[JOI Word of Torah] Big Tent Judaism: Toledot

[Kerry M. Olitzky]

“Big Tent Judaism” Word of Torah

 

November 10, 2007 / 29 Cheshvan, 5768

 

Toledot

 

This is a Torah portion that is replete with tension. It threatens to
explode on the surface of the narrative in each word. We can feel it pulling
at us as each verse unfolds to continue the saga of the ancient patriarchs
and matriarchs of the Jewish people. 

 

This portion is also filled with déjà vu. Each time we read it, we feel as
if we have read it before—and not just at this time in years past. Isaac
returns to Gerar where his father had been. He pretends that his wife Rachel
is his sister—to protect her—just as his father Abraham had done with
Isaac’s mother, Sarah. And then Isaac digs a well in the same place as his
father had dug. 

 

But the tension is what pulls me back to the portion. It is family tension,
the kind that permeates the entire book of Genesis, and it is family tension
that so many try to avoid. So people do what Isaac did. They skirt the truth
and tell themselves that it is to protect those they love when maybe it is
to protect themselves. But they try to follow their parents’ path (as in
redigging the well of Abraham) because they think that that is the only way
to bring peace to the family. Then they find that they can’t recreate the
past. And they have to forge ahead on their own before the life-giving
waters will flow forth and provide them what they need to continue their
journey.  

 

---

 

Rabbi Kerry Olitzky is the author of many inspiring books that bring the
Jewish wisdom tradition into everyday life, and is most recently the
co-author of 20 Things for Grandparents of Interfaith Grandchildren to Do
(And Not Do) to Nurture Jewish Identity in Their Grandchildren and Jewish
Holidays: A Brief Introduction for Christians.

 

To subscribe to the free weekly JOI Big Tent Judaism Word of Torah mailing
list, please send an email to PGolin at JOI.org. 

 

For more information visit: https://joi.org/mailman/listinfo/wordoftorah  

 

You are welcome to use these ideas in your own work and writings as long as
you would be so kind as to credit Rabbi Kerry Olitzky and the Jewish
Outreach Institute, thank you.

 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://joi.org/pipermail/wordoftorah/attachments/20071105/5154b3b4/attachment.htm