Torah Readers Reflections

The Torah  story of Isaac is a story full of surprises from beginning to end. In fact, one can critically say that this is not how a story is told - most of the relevant details are missing in this story. The commentators try to complete many details, which results in some order in the stories, but the differences between the various interpretations indicate that  what is hidden in the story is more than what is visible.

A very good example of this can be found in the story of Isaac's travels to Gerar:

1. There was a famine in the land—aside from the previous famine that had occurred in the days of Abraham—and Isaac went to Abimelech, king of the Philistines, in Gerar.
2. God had appeared to him and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; stay in the land which I point out to you.

……

6.  Reside in this land, and I will be with you and bless you; I will assign all these lands to you and to your heirs, fulfilling the oath that I swore to your father Abraham.
7. So Isaac stayed in Gerar.
8. When the local leaders asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” for he was afraid to say “my wife,” thinking, “The local leaders might kill me on account of Rebekah, for she is beautiful.”
9. When some time had passed, Abimelech king of the Philistines, looking out of the window, saw Isaac fondling his wife Rebekah.
10. Abimelech sent for Isaac and said, “So she is your wife! Why then did you say: ‘She is my sister’?” Isaac said to him, “Because I thought I might lose my life on account of her.”
11. Abimelech said, “What have you done to us! One of the men might have lain with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.”
12. Abimelech then charged all the people, saying, “Anyone who molests this man or his wife shall be put to death.”
13. Isaac sowed in that land and reaped a hundredfold the same year. God blessed him

 A good story is built with a logical plot, however the plot in this story is unclear and illogical. It raises a few questions:

1. How is it that there is hunger in the whole country but there is none in Gerar? 
2. Why does God tell Isaac not to leave the country, when it seems that Isaac had no such intention? 
3. Where were Jacob and Esau in the story? 
4. Why do the local people ask what is the relationship between Isaac and Rebekah after he decides to live there and not as soon as he arrives? 
5. If Rebekah is Isaac's sister why does no one want to take her (unlike Sarah)?
6. When they discover Isaac's lie, why don't they expel Isaac like they did to his father Abraham? 
7. What caused Isaac's incredible wealth? What does it mean to "find a hundred Shearim"? 

This is really just a sample, the missing details and the illogicality in Isaac's story is present throughout, both in his events and in his actions. This is also very evident in the story of the blessings. Why doesn't Isaac and Rebekah (who seem to have lived in a good relationship) talk to each other about the blessings? Why is Isaac not angry when he finds out what happened? Isaac says that he is already old, so he wants to bless Esau, but in the end, he lives for over fifty more years. The story of the wells that is told at length in the Torah is also a story full of misunderstanding, However this page is not long enough to list the discrepancies.

Why are the few stories that the Torah chooses to tell about Isaac so meaningless? 

This in itself seems to be a great study. We are used to thinking of the world as a clear and understandable world. A world that is conducted in a scientific way, where everything has a clear reason that if we try a little we can understand it. It's a good option to look at the world that way, but it doesn't always work. 

The world is full of mysteries, lack of understanding, and meaningless things and we are required to deal with them as well. Whether it is a lack of understanding between people, whether it is a lack of understanding of the happenings around us and in the world. Isaac, is a father who teaches us to deal with life through these lenses. Isaac puts up with the lack of systematicity of reality and continues to act in it despite and out of its illogicality. 

He does not understand why they fight with him about the wells - and he continues to dig. He wants to bless his eldest son and he is deceived - yet he is not angry. He maneuvers in a reality where not everything is clear. He lived with a close relationship to God, but not with the intention of understanding everything and he teaches us that it is possible to live in such a reality in a straightforward way, imbued with a purpose and a pleasant walk, precisely out of the acceptance that we will not understand everything. 

Isaac knew he had a path and he walked that path even when he didn’t understand what was happening around him. The Torah, which wants to convey to us in a meaningful way the way of the life of Isaac as such, fills the story with a lack of understanding so that we must wear these lenses and learn to deal with a life where not everything is understood. Isaac’s life is a life that has Laughter. Laughter is the expression that not everything goes "by the book" in reality and you have to learn to live with that as well in a moral and behavioral way of believing.   

Matan Schneweis