This week’s parsha (Torah portion) is called Lech l’cha which in Hebrew is a command to go to yourself. The person giving the command is god and he is commanding Avram (who becomes Avraham later in this parsha). What else is in the parsha, you ask? A good question, and I am glad you asked.
Let me share with you a quick summary: God commands Avram to go to himself and from his homeland and the house of his father and to a land that god will show him. God then tells Avram how full of blessings he will be for the world. Avram leaves with his wife and his nephew Lot and travels to the land of Canaan, to a place called The Teaching Tree. It is here that god first tells Avram that this is the land he is promising to Avram’s offspring.
Famine occurs and Avram goes to Egypt. Before entering Egypt, he tells his wife Sarai to say she is his sister and not his wife because he fears he will be killed for her. The Pharaoh of the time takes Sarai and Avram gains wealth. Pharaoh figures out that Sarai is really Avram’s wife when Pharaoh’s household is touched by a plague, and he sends Avram and Sarai away.
They go back to the land with Lot, and Lot separates from Avram because the land cannot support both of them. Lot goes to live near Sodom. After Lot leaves, god tells Avram to look around and all the land that he sees will be given to his children. Avram travels to a place called The Trees of Reflection, which are in Chevron (Chevron literally means friends, so the trees of reflection are with the friends).
At this time, a war is fought between 4 kings and 5 kings, and Lot is taken captive. Avram goes after the kings who captured Lot and defeats them with only 318 men. He returns with everything that was taken by the kings, and is met by a man called The Kings of Righteousness, who is king of Shalam (health and wholeness). This king brings him food and wine and blesses him. This king (in Hebrew, his name is Malki-Tzedek) is also a priest of the most high power (yet another name for god – Kel Elyon).
Avram returns everything he got from the war, keeping nothing for himself. God again visits Avram saying, “I am your shield,” and that Avram’s reward will be very great. Avram says back that he doesn’t know what god will give him considering he has no-one to carry on after him, that he has no offspring.
God tells him he will have children and Avram has faith in god. God then says a third time to Avram that this is the land his children will inherit. Avram has his doubts, and god tells him a ritual to do to find out. Avram does the ritual and, “A heavy sleep falls on Avram. Behold a great, dark god-mother (the word here is Ayma whose 4 letters are interwoven of the word for mother and a name for god) falls on him.” This dark-mother-goddess-aspect tells Avram that his offspring will be slaves for 400 years in a foreign land, and will leave that land with great wealth and they will return to the land, but the sins of the peoples on the land will not be completed until that time.
Sarai, at this point gives her maidservant Hagar (meaning the sojourner) to Avram as a wife because Sarai has not been able to produce children. Hagar conceives and Sarai and Hagar have problems because of this. Sarai mistreats Hagar and Hagar runs away. An angel comes to Hagar and tells her to go back and accept the suffering, and she will have a son (Yishmael meaning god will hear).
God comes to Avram again and tells Avram that he is Kel Shadai. This is often translated as God Almighty, but it can also be translated as The Power of Enough, or The Power of my Breast.
God tells Avram to walk before her and be tamim (perfectly simple/innocent…it is a hard word to translate), and they make a covenant where god tells Avram his name is now Avraham, and Sarai is now Sarah, and lots of other things including that all males starting with Avraham need to be circumcised as a sign of this eternal covenant.
God then tells Avraham he will have a son thru his 90 year old wife, Sarah. After Avraham laughs at this, god tells him to name the boy Yitzchak (Isaac) which means laughter.
This is the whole parsha. Wow. I was trying to keep it to be a short summary, but I feel like I wrote a whole book.
With so much going on, one can find a lot of things to talk about. What strikes me at this moment is the process of getting close to god, or, how to get from one place of being to another.
This parsha is the command to go within oneself. What happens when one does this? What happens when somebody starts on a spiritual journey?
At first the person feels like they have been given lots of blessings. They find a teacher (see the teaching tree) and they get a glimpse, a taste, of their promised land.
But that feeling of elation soon turns to one of emptiness, of famine. A person no longer feels like they are getting nourished from their journey.
At times like this, one needs to be disciplined and focused. This is Avram going to Egypt, for Egypt in Hebrew is Mitzrayim, which means narrows, and is a place where you have to narrow your focus.
When one can keep their focus and discipline, they discover a new and higher joy in their spiritual path. This is the leaving of Egypt and returning to the promised land with newfound wealth.
At this point of one’s spiritual growth, one often finds they need to shed something they have brought with them, because it has become unsustainable. Often times it is a bad habit, but it could also be an attitude or belief. Usually this is precipitated by an internal conflict. This is the fight between the shepherds of Lot and Avram and the people on the land, and leads to Lot leaving Avram.
When one sheds what they no longer can sustain, they are given another reminder of their purpose or goals. This is god showing the land again to Avram. Avram settles at Eylone Mamre, which can be translated to The Trees of Reflection.
At this point in one’s journey, you have to start looking at yourself, at your own reflection. You can no longer rely on a teacher telling you; you are too deep. You need to be willing to see your own pure reflection, to see who you really are. You have to be able and willing to accept and fight for those parts of you that you don’t like. This is represented by Avram fighting Lot’s captures.
It might seem contradictory to let go of Lot and then fight for Lot, but Lot is representing two different things. In both cases, he is things you don’t like about yourself. In the first case, where Lot leaves, he is a part of you that you realize is not really a part of your essence. In the second case, he is your dark side, your shadow.
When Avram returns, he doesn’t accept any of the spoils. This is important because you don’t want to be taking on other peoples’ stuff. Give it back to them! If you can do that, you will be blessed and god will protect you (I am your shield, god tells Avram).
Somewhere on your journey, you will get to a place where you don’t feel you can sustain the journey; you have a lapse of faith.
For Avram, this is where he questions god about who is going to inherit the land. He questions because he is old and he has no children.
If you can move past that place of doubt, then you have created a bond with god that is permanent. This bond is a part of you and is unshakable, and is represented by circumcision.
When that bond is created, you become a changed person. In Jewish tradition, a person’s name is their essence. Hence when Avram forges this bond with god, his essence changes and so does his name. As a new person, what seemed impossible before (for Avram and Sarai having children) becomes possible (for Avraham and Sarah).
Whew! We just covered a lot of material. I hope everyone was able to stay with it. As always, I welcome questions and comments. And I wish everybody the strength to go within themselves and to stay on their quest for whatever it is their soul is yearning for, on the land of their dreams, and during the times of famine.
If you want to read what I wrote about this parsha last year, click here.
About the Author
Shmuel Shalom Cohen spent 10 years studying Torah in Jerusalem. Six years ago, he started Conscious Torah to help Jews connect to their tradition in ways they didn’t think possible. Shmuel also started, and is the executive directory of Jewish Events Willamette-valley, a non-profit whose mission is to build Jewish community, pride, and learning. In his free time, Shmuel likes walks in nature, playing music, writing poetry, and time with good friends.