One of the most striking lacuna in the Torah is the reason for why God chooses Abraham (he’s still Abram at this moment, but I’ll refer to him by Abraham for simplicity). We are introduced to him briefly, and then his story begins with God’s instruction for Abraham to לֶךְ־לְךָ֛, to leave everything that is familiar to him and begin a long, unnerving journey.
One of the most famous and popular midrashim tries to explain Abraham’s selection: Abraham works in his father’s idol shop and smashes the idols in an act of rhetorical defiance and awareness that there must only be one God. I was shocked to find out that this was not actually in the Torah— I heard it told so many times in Hebrew school that I assumed it must be in the text, an experience I have heard from many people.
I see this story’s massive circulation as a reflection of the deep desire to understand why Abraham is chosen and a profound dissatisfaction with the Torah’s brevity. If Abraham is the founder of monotheism and the first Jew, it’s unsettling to think that God chooses him without a reason. And it conflicts with meritocratic sensibilities— shouldn’t someone do something to merit this honor?
The story of Abraham smashing his father’s idols works on at least two levels. First, it has all the ingredients of a great story: drama, destruction, generational divides, rebellion, and confrontation. If we are already inclined to root for Abraham, this story further cements his heroic status. Second, it works because Jewish readers see Abraham as a stand-in for the Jewish people. Depictions of Abraham function to aspirationally describe the Jews: we say who Abraham is with the hopes of shaping who we will be (or reflecting back who we already are— it is no surprise that Maimonides the rationalist philosopher paints Abraham as a rationalist philosopher). A midrash names this impulse:
He proceeds to identify a series of parallels that create connection between moments in the life of Abraham and in the life of the Israelites, particularly when they are enslaved in Egypt. Because we know that Abraham’s life hints at what is to come in the future, we are motivated to look into Abraham as a predictor of who we might become.
Maimonides did not create his philosopher Abraham out of nowhere. We get inklings of it from the Midrash:
In this powerful midrash, we see Abraham’s observational philosophy at work. He is compared to someone who recognizes a problem in the world and investigates it. The master of the castle only volunteers the information of his ownership after the traveler inquires. Similarly, God waits patiently to be found by Abraham. Abraham comes off as an astute student who sees the world and believes that there must be some force responsible, and God rewards his curiosity by choosing him. It is not surprising that the Rabbis would value a portrait of an intellectual Abraham who uses reason to make sense of the world and then is rewarded by God— they are engaged in their own intellectual pursuit which they hope will bring its own rewards.
For some of the Rabbis, Abraham is not just a propagator of the knowledge of God but also a partner in the creation of the world. In Genesis 14:19, King Melchizedek blesses Abraham after Abraham is successful in battle:
He blessed him, saying, “Blessed be Abraham of God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth.”
The straightforward reading would understand the final clause, “creator of heaven and earth,” to be a further honorific for God. Rabbi Yitzhak offers a provocative reading:
Rabbi Yitzhak creatively rereads the passage to not describe God but to be about Abraham. In Rabbi Yitzhak’s telling, Abraham is not just God’s messenger but God’s partner in creation which suggests that humans can be participants in creating the world.
Our midrash that compares Abraham to a traveler also highlights another aspect of Abraham’s identity, that of someone on the road. Abraham’s first action in the Torah is to move, and movement will define his life, the lives of his descendants, and ultimately the lives of the Rabbis and the Jewish people writ large. The midrash highlights the part of Abraham’s identity that will become central to the Jews— that of a people often on the move.
Other midrashim also comment on this:
In Rabbi Berekhyah’s beautiful analogy, Abraham’s travels allow him self-actualization. By moving around the world, Abraham spreads his discovery of God’s oneness and brings others into the fold. Isolated and at home, he can do no good. It is only when he leaves everything familiar to him that his essence is shared with the world, just as the fragrance of balsam-tree juice must be moved in order to be smelled. While Rabbi Berekhyah was based in the Land of Israel, he lived after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem where the displacement of Jews around the world was a fact of life. Even though God’s first dispatch to him reveals that Israel will be the land of his descendants, Abraham ironically becomes a kind of stand-in for Diaspora, where Jewish movement allows for the spreading of Jewish ideals and beliefs. Again, we and the Rabbis see in Abraham what we wish to see in ourselves or what we perceive ourselves already to be.
In these passages, we detect the literary genius of the Rabbis: they not only seek to better understand Abraham, they aspire to find themselves in the text. Thanks to their good work, we can join in and search for ourselves as well.
Wonderful. I’m loving learning from you!