he can walk YHWH’s path. Our teachers can only take us so far; we can go still further. Our fathers camped in “the place of the deceased Son”, but we must not remain there; the resurrection tells us to go beyond that. There is still a land of promise to enter, as in the pattern repeated at the Exodus. We have to revisit the “place of the word” to learn how to get where we are going. We have to be more defined by where we are going than where we came from. We are Hebrews—descendants of the man who belongs to the other side. This is the foundation of Israel. One day all of Israel will be on the other side and will define the other side. It is a place YHWH will show him—literally “make him see”, or perceive. It was not the Land itself that He wanted to show him, like a tourist. Though it was more beautiful to look at then, that was not the main thing YHWH had in mind. There is a palpable difference in the air when one goes there. It is a place to perceive the truth about YHWH. He is not limited to this Land, but He does consider it sacred. But how can it be, if it is in the land of Kanaan, the pervert? Terakh had been headed there. He either had to be after the things of the flesh, or the tents of Shem, whom Kanaan was ordered to serve. He did have his tents in Kanaan (v. 6) Noakh had made him priest (14:18) and therefore teacher. So YHWH wants Avram there not because it flows with milk and honey, but because there was a “King of Righteousness” there who could teach him the ways of the Most High. His path is to prepare Avram to live there with Him.
2. "Then I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
3. "I will bless those who bless you, and curse the one who despises you, and into you shall all the families of the earth be grafted."
Not “the one who curses you”, as the translations often have it, but simply the one who does not take him seriously and does not treat him as important—and Lot himself ended up doing this, and paid a price for it.
4. So Avram went, just as YHWH had told him, and Lot went with him. And Avram was 75 years old when he departed from Haran.
5. And Avram took his wife Sarai, and his brother's son, Lot, and all their possessions which they had gained, and the persons whom they had prepared in Haran, and they left to go to the land of Kanaan. When they entered the land of Kanaan,
Persons whom they had prepared: literally, “souls they had made”. None of these were his blood relatives; already people were being grafted into his family (v. 3), probably people who had nowhere else to go, possibly being ostracized along with him when they questioned idolatry.
6. Avram traveled across the land as far as the site of Sh'khem, to the Oak Tree of the Teacher [Elon Moreh]; and the Kanaanite was in the land at that time.
The site of Sh’khem: The city was probably not there yet, as its namesake was contemporary with Avram’s great-grandsons. Avram’s father had actually set out to go to Kanaan. Why would a son of Shem want to go there? It could only be for one of two reasons: to gratify the flesh (the hallmark of Kanaan) or to fulfill his role as a son of Shem and teach the Kanaanites to serve YHWH instead. Avram seems to have this in mind, as the first place he goes in the Land is a place dedicated to teaching. He may have gone to see what was being taught by the Kanaanites, and thus confirmed that Shem’s teaching was indeed needed. (This tree may also have had some connection to Shem, the great teacher, himself, who would still be alive for two more generations. We later see him living about 30 miles away from here.) That Avraham came here first may also be the reason Yaaqov and Y’hoshua went to Sh’khem as soon as possible after crossing the Yarden, in addition to the fact that YHWH had told him to build an altar here and write the words of the Torah on it. Yoseyf, our ancestor, is buried there, so our path may take us there first as well.
Commentary on
Parashat Lekh L'kha
Get Yourself Walking!
