BS”D

Chaye Sarah – Unreal Estate

Dr M Bank

A Guten Erev Shabbos everyone.

This week’s parsha is parshas Chaye Sarah. Traditionally a lot of people go to Hevron for. We contemplate a real estate deal done roughly 4,000 years ago. If we think about it, what were the assets, the wordly assets, that Avraha and Sarah had acquired during their journey through this world? What real estate did they own. What wordly investments had they made in the stock exchange, realty, houses, palaces, mansions. Many people in those days had built homes. Avraham and Sarah had a tent, a flock of sheep and cattle. Some herdsmen who took care of their flocks. Really if you could describe it in todays terms, they were nomads. They were going from place to place, their flock was eating off the land, and they didn’t have a permanent address. If you think about it, Avraham was maybe one of the richest people in the world, in his generation. The Pharaoh had showered him with gifts. He was blessed with exponential prosperity. His flocks were so large that Lot and Avraham’s flocks could not exist on the same terrain. So Lot had to go to the place with the most lush vegetation at the time, almost like the valley of Eden, the Dead Sea Valley today. That whole valley supported Lot, his nephew, his flocks. So what was the wealth of Avraham Avinu? He must have been fabulously wealthy. So, for a person who is wealthy one of the first things they think of is lets set roots, buy a house, find a nice neighbourhood. Lets own some real estate. I would like to call this weeks parsha, unreal estate.

Shidduchim for Olam Hazeh and Olam Haba. The real bayis neeman.

How do we build our internal Bayis Neeman?

A person buys an enormous mansion in this world. He puts all his life’s savings into it. Who knows. Maybe an earthquake swallows it up. Maybe he falls on hard times and he has to sell up hi home and move to something smaller. He has to leave the country. Whatever it is. In this world, nothing is guaranteed. The only thing that we take with us from all the assets, gold and silver and that which we acquire in this world, is that which we translate into mitzvos. The greatest mitzvah that we can acquire in this world is children in Torah. That is the regel hadavar, that is what our neshama stands on in shomayim.

So all our forefathers are standing on our good deeds. I know its hard to imagine but that’s how it works.

Avraham Avinu had no real estate in which to bury his wife. Sarah died in Kiryat Arba, which is Hevron, in the land of Canaan. Avraham eulogized and bewailed her. There is a small kaf in the word velivkosa. We learn from this that his weeping was kept very private. It was a very tznius family. People had no idea of the true wealth of Avraham Avinu until today. All that we can understand about Avraham Avinu is his chessed and emes to he level we can understand it. It says that there are three middos that you can be sure that if a person has them, he is from the pedigree of Avraham Avinu. That it is from his home. Chessed, tznius – anavah, to be very modest and hidden and busha, to be bashful (embarrassed). For us as Jews to be embarrassed if somebody notices what we are doing is a very Jewish thing. To be very modest and not to look ofr Kavod or applause. Not to look for wordly recognition, because we are looking for H’s acknowledgement and His blessing. Chessed, whatever H has given us, is not for ourselves, but rather so that we can help others, so that we can bring out the best. Avraham’s grief was infinite but the full measure of his pain was concealed in his heart and the privacy of his own home, according toRav Hirsch.

Now Avraham Avinu had t take care of the mitzvah of burying his dead. This is a mitzvah of such urgent proportions, that a person is not allowed to pray or do any other mitzvah until they have done this one, except of course, for pikuach nefesh. A person doesn’t have to dig a grave for a Comrade if they are under fire. The tradition in Jerusalem is even to bury at night. This shows the extent of mehudar in the mitzvah, not letting the neshama suffer for even one moment. The chevra kadisha are tremendously righteous people, the most righteous in the community. When they bury the deceased they plead for forgiveness for anything they might have done during their short time with the deceased’s body that might in any way have caused it any pain or suffering. It’s a tremendous insight that we see from this, that a person in their life has so many relationships where one sie offended the other, that we carry with a heavy heart. How much more so whena person leaves this world, that his grave and his name shouldn’t be desecrated, that one hs to be very careful both with the living and with the dead. A famous thing that my late father zt”l said was, ‘if you can’t say something good about a person, say nothing’. We see Avraham Avinu immediately rose and spoke to the children of Het saying, I aman alien and resident amongst you, a ger toshav. So we understand from this hi tremendous humility. He had areay beenpromised the land for his descendans, but not yet for him. So everything that he ould own, the plot, was insignificant comared to the mitzvah of burying his beloved wife, his soul mate. The one that H had chosen for him to perpetuate the purpose of reation through Am Yisrael. Throgh Sarah came Yithak and then Yaakov – Yisrael. So this was a divine decree set before creation, that there would be Am Yisae. As long as there is heaven and earth, there will be Am Yisrael (BE’H). So this was the start of world history, the nation of Israel’s forefather taking cae of his beloved wife. Avrham could have said, H promised me this land, give me what I want. What did he say? I am a resident alien, I have no right to be here, I am so privileged, I beg you from the bottom of my heart. What did they say? The people answered him, ‘You are a prince of the Lord in our midst”. They saw him as very great. He saw himself as nothing, dust and ash. Which is also a remez of the akeidas Yitzhak. H had promised Avrahm that he would become a great nation. He was almost reduced to ashes, before Avraham took the ram instead, which is also a source for the Shofar of Elul and Rosh Hahana to remind us that we are also dust and ash. Instead, an infinite miracle happened and we became a mighty nation because of the emuna of our forefather Avraham Avinu. So they told him, we are so privileged to have you in our midst. In the choicest of burial places, bury your dead. Not one of us will withhold his personal burial place from you. Whatever you want is yours to bury your dead. Avraham responded, if that is truly your will, heed me, intercede with Ephron the son of Zohar. Let him grant me the Cave of Machpela, which is his, on the edge of his field, let him grant it to me for its full price, in your midst, as an estate for a burial site. Whatever he wants, we are not negotiating, just say your price. So when a person negotiates something, the worst thing a person can do is say, name your price. Then the zeros click like at the gasoline pump. The prices are unlimited. We see the total emuna that Avraham Avinu had. The more that they charged, the more of a mitzva it was in his eyes. He saw something infinitely beyond this world. He realised that by having it an an unregretable price for the seler, he would have it forever. Ephron was sitting in the midst of the children of Het, and he responded to Avraham in the hearing of the children of Het, for all who came to the gate, saying ‘No, my lord, heed me. I have given you the field, and as for the cave that is in it, I have given it to you. In the sight of the children of my people I have given it to you. Bury your dead’. So now he had included th field and would demand a King’ ransom, fitting for a prince of H’. So Ephron mentioned the price. If we could imagine it today, a silver coin back then was a block of pure sterling silver. It may have been worth 1000 dollars. It is not like todays shekels, 400 NIS could buy you a DVD player or you could take your family out for a meal. We are talking about something infinitely more. That’s half a million dollars to bury your dead. For every Avinu it was worth it to fulfil the mitzvah in all its details as he had learnt it. How many burial places do we know for our forefathers. Yet for Avraham Yitzhak and Yaakov, we know exactly where they were buried – Maaras haMachpela. The 12 tribes – most of their burial places are unknown until today. Many of us don’t know from which tribe we came. That will be revealed in the time of the moshiach. Even beyond that, in the 3,600 years since our forefathers came back from Egypt, who knows where every one of their forefathers are buried. Yet we know exactly where the Avos were buried 4,000 years ago. The only thing disputed is who owns it. Ishmael and Esav also lay claim to Maaras HaMachpela, but we know that it will eventually come back to us. That depends on us entirely, to rise up to the become a light unto the nations. Avraham heeded Ephron, weighed out the price he had mentioned before the childen of Het, 400 silver Shekels in international currency. The sale of the cave, the field, all the trees and the surrounding boundaries was confirmed. Afterwards Avraham buried his wife.

So we are going to explore now probably the most epic event. When we look at the details of how it is described in the Torah, it is startling – mind boggling. Avaraham takes his trusted servant Eliezer and makes him take an oath not to take him a wife from Canaan. This also excluded Eliezer’s daughter, whom Eliezer wanted to introduce into Avraham’s household. The whole war against the Kings is covered in a couple of sentences. In contrast, the shidduch of his son fills almost a whole parsha. We see that the miht of war is not a big deal to H’. He can give the might over to the weak easily but a shidduch is truly an important thing. It is the most important decision most people make in their entire life. Under the generation you have to have a vision of all your generations – all your forefathers, tradition has it, come with you under the chuppa as well, to pray for you and for all the descendants that will come from you. The question is not whether you have the right woman. H can make any marriage fantastically successful. Sara had no children until she was 90. Yet, trough that child the world was perpetuated. When she heard Yitzhak was on the Akeida, she got such a shock, she passed away. She had accomplished her infinite mission in this world ad H had taken her back.

Imagine your father has an electrician or plumber, a foreman, or a manger for his business. He works for your father for several years. All of a sudden he father asks him to go across to Europe or Iran and to find a bride for his son. I trust you. If you were the son, would you accept such a thing. You might say, Dad I know you have my best intentions at heart, your foreman is a good man, he’slaid a lot of foundations, earns his salary …. The essence is bitachon which creates the stablest marriages. If the fathers are in Torah and the mother are also in Torah, you can build very firm foundations. In the secular world the father says go out and have a good time because when you’re married you’ll be trapped. This is a tragic message. Our purpose in this world is to perpetuate the recognition of H and to perform the ratzon H’. For every one of us involved in mitzvos, you guys giving up everything and coming from the four corners of the world, to Yerushalayim. You have no idea what a zhus it is, that all our fathers were pleading with H to do Krias Yam Sus to bring them back to Torah and Eretz Yisrael. By doing these two you can sustain the world for eternity. With these you can build.

Imaine your on the highway and your car breaks down. Its late at night and there is almost no-one on the highway. A car pulls over and the driver looks respectable. He asks if he can help and gives lift to the nearest village. The car looks decent. However, as soon as you get it, the driver puts his foot flat on the gas, there is a line of smoke from the back of the vehicle, and the driver is flat-footing it at 180 km/hour, the rain is treacherous, they ar dunk, you can smell their breath, and they are driving into oncoming traffic on the wrong side of the road with the lights off. What do you feel? Regret for eternity for the tragic mistake you just made, going with somebody without fear or concern for their on life or anybody else’s. You cry out to H’, please save me from this totally hopeless situation. Versus a person who pulls up to the side of the road, from the AAA, who says, OK Sir, we can help you, but we need to go back to the city. We can take you back to the city, there is a place there where you can have a nice hot cup of coffee, or whatever, and we’ll bring all the equipment to help you with your car. The guy drives very carefully, he is very cautious. What is the likelihood of getting to your destination? Very good. The reckless driver is an analogy for a person traveling through this world without torah. Versus the other kind of driver, who is safely on his way to his destination – his portion in the world to come, not prematurely, but in its right time after having accomplished everything that was meant to be accomplished in this world.

How could Avraham have sent his servant and not gone himself?

If you brought your prospective wife to meet your father, would he say I’m too busy, just show her to the manager and if he likes her, it’s a done deal. Not many parents would endorse such a marriage. But, imagine if they say, if the rabbi gives his blessing, I give my blessing. That is on solid foundations. If the Rabbi shows concern, then what might otherwise have seemed OK is likely to be a mistake. If there is not spiritual blessing, then there is likely to be no blessing. Imagine if the rabbi identifies that she was not converted Jewish at all. Because of Avraham Avinu’s advanced age, says the Ramban. This was three years after Srah Imeinu’s death. She was 90 when she had Yitzhak. She died at 127. He was now 40. The Mishna suggests a person should get married at 18, but there is still hope at 40 and Yitzhak shows. Just don’t leave it any latter! Eliezer was his shaliach, as wellas , in a way, a shaliach for H, although he was also not young. Avraham Avinu knew that Yitzhak would listen to Eliezer.

Avraham’s objection to the daughters of Canaan could not have been based on idol worship, as his family in Haran also worshipped idols. Rather, it was something far deeper – the moral degeneracy of the Canaanite nation. Idolworship is an intellectual deficit that can be remedied with education. A lack of morals can affect the core of a person’s entire behaviour. It therefore disqualified a person from marrying a forefather of Am Yisrael. Or, for that matter, any one of Am Yisrael. If a person who is not modest, kind and bashful, you have to suspect that they are not really part of Am Yisrael. So at this stage Eliezer said to Avraham Avinu, when Avraham said “rather than choosing amongst the Canaanites, to my land and to my kindred shall you go and take a wife for my son Isaak”. So it seemed that H’s covenant was Eretz HaKodesh. Thi land and not that land. But, at that stage he was a resident alien, the birthright hadn’t yet come to fruition. As h told Avraham Avinu, you will be a stranger in a strange land or 400 years. So we see from that, that exactly until the moment Am Yisrael came into Eretz Yisrael, it was 400 years. That your descendants, Avraham, from the birth of Yitzhak Avinu, until am Yisrael cam e into Eretz Hakodesh, was exactly 400 years, to a day. So we that avraham an his descendants were all Ger Toshavs, resident aliens. Visitors that had no rights. So the land Avraham Avinu had come from was the land where he knew his family were. He felt that for Yithak Avinu, the right soulmate was from that family and from my kindred shall you take a wife for my son Yitzhak. Eliezer said, maybe she will not want to come. Should I take Yitzhak there? Maybe when they see him they will agree. Avraham said whatever you do, do not take him back there. G-d of Heaven, who took me from the land of my forefathers, from the place of my birth, who swore to me saying, to your offspring will I give this land, he will send an angel before you and you will take a wife for my son from there. If the woman shall not wish to follow you, you will be absolved from this oath of mine. Do not return my son to there.

Why is it so important that Yitzhak Avinu should not go to Haran.

An interesting question considering shidduchim nowadays. If a person can’t find a shidduch in Irael, it is one of the 3 things a person can leave Israel for. A shidduch, parnassah and for health. He might meet an young lady in Hutz LaAretz, they might settle there, but who knows what will happen with the second generation. It says in Pirkei avos, beware of your words, lest you been sent in Golus, and your disciples, which is really your children, the greatest disciples a man has, will drink from poison water and perish. What is poisoned water? If Torah is considered to be the Be’er Mayim Hayim, the spring of living water, poisoned water is that tainted by idolatrous philosophies, be it philosophy, alien faiths or even technology. All these things can cause tragedy to a person living in Torah in Eretz Hakodesh. So from all those things, challenges exist. So the questionis, when a erson has generations of children in hutz LaAretz, what is the likelihood of every one of them returning to Eretz Yisral and Ir haKodesh. Statistically, not very much. Very frightening.

But, if a person makes the move, with his body and soul, moves to Yerushalayim and dedicates his life to Torah, What is the likelihood of staying in Eretz Yisrael or Ir Hakodesh? Pretty good. It’s a real, sincere Aliya. So we see how important it was for Avraham Avinu and how important it is to us. If a person meets a potential partner and she doesn’t want to stay in eretz Yisroel, then you have to question whether it is the right shidduch. So it turns out Eliezer went with a huge entourage of flocks, camels. He made a “deal” with H. H, G-d of my master Avraham. May you so arrahnge it for me this day, that you do kindness with my master Avraham. See, I stand here by the well of water and the towns’ daughters approach to draw water. Let it be that the maiden that I shall ask ‘please tip over your jug so I may drink’ and who answers ‘ Drink and I will even water your camels’. Her will You have designated for Your servant, for Isaak. And may I know through her that You have done kindness with my master”.

So he set up, in a sense, a condition. If we look even deeper into that, it is almost like a prophecy. It has to be that she is not only at the level where she wants to help human beings. She also feels the suffering of animals. Her hospitality is that she wants to help.

May you all be zoche to find the right partners here in Eretz Yisrael and may we see the Geula Shleima, Beis Hamikdash, Moshe Rabbeinu, Aaron Hakohen the Avos and Imahos, bimheira veyameinu.

A Guten Shabbos to Kol Am Yisrael.