WEBVTT 00:00:02.000 --> 00:00:08.000 Shabbat Shalom, everybody! It's great to be with you. Today is November 15th. 00:00:08.000 --> 00:00:13.000 We are in Parshat Chaye Sarah, which is, like, 00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:17.000 all the Torah portions, a very lovely Torah portion, and we'll… 00:00:17.000 --> 00:00:21.000 give you a quick synopsis in the very beginning. 00:00:21.000 --> 00:00:25.000 As we make our way in. 00:00:25.000 --> 00:00:27.000 I want to invite, before we begin, 00:00:27.000 --> 00:00:29.000 If there were names… 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:32.000 that people want to offer up to dedicate our 00:00:32.000 --> 00:00:37.000 Session 2 for their healing. 00:00:37.000 --> 00:00:42.000 Yeah, just please unmute. 00:00:42.000 --> 00:00:47.000 My cousin Joyce Lee. Who is fighting glioblastoma? 00:00:47.000 --> 00:00:51.000 Hmm… 00:00:51.000 --> 00:00:56.000 Healing of spirit and healing of body. 00:00:56.000 --> 00:01:01.000 And for her care team. 00:01:01.000 --> 00:01:02.000 Leslie and Joan Gardner. 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:03.000 Leslie and John Gardner. 00:01:03.000 --> 00:01:05.000 for them. 00:01:05.000 --> 00:01:12.000 Dennis Faber, who's healing from cancer and cancer treatment. 00:01:12.000 --> 00:01:19.000 And Marie Neal will be going for lung surgery for cancer in a week. 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:22.000 For healing hands. 00:01:22.000 --> 00:01:36.000 My friend Johanna, who just had a mastectomy. And the family of Anamendieta, who just lost their matriarch. 00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:42.000 My cousins. Jeff Lori. 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:48.000 And our beautiful… Denise, right? 00:01:48.000 --> 00:01:50.000 Thank you, everyone. 00:01:50.000 --> 00:01:52.000 If there are other names, please put them in the 00:01:52.000 --> 00:01:55.000 chat box, let's offer up… 00:01:55.000 --> 00:01:59.000 Abraha for learning and dedicated to their healing. 00:01:59.000 --> 00:02:01.000 Baruch Hatta Adonai. 00:02:01.000 --> 00:02:03.000 Elohenu melechalam. 00:02:03.000 --> 00:02:08.000 Ashearchanubimitzwetavitsivanula asok, Torah. 00:02:08.000 --> 00:02:09.000 Amen. 00:02:09.000 --> 00:02:17.000 Blessed are you, Adonai, our God, sovereign of the world, and of healing, and of Shabbat, who makes us holy in 00:02:17.000 --> 00:02:19.000 Connecting commands. 00:02:19.000 --> 00:02:26.000 And commands us to busy ourselves in words of Torah, Shabbat Shalom, everyone. 00:02:26.000 --> 00:02:30.000 The Parshach Haasara, the life of Sarah, 00:02:30.000 --> 00:02:38.000 is, uh… Saga does not make an appearance, because Sarah already has died. 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:40.000 and having died. 00:02:40.000 --> 00:02:43.000 She is buried in the cave of Machpelah. 00:02:43.000 --> 00:02:47.000 Which is a whole story in itself. 00:02:47.000 --> 00:02:49.000 And then Avraham… 00:02:49.000 --> 00:02:52.000 being widowed, right? 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:57.000 what's the next thing you do? Naturally, you try to get your son married. 00:02:57.000 --> 00:02:59.000 So he sends his… 00:02:59.000 --> 00:03:06.000 servant whom we understand to be Eleazar. 00:03:06.000 --> 00:03:08.000 My God is help. 00:03:08.000 --> 00:03:09.000 Hmm. 00:03:09.000 --> 00:03:16.000 Literally his name. Sends Eliezer off to Avraham's… 00:03:16.000 --> 00:03:20.000 The big family over yonder. 00:03:20.000 --> 00:03:25.000 A bunch of miraculous things happen, of course, because it's Torah. 00:03:25.000 --> 00:03:31.000 LEAs are finds the family, 00:03:31.000 --> 00:03:35.000 They identify Rivka. 00:03:35.000 --> 00:03:38.000 And there's a whole discussion about what's to be. 00:03:38.000 --> 00:03:41.000 And that's where we will pick up our intrepid heroes. 00:03:41.000 --> 00:03:44.000 This week. 00:03:44.000 --> 00:03:52.000 With that, we… I have, uh, Rachel and I have chunked this into 6 mini-chunks. We're in Genesis 24. 00:03:52.000 --> 00:03:57.000 toward the end, and you'll notice this is a long chapter. 00:03:57.000 --> 00:04:02.000 Usually you see 20 Sukim, 20 sentences, 30 sentences at most. 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:06.000 We're going through verse 67. 00:04:06.000 --> 00:04:09.000 So let's please do what we do. 00:04:09.000 --> 00:04:11.000 And as we read… 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:13.000 See what pops for you. 00:04:13.000 --> 00:04:17.000 in the Midrash space of what connects. 00:04:17.000 --> 00:04:22.000 What wants to be lifted up? 00:04:22.000 --> 00:04:26.000 Her brother and mother said, Let the maiden remain with us. 00:04:26.000 --> 00:04:37.000 days or 10 months, then she can go. Avraham's servants said to them, Do not delay me. Yudhay Vavhe made my way successful. 00:04:37.000 --> 00:04:46.000 Give me leave to go to my master. They said, we'll call the girl and ask her mouth. 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:52.000 They called Tarifa and said to her, will you go with this man? 00:04:52.000 --> 00:04:57.000 And she said, I will go. So they sent off their sister, Rivka. 00:04:57.000 --> 00:05:04.000 And her maid with Abraham's servants and his entourage. 00:05:04.000 --> 00:05:13.000 They blessed Rivka and said to her, Sister, may you grow into thousands of myriads. May your descendants inherit the gates of their foes. 00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:18.000 Rivka and her maids arose, mounted the camels, and followed the man. 00:05:18.000 --> 00:05:29.000 The servant took Rivka and went. 00:05:29.000 --> 00:05:34.000 Someone. 00:05:34.000 --> 00:05:44.000 It came from going from Beir Le Chaurot. As he had settled in the Negev region, Isaac went out Lasuach. 00:05:44.000 --> 00:05:55.000 in the field toward the turn of evening. He lifted his eyes, and he saw, and behold, camel's approached. 00:05:55.000 --> 00:05:58.000 Rivka lifted her eyes and saw Yitzhak. 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:03.000 She got off the camel and said to the servant, Who is that man walking in the field toward us? 00:06:03.000 --> 00:06:06.000 And the servant said, That is my master. 00:06:06.000 --> 00:06:09.000 So she took her veil and covered herself. 00:06:09.000 --> 00:06:19.000 The servant told Yitzchak all the things that he had done to get Rivka. Yitzchak brought her into the tent of his mother, Sarah, and he took Rivka as his wife. 00:06:19.000 --> 00:06:30.000 Yitzchach loved Rivka and found comfort after his mother's death. 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:33.000 or we start doing what we do. 00:06:33.000 --> 00:06:36.000 No… 00:06:36.000 --> 00:06:38.000 that but for this… 00:06:38.000 --> 00:06:43.000 piece here, there would be no us. 00:06:43.000 --> 00:06:47.000 Think about it. Abraham? 00:06:47.000 --> 00:06:48.000 Isaac? 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:51.000 Mm-hmm. 00:06:51.000 --> 00:06:56.000 everybody else. 00:06:56.000 --> 00:06:58.000 So this is not… 00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:02.000 just a small plot point. 00:07:02.000 --> 00:07:03.000 Delia. 00:07:03.000 --> 00:07:09.000 I, um, I'm so thrilled that the translation here said, ask her mouth. 00:07:09.000 --> 00:07:15.000 Because that's not usually… What it's translated, it's usually saying we will ask the. 00:07:15.000 --> 00:07:22.000 The young girl… the young girl, but. in… is this the one that says the young man, the young woman, the yelled? 00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:23.000 This is not actually any particular translation, this is… 00:07:23.000 --> 00:07:28.000 The. 00:07:28.000 --> 00:07:29.000 Um, this is us. 00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:30.000 hours. We are literally, you know, at Piha. 00:07:30.000 --> 00:07:37.000 Right, but… but… Yeah, but that… right, but the asking is consulting an oracle. 00:07:37.000 --> 00:07:39.000 Ooh! 00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:46.000 in the, like, third definition of unbrowned drivers and Briggs, but I thought this was also the one. 00:07:46.000 --> 00:07:50.000 Where sometimes in the Torah, it says we will ask. 00:07:50.000 --> 00:07:56.000 the young… the young girl, the young man, and they have it in parentheses. 00:07:56.000 --> 00:07:57.000 Yeah, not in this case. 00:07:57.000 --> 00:07:58.000 Yell it and yell duh. I don't… Not in this case. 00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:00.000 Not in this case. 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:07.000 Okay, but asking is… um, so she's… it's a kind of behind the scenes that we have women with a lot of power here. 00:08:07.000 --> 00:08:08.000 Hmm, love that. 00:08:08.000 --> 00:08:10.000 Dut, duh duh! 00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:16.000 Not that going into, um, Sarah's. Um, tent. 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:23.000 And he… It looks like Isaac really. 00:08:23.000 --> 00:08:28.000 is able now to say goodbye to his mother. 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:29.000 Hmm. 00:08:29.000 --> 00:08:37.000 With Privka with him. 00:08:37.000 --> 00:08:40.000 I see David's hand. 00:08:40.000 --> 00:08:42.000 Um… 00:08:42.000 --> 00:08:46.000 Well, because I read Rabbi David's blog this week, 00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:47.000 You cheater. 00:08:47.000 --> 00:08:50.000 I… I know… I know to ask about the, uh… 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:54.000 The untranslated word lasuach. 00:08:54.000 --> 00:08:57.000 You noticed that, huh? 00:08:57.000 --> 00:08:58.000 I did. 00:08:58.000 --> 00:08:59.000 cheater. 00:08:59.000 --> 00:09:00.000 Mm-hmm. 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:05.000 And I… I don't know, I assume… I assume it's written that way. 00:09:05.000 --> 00:09:11.000 In part to get our interest, but also because it's not exactly translatable. 00:09:11.000 --> 00:09:12.000 English. 00:09:12.000 --> 00:09:17.000 Indeed, the verb la suach and, uh, 00:09:17.000 --> 00:09:24.000 I'm thinking of one of you in particular who seems to really love this word, is a Hepax Legamina! 00:09:24.000 --> 00:09:29.000 Good morning, James! 00:09:29.000 --> 00:09:34.000 It's a hapex, meaning it appears nowhere else. 00:09:34.000 --> 00:09:39.000 And so, we have to figure it out as best we can using what tools we've got. 00:09:39.000 --> 00:09:41.000 Uh, we will get to it. 00:09:41.000 --> 00:09:44.000 And we'll see some different answers over the course of our morning. 00:09:44.000 --> 00:09:46.000 Yep. Yep. 00:09:46.000 --> 00:09:50.000 Thank you, David, the check's in the mail, even if you cheated. 00:09:50.000 --> 00:09:51.000 It's not cheating, that's just paying attention. 00:09:51.000 --> 00:09:55.000 I know that. 00:09:55.000 --> 00:09:58.000 What is Isaac? I should have said Yitzrak. 00:09:58.000 --> 00:10:04.000 doing there. 00:10:04.000 --> 00:10:07.000 Bring it. What's… what's reading you here? What's… 00:10:07.000 --> 00:10:14.000 What says Darshani? You've got to Midrash me. 00:10:14.000 --> 00:10:16.000 I see Joan's hand, and then I… 00:10:16.000 --> 00:10:19.000 I think I saw Delia's hand again. 00:10:19.000 --> 00:10:20.000 I didn't. I did not see Delia's hand. It's not there. 00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:25.000 No, you didn't. No. 00:10:25.000 --> 00:10:30.000 Did something… Did something give him a hint? 00:10:30.000 --> 00:10:35.000 That would… that… we're not aware of to go out looking. 00:10:35.000 --> 00:10:37.000 Ooh… 00:10:37.000 --> 00:10:40.000 Why did he go out 00:10:40.000 --> 00:10:47.000 What was that about? 00:10:47.000 --> 00:10:51.000 Yup. Beauties. 00:10:51.000 --> 00:10:52.000 I FUCK YOU DID! 00:10:52.000 --> 00:10:56.000 I do have a hand. It's actually like. No, I was just touching my mouth, but I guess someone knew I had a hand. 00:10:56.000 --> 00:10:58.000 And then Nancy, then Susan. 00:10:58.000 --> 00:11:11.000 Um, it's actually kind of like my dog. when someone is coming to my house, they know it when the car… you know, she starts barking, and I go, no, no, they're not here yet. 00:11:11.000 --> 00:11:12.000 Mm-hmm. 00:11:12.000 --> 00:11:13.000 But she feels them on the way. 00:11:13.000 --> 00:11:16.000 Yep. 00:11:16.000 --> 00:11:18.000 Some of the rabbis asked that question, too. 00:11:18.000 --> 00:11:29.000 Uh-huh. Although the next time I get a dog, I might name it Yetzchrac. Okay, Nancy and then Susan. 00:11:29.000 --> 00:11:30.000 Mm-hmm. Glad you noticed that. 00:11:30.000 --> 00:11:38.000 She took her veil and covered herself. Why did you feel… Why did she feel the need to cover herself? What was going on? 00:11:38.000 --> 00:11:42.000 Um, that… I don't know. 00:11:42.000 --> 00:11:45.000 Okay, so let's stay with that a second. 00:11:45.000 --> 00:11:48.000 It has your attention here. Midrash… 00:11:48.000 --> 00:11:56.000 is not just a brain game, right? So, Midrash is also trying to leap over the longest 18 inches in the world between head and heart. 00:11:56.000 --> 00:12:02.000 So, I'm curious whether it's Nancy or somebody else 00:12:02.000 --> 00:12:10.000 What's the emotional space of that curiosity? What does it feel like? 00:12:10.000 --> 00:12:14.000 Sacred. Um, I mean, I had two thoughts. One is. 00:12:14.000 --> 00:12:22.000 she's ashamed, for some reason. She feels embarrassed for some reason, and she feels she has to cover herself, or. 00:12:22.000 --> 00:12:28.000 Or she's feeling something like there's something between us, and I'm not sure I want this. 00:12:28.000 --> 00:12:33.000 or I feel that I have to cover it up because it's sacred. 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:34.000 Mmm. 00:12:34.000 --> 00:12:37.000 it's a real mixed bag for me of what. 00:12:37.000 --> 00:12:40.000 The sacred spiritual mixed bag. 00:12:40.000 --> 00:12:41.000 Yeah. Mm-hmm. 00:12:41.000 --> 00:12:42.000 That might be. Or fear. Yeah. Or here, yeah, she wrote. 00:12:42.000 --> 00:12:44.000 Uh, Natalie, is it on this? 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:53.000 Uh, yes, um, when I saw the piece about the veil, I thought about the wedding veil, and how brides are traditionally covered. 00:12:53.000 --> 00:13:00.000 Until they approach their groom, and then, you know, there's a ceremony around lifting the veil, so… 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:02.000 I was wondering if it was connected. 00:13:02.000 --> 00:13:06.000 Tune in to The Next Generation, where we get into a little bit of trouble. 00:13:06.000 --> 00:13:14.000 And I just want to lift up Adam, as mentioned in the chat, it may have been a cultural norm for women to be veiled around strangers. 00:13:14.000 --> 00:13:15.000 Mm-hmm. 00:13:15.000 --> 00:13:17.000 Which we know is still a cultural norm in some places. 00:13:17.000 --> 00:13:20.000 Mm-hmm. 00:13:20.000 --> 00:13:29.000 Interesting. Susan and then Joan. 00:13:29.000 --> 00:13:32.000 Okay. 00:13:32.000 --> 00:13:33.000 Please. 00:13:33.000 --> 00:13:37.000 I don't want to interrupt the flow. I was going to respond to the previous question about… Is that okay? So… I feel like he went into the field. 00:13:37.000 --> 00:13:41.000 Um, to meditate. Um, to open itself. 00:13:41.000 --> 00:13:48.000 To nature and to… Um, do something prayerful. 00:13:48.000 --> 00:13:50.000 Fascinating. So… 00:13:50.000 --> 00:13:57.000 Which might have been hinted at a little bit in my Devartora last night at CBI about 00:13:57.000 --> 00:14:00.000 ways of connecting at the… 00:14:00.000 --> 00:14:05.000 at the shifting time of evening. 00:14:05.000 --> 00:14:15.000 Fasten… oh, wow, there were so many hands! Alright, in this order, maybe. Joan Deanna James Sherrill. 00:14:15.000 --> 00:14:20.000 That word modesty that I think still exists somewhere. 00:14:20.000 --> 00:14:21.000 Yeah. 00:14:21.000 --> 00:14:27.000 Um, the, uh… If this was possibly going to be a. 00:14:27.000 --> 00:14:37.000 A husband, um, you, you would cover yourself as someone commented about the wedding ceremony. 00:14:37.000 --> 00:14:44.000 Because you should not be uncovered before a. A strange man, but also because. 00:14:44.000 --> 00:14:47.000 It reminds me of the dipping down to come up when you. 00:14:47.000 --> 00:14:58.000 You retreat before you. come into a new situation. It's almost like an emotional preparation for big change. 00:14:58.000 --> 00:15:00.000 Ooh… 00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:04.000 Descent for the sake of ascent. 00:15:04.000 --> 00:15:09.000 That's gorgeous. 00:15:09.000 --> 00:15:19.000 Okay, we're getting deep and real here. Deep. Pun. Sorry. Deanna James Sherrill. 00:15:19.000 --> 00:15:32.000 and it expresses. some of what I was going to say, but in a different way, um… When we read that, and she… covered herself upon seeing him specifically. 00:15:32.000 --> 00:15:44.000 Not just any stranger. My feeling was… Yes, appropriate, because it's a threshold moment. She's about to meet this person who is. 00:15:44.000 --> 00:15:49.000 going to be her husband, she's going to be his wife, and it's so huge. 00:15:49.000 --> 00:15:54.000 You can't take it all in at once, you have to take a step back, you have to cover yourself. 00:15:54.000 --> 00:16:01.000 There's a kind of safety in covering yourself, not because there's danger, but because you have to, like. 00:16:01.000 --> 00:16:09.000 Let your system integrate this big thing that you're about to step into. 00:16:09.000 --> 00:16:17.000 Um… The poet David White wrote a beautiful essay about shyness. 00:16:17.000 --> 00:16:28.000 And it's about this. It's the only positive thing I've ever read about shyness, and I'm very shy, so I'm very aware of that. And he talks about the necessity for shyness when you are about to enter into. 00:16:28.000 --> 00:16:37.000 something very huge, like a significant relationship, that it is actually a sacred moment, not just a moment, a process. 00:16:37.000 --> 00:16:42.000 And that the shyness serves a function. a slow approach. 00:16:42.000 --> 00:16:48.000 So, that's part of it, and then also, I just have this question at the very top. 00:16:48.000 --> 00:16:56.000 Why does she just go with them? And say, yeah, I'll marry this guy. Is there a backstory that I. 00:16:56.000 --> 00:17:07.000 I mean, I'm unaware of everything in Torah, so is there a backstory that I need to know about this that would explain her motivation? Because, um… you know, as… Okay. 00:17:07.000 --> 00:17:14.000 There is not, which is part of why this moment gets seized on in a lot of Midrash, 00:17:14.000 --> 00:17:17.000 Because it's a heck of a thing that she does here. 00:17:17.000 --> 00:17:22.000 Yes, exactly. So I want to know her motivation. Why does she just automatically say. 00:17:22.000 --> 00:17:24.000 Yes. To this situation. 00:17:24.000 --> 00:17:28.000 Yep. Yeah, I mean… 00:17:28.000 --> 00:17:37.000 Hmm. Have we seen this before? 00:17:37.000 --> 00:17:39.000 Wait for it. 00:17:39.000 --> 00:17:42.000 Unless you happen to have it. 00:17:42.000 --> 00:17:46.000 Have we seen this before? 00:17:46.000 --> 00:17:50.000 Sure, I'll go. 00:17:50.000 --> 00:17:55.000 I want to say again, don't look at her as a young girl. 00:17:55.000 --> 00:17:56.000 There you go! Somebody got it. 00:17:56.000 --> 00:17:57.000 Abraham. Abraham, Abraham, Abraham! 00:17:57.000 --> 00:17:58.000 So, is this an Avraham Lechlecha moment? 00:17:58.000 --> 00:18:01.000 No. Okay. 00:18:01.000 --> 00:18:04.000 If I could spell it. 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:07.000 Aha! 00:18:07.000 --> 00:18:08.000 Maybe so, maybe so. 00:18:08.000 --> 00:18:13.000 And… and is she answering with a much deeper knowledge? 00:18:13.000 --> 00:18:16.000 Not just a young woman going to a. have a new husband. 00:18:16.000 --> 00:18:18.000 So you're back to the oracular, yeah. 00:18:18.000 --> 00:18:20.000 I'm back to the Oracle, yeah. Yeah. 00:18:20.000 --> 00:18:23.000 Yup. Yup. 00:18:23.000 --> 00:18:25.000 Yup, yup. 00:18:25.000 --> 00:18:33.000 This is getting real, folks! James Sherrill! 00:18:33.000 --> 00:18:36.000 So, is it okay to go back to, uh, La Sloch? 00:18:36.000 --> 00:18:37.000 For a moment. 00:18:37.000 --> 00:18:38.000 Lasuach! 00:18:38.000 --> 00:18:39.000 What is Isaac doing? 00:18:39.000 --> 00:18:41.000 So, 00:18:41.000 --> 00:18:45.000 he's lost his mother. He's grieving, he's beside himself. 00:18:45.000 --> 00:18:48.000 To say it simply, he's a hot mess. 00:18:48.000 --> 00:18:50.000 And, um… 00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:53.000 What do these… 00:18:53.000 --> 00:19:01.000 these patriarchs, these men of God, etc., do when that happens. 00:19:01.000 --> 00:19:02.000 He thought they don't? 00:19:02.000 --> 00:19:05.000 Heatbo did. 00:19:05.000 --> 00:19:07.000 Yep. 00:19:07.000 --> 00:19:08.000 Oh, we will get into that. 00:19:08.000 --> 00:19:09.000 Um, that's exactly what that screams to me. I… I… 00:19:09.000 --> 00:19:11.000 Yeah, put that down. 00:19:11.000 --> 00:19:17.000 I think he's going out. I mean, the whole scenery, you know, the fields and all that such in the evening. 00:19:17.000 --> 00:19:24.000 He's going out to basically pray, meditate, to be with God, to walk with God. 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:27.000 Um, it's, it's, it's a sense of communion. 00:19:27.000 --> 00:19:30.000 with… with the man upstairs. 00:19:30.000 --> 00:19:35.000 And I think that that is appropriate to the story and the timing here. 00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:38.000 Um, obviously… 00:19:38.000 --> 00:19:43.000 This woman knows that this man is beside himself with disgrace, 00:19:43.000 --> 00:19:47.000 And, uh, that's why we see her doing the things that she's doing as well. 00:19:47.000 --> 00:19:53.000 Um, I think that the grief really informs this entire passage. 00:19:53.000 --> 00:19:57.000 Because it is the motivator for everyone. 00:19:57.000 --> 00:20:00.000 It's… it's that love that, you know… 00:20:00.000 --> 00:20:03.000 Wow, it's a rebound relationship? 00:20:03.000 --> 00:20:05.000 Ah, it's a little more than that, but… 00:20:05.000 --> 00:20:07.000 Yeah, it's not what I'm hearing. 00:20:07.000 --> 00:20:13.000 it's… it's… it's that feeling that people come together under such situations. 00:20:13.000 --> 00:20:21.000 And again, as the stories go, we see repeatedly that the men turn to God, in this case, as well as their wives. 00:20:21.000 --> 00:20:23.000 Um, and the wives… 00:20:23.000 --> 00:20:27.000 They do the dutiful thing, traditional dutiful thing. 00:20:27.000 --> 00:20:29.000 to help the man out as well. 00:20:29.000 --> 00:20:33.000 I think that we're seeing a lot of that in story. 00:20:33.000 --> 00:20:37.000 Okay, just to make sure we've got the vocab, um… 00:20:37.000 --> 00:20:42.000 The phrase… the word hipbo de Dutch, we will get to that. 00:20:42.000 --> 00:20:45.000 the Hebrew, uh, lehit poded, 00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:50.000 a verb that starts with lehit is reflexive. It's to bode yourself. 00:20:50.000 --> 00:21:00.000 Uh, it is to be alone together with God. 00:21:00.000 --> 00:21:04.000 He'd bought a duty is the construct form. 00:21:04.000 --> 00:21:07.000 So we will get to that. Thank you, James. 00:21:07.000 --> 00:21:10.000 A couple more. Who do we have? Cheryl Susan. 00:21:10.000 --> 00:21:14.000 And welcome, Gail. 00:21:14.000 --> 00:21:26.000 Um… I kind of got… grown a little by… Julia's prophetic. 00:21:26.000 --> 00:21:35.000 Um, thoughts, and where I… Originally was caught by… well, first I want her to stay. 00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:38.000 days or 10 months, so right away, that's kind of like a weird kind of thing. 00:21:38.000 --> 00:21:40.000 That is not a typo. 00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:41.000 Yep, that's actually what it says. 00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:53.000 10 months. I mean, it's bizarre. However… Um, then, in 6061. 00:21:53.000 --> 00:21:54.000 What is? 00:21:54.000 --> 00:21:56.000 It's like a prophecy right there. Family of Rivka. 00:21:56.000 --> 00:22:01.000 Are saying goodbye to her. She's going off to who knows where. 00:22:01.000 --> 00:22:09.000 And… sister, may you grow into thousands of myriads, not may you yield. 00:22:09.000 --> 00:22:16.000 But may you grow. Then may your descendants inherit the gates of their foes. 00:22:16.000 --> 00:22:25.000 also kind of a weird thing. Inherit the gates of their foes, so… May you grow into thousands of myriads. 00:22:25.000 --> 00:22:30.000 Caught me. And then inherit the gates of their foes. 00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:42.000 Meaning that the descendants of Rivka will. Populate, and… take over. 00:22:42.000 --> 00:22:43.000 complicated? 00:22:43.000 --> 00:22:46.000 Which is, you know… Complicated. Thank you so much. 00:22:46.000 --> 00:22:55.000 Mm-hmm. By the way, this phrase, sister, may you grow into thousands of myriads? 00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.000 Reviva. 00:22:59.000 --> 00:23:02.000 is… 00:23:02.000 --> 00:23:05.000 the special thing that the… 00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:09.000 Orthodox Rabbinic Seminary for Women. 00:23:09.000 --> 00:23:11.000 Maharat. 00:23:11.000 --> 00:23:15.000 places as the gate into the rabbinate. 00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:23.000 for their women who are ordained. 00:23:23.000 --> 00:23:24.000 A lot. 00:23:24.000 --> 00:23:26.000 Interesting. I mean, myriad's already means… many diverse. 00:23:26.000 --> 00:23:27.000 Yeah… 00:23:27.000 --> 00:23:37.000 lots of things. So it's… it goes back to the thing that I love, is when it says… when the Torah says something twice. 00:23:37.000 --> 00:23:38.000 Where? Wait, wait, wait, where have we heard that? 00:23:38.000 --> 00:23:43.000 So thousands of myriads is countless. 00:23:43.000 --> 00:23:45.000 Hmm, does that feel familiar? 00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:46.000 Marcy's giving us the universal symbol for the finger pointing upward. 00:23:46.000 --> 00:23:52.000 Which then… 00:23:52.000 --> 00:23:53.000 You got it. 00:23:53.000 --> 00:23:54.000 You'll be like the stars. 00:23:54.000 --> 00:23:57.000 Yeah. Listen. 00:23:57.000 --> 00:24:03.000 Also, I want to lift up in the chat that Deanna has mentioned, I heard it as, may you grow into thousands of Miriams. 00:24:03.000 --> 00:24:05.000 On the prophetic front? 00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:08.000 I like it. 00:24:08.000 --> 00:24:10.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:14.000 Yup, yup. So, here we go. 00:24:14.000 --> 00:24:18.000 Rivka is having an Avraham moment, in fact, more than one. Uh-huh? 00:24:18.000 --> 00:24:25.000 Awesome sauce. Susan, last one. We've got some fun text to walk through. 00:24:25.000 --> 00:24:34.000 And just regarding, um… Rivka's motivation, I… You know, aside from. 00:24:34.000 --> 00:24:37.000 The parallel with Abraham and having faith and going. 00:24:37.000 --> 00:24:43.000 I felt like, and maybe this was lifted up by a poem that Rabbi Rachel shared, but. 00:24:43.000 --> 00:24:49.000 Um, she made reference to how she fell or glided off the horse. 00:24:49.000 --> 00:25:00.000 And I feel like it was a Bichert moment for her that, um, it was like there was a purity to. 00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:01.000 you're talking about getting off the camel. 00:25:01.000 --> 00:25:04.000 Her visceral response, maybe, to Isaac. 00:25:04.000 --> 00:25:10.000 Yeah, and going with ICE. I mean, I think… I think she felt very drawn to him. 00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:16.000 Hmm… 00:25:16.000 --> 00:25:17.000 No, I got my money's worth today, I don't know about you. 00:25:17.000 --> 00:25:20.000 Yeah, this is an extraordinary page of… 00:25:20.000 --> 00:25:23.000 of commentary here. 00:25:23.000 --> 00:25:25.000 And I see in y'all's comments… 00:25:25.000 --> 00:25:33.000 Kind of two main spheres. One of them has to do with Rivka and what was going on with her, and for her, and within her. 00:25:33.000 --> 00:25:37.000 The other one has to do with Yitzhak and this Las Suf, 00:25:37.000 --> 00:25:47.000 thing, and fortunately for you, um, or fortunately for us, those are exactly the two areas in which we prepared texts. 00:25:47.000 --> 00:25:50.000 So we're going to start with Rivka, and then move to Yitzhak. 00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:57.000 I'm still confused about why they're interchanging, um. Isaac, yes. 00:25:57.000 --> 00:25:58.000 Oh, that's… that's us. That's because we… 00:25:58.000 --> 00:26:05.000 Oh, this? This, Linda, that was my error when I was typing this. I should have written Yitzchak here. 00:26:05.000 --> 00:26:06.000 My bad, sorry. 00:26:06.000 --> 00:26:07.000 Okay. 00:26:07.000 --> 00:26:13.000 Because this is not a particular translation that we cut and paste from somewhere, 00:26:13.000 --> 00:26:19.000 Um, it… it's not… we're not always consistent on how… whether we use the Hebrew names or the anglicization of the names, but that's on us. 00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:22.000 Yeah, my bad. Totally my bad. 00:26:22.000 --> 00:26:25.000 Totally my bad, I apologize. 00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:26.000 Isaac is not there. 00:26:26.000 --> 00:26:28.000 Um, before you go, I'd just say one other thing? 00:26:28.000 --> 00:26:29.000 Sure. 00:26:29.000 --> 00:26:36.000 Um, it says… Isaac. 00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:45.000 It's awkward, where is it? Where he saw the… Oh, he lifted his eyes and saw. 00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:50.000 And behold… 00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:59.000 So he… it makes the differentiation between the I function and the. 00:26:59.000 --> 00:27:00.000 Hmm… 00:27:00.000 --> 00:27:01.000 Mental function. 00:27:01.000 --> 00:27:08.000 And then Rivka lifted her eyes and saw. 00:27:08.000 --> 00:27:09.000 Uh-huh? 00:27:09.000 --> 00:27:10.000 Well, but behold. 00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:13.000 And didn't Abraham also? 00:27:13.000 --> 00:27:22.000 So, I'm going back to the Oracle, it's all Oracle. It's all mystical levels of that. 00:27:22.000 --> 00:27:23.000 Mm-hmm. There's a lot going on here. 00:27:23.000 --> 00:27:26.000 below the Pochat surface. 00:27:26.000 --> 00:27:30.000 Mentora says what Torah says, Torah's… 00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:32.000 You know, those words are deliberate. 00:27:32.000 --> 00:27:41.000 Here we go! Here we go! Let's go. 00:27:41.000 --> 00:27:43.000 Rabbi Rachel, you want to start, or would you like me to start? 00:27:43.000 --> 00:27:52.000 We're starting at the top, we just have this one line from Genesis, right? Abraham's kin called to Rifka and said to her, Will you go with this man? And she said, 00:27:52.000 --> 00:28:02.000 I will go. That's our one little verse. 00:28:02.000 --> 00:28:03.000 Right. 00:28:03.000 --> 00:28:08.000 Right? A oracular, prophetic, what was going on with her, what was she thinking, what was she feeling? Here are some of the tradition's answers. 00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:12.000 Somebody want to read Rashi? 00:28:12.000 --> 00:28:18.000 Short and sweet. 00:28:18.000 --> 00:28:23.000 And she said, I will go. of my own accord, even if you do not agree. 00:28:23.000 --> 00:28:24.000 Nah, no, no. 00:28:24.000 --> 00:28:34.000 Right, so already Rashi's giving her a little bit of a sassiness, maybe, like, well, I don't care what you say, I'm gonna go with this guy. 00:28:34.000 --> 00:28:36.000 I am master of my fate. 00:28:36.000 --> 00:28:39.000 Captain of my soul, and I'm gonna go. 00:28:39.000 --> 00:28:43.000 And if you've heard us talk about Rashi a bunch of times, 00:28:43.000 --> 00:28:47.000 This… is surprising. 00:28:47.000 --> 00:28:51.000 Yeah. 00:28:51.000 --> 00:28:52.000 Take a list of the top 10 00:28:52.000 --> 00:28:54.000 What's that? What are you doing? 00:28:54.000 --> 00:28:56.000 rabbinic exegetes of that era. 00:28:56.000 --> 00:28:58.000 How many of them are going to go 00:28:58.000 --> 00:29:01.000 Go, girl! 00:29:01.000 --> 00:29:05.000 And there's a… that Ruth Naomi thing, too. Going. 00:29:05.000 --> 00:29:06.000 Mmm, I will go, yup. 00:29:06.000 --> 00:29:08.000 Mm-hmm. 00:29:08.000 --> 00:29:12.000 Where you go, I will go, beloved. 00:29:12.000 --> 00:29:13.000 Where you go, I will go, where you stay, I will stay. 00:29:13.000 --> 00:29:15.000 I was thinking exactly the same thing. 00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:16.000 Uh-huh. 00:29:16.000 --> 00:29:22.000 And lifting up in the chat, Elma's saying there's an electric spark as both of them saw. 00:29:22.000 --> 00:29:25.000 Um, that their soul's connected. 00:29:25.000 --> 00:29:27.000 As they lifted up their eyes and saw… 00:29:27.000 --> 00:29:31.000 each other. 00:29:31.000 --> 00:29:41.000 So, Bharashit Rabba is going to touch on that weird days or 10 months thing. Somebody want to read that one? 00:29:41.000 --> 00:29:48.000 Her brother and mother said. Let the maiden remain with us for a day… for days or 10 months. 00:29:48.000 --> 00:29:53.000 Then she can go. Where was her father, Betuel? 00:29:53.000 --> 00:29:59.000 He tried to restrain Rucker's betrothal and was plagued overnight. 00:29:59.000 --> 00:30:05.000 Let the maiden remain with us days, for the seven days of mourning for Betuel. 00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:10.000 Or month… 10 months for the time a virgin is given to secure her needs for herself. 00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:12.000 Whoa. 00:30:12.000 --> 00:30:14.000 That goes a couple of unexpected places. 00:30:14.000 --> 00:30:18.000 Welcome, Daniel. 00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:19.000 So let's unpack this. 00:30:19.000 --> 00:30:20.000 Yeah. 00:30:20.000 --> 00:30:22.000 Hmm. 00:30:22.000 --> 00:30:26.000 Where was Daddy? 00:30:26.000 --> 00:30:30.000 is usually, you know, you go ask Daddy. 00:30:30.000 --> 00:30:34.000 Right. Who has to give his permission for a girl to marry? 00:30:34.000 --> 00:30:36.000 Typically, it's dead. 00:30:36.000 --> 00:30:37.000 with all the issues. 00:30:37.000 --> 00:30:43.000 He's not even mentioned here. He's not even in the story. 00:30:43.000 --> 00:30:45.000 So… 00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:50.000 Midrash always trying to include the excluded. 00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:52.000 Where's Dad? 00:30:52.000 --> 00:30:58.000 Surely, something had to have happened to keep him out of this, and so Bereshit Rabba, 00:30:58.000 --> 00:31:02.000 is imagining that he wasn't going to be so keen on this, and God said, 00:31:02.000 --> 00:31:06.000 You know that stomach bug going around? 00:31:06.000 --> 00:31:07.000 God forbid. 00:31:07.000 --> 00:31:09.000 Right? 00:31:09.000 --> 00:31:10.000 Right? So… 00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:13.000 And then promptly dropped dead, apparently. 00:31:13.000 --> 00:31:21.000 So, if anyone has stomach issues here, this is not that. I'm very sorry. Healing, healing, healing, wooga, wooga, wooga, wooga, wooga. 00:31:21.000 --> 00:31:23.000 Right? 00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:28.000 So now we make something of the 7 and 10. So the 7 days is Shiva. 00:31:28.000 --> 00:31:30.000 You know, she's gotta stay for Shiva. 00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:36.000 Um, and then 10 months for the time of betula, 00:31:36.000 --> 00:31:38.000 someone unmarried, which… 00:31:38.000 --> 00:31:42.000 has been rendered as virgin. 00:31:42.000 --> 00:31:46.000 The way most of our translations render it. 00:31:46.000 --> 00:31:53.000 So it's there as a reminder that every translation is itself a midrash, and this is how… 00:31:53.000 --> 00:31:56.000 Most of our source texts are rendered in English. 00:31:56.000 --> 00:31:57.000 is given to secure her needs for herself. 00:31:57.000 --> 00:32:00.000 Hmm. No. 00:32:00.000 --> 00:32:02.000 In… 00:32:02.000 --> 00:32:06.000 Talmud in Mishnah, 00:32:06.000 --> 00:32:10.000 Someone needs time to prepare. 00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:17.000 Think about the dowry, think about the preparation to leave the parental home. 00:32:17.000 --> 00:32:22.000 women, when they got married back then, were probably not 00:32:22.000 --> 00:32:27.000 Upwardly mobile and had careers of their own and had gone to graduate school and were paying off student loans. 00:32:27.000 --> 00:32:28.000 Right? 00:32:28.000 --> 00:32:35.000 Back then, when my mother got married in 1954, she had a hope chest. 00:32:35.000 --> 00:32:36.000 Right? Filled with… 00:32:36.000 --> 00:32:37.000 Yeah. 00:32:37.000 --> 00:32:42.000 Linens that she had been collecting. 00:32:42.000 --> 00:32:43.000 Right. 00:32:43.000 --> 00:32:48.000 So that she would have what to take with her when she got married. Now, that may have been a Southern thing, it's possible that… 00:32:48.000 --> 00:32:49.000 up here in the north, y'all weren't doing that in the 50s. 00:32:49.000 --> 00:32:53.000 Oh. Yeah, we… yes, we were. 00:32:53.000 --> 00:32:56.000 All right, well, see, there you go. 00:32:56.000 --> 00:32:59.000 Right. So, the fact… 00:32:59.000 --> 00:33:03.000 That Rivka just said, I'll go! 00:33:03.000 --> 00:33:08.000 So, obviously, she was violating Talmud, 00:33:08.000 --> 00:33:09.000 Never mind, it hadn't happened yet, but that's not important right now. 00:33:09.000 --> 00:33:16.000 Which, obviously, she knew about, because there's no before and after in Torah, this is a classical exegetical principle. 00:33:16.000 --> 00:33:22.000 So we can always imagine that in the time of the patriarchs and matriarchs, they were already familiar 00:33:22.000 --> 00:33:27.000 with the mainstream Jewish customs of the 600s or the 1200s or the 1800s. 00:33:27.000 --> 00:33:31.000 Right, so Avram wore a black hat, and they kept kosher, and… 00:33:31.000 --> 00:33:32.000 I mean, they had pay us and all the things. 00:33:32.000 --> 00:33:39.000 Right, right, right. So, but this is, this is a massive departure. The fact that she's not undertaking 00:33:39.000 --> 00:33:45.000 this, maybe, cultural become legal 00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:51.000 period of preparation says something about how eager she is to go. 00:33:51.000 --> 00:33:54.000 And that God is blessing it. 00:33:54.000 --> 00:34:01.000 Which means… sometimes it's okay to break the law for a higher purpose. 00:34:01.000 --> 00:34:04.000 That's something that I mentioned in the chat, that. 00:34:04.000 --> 00:34:11.000 And she said, Yudhave, like, cleared the path. Like, she had a knowing. 00:34:11.000 --> 00:34:16.000 I mean, how else would she have been able to say that? So she had a belief? 00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:22.000 And she had no way, and therefore maybe even more spiritually bent than her family. 00:34:22.000 --> 00:34:24.000 Beautiful. 00:34:24.000 --> 00:34:32.000 And there's nothing to say that she couldn't do that time once she was with. 00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:33.000 But she knew she had to go. She had. 00:34:33.000 --> 00:34:39.000 Yep. 00:34:39.000 --> 00:34:40.000 Back to Delia's vernacular 00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:46.000 Well, and this is a… yes, and this is a little… I hope I'm not just. 00:34:46.000 --> 00:34:48.000 squeezing this to death, or to life, I'm not sure. 00:34:48.000 --> 00:34:52.000 Well, you're oracularizing the oracular, prophetic, 00:34:52.000 --> 00:34:53.000 Oracle. 00:34:53.000 --> 00:34:57.000 But… Well, the… in the Dalai Lama lineage, there are Dalai Lamas who. 00:34:57.000 --> 00:35:03.000 Tell them… before the, um… which one had to leave Tibet? 00:35:03.000 --> 00:35:11.000 The previous one said, I have to die early because this is going to happen and I need the next Dalai Lama to be at least somewhat trained. 00:35:11.000 --> 00:35:15.000 But for that, so to change… to make… to see the future, and to say. 00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:17.000 Yeah. 00:35:17.000 --> 00:35:19.000 I have to do it now, because this has to happen. 00:35:19.000 --> 00:35:22.000 Gotta get moving, because things are coming. 00:35:22.000 --> 00:35:23.000 Time to go! 00:35:23.000 --> 00:35:24.000 I just… I have a comment about… 00:35:24.000 --> 00:35:25.000 Yeah. Yeah. 00:35:25.000 --> 00:35:27.000 Hi, Iris. 00:35:27.000 --> 00:35:35.000 Breaking the law for the sake of the mission, in a sense, that reminds me of the first 00:35:35.000 --> 00:35:37.000 born not always receiving the blessing, 00:35:37.000 --> 00:35:43.000 Um, because, you know, they knew that someone else was more… 00:35:43.000 --> 00:35:44.000 fitting, but had the spiritual… 00:35:44.000 --> 00:35:46.000 Interesting. 00:35:46.000 --> 00:35:47.000 Interesting. 00:35:47.000 --> 00:35:48.000 I had this bird going. 00:35:48.000 --> 00:35:57.000 There's a… there's an overturning of a clear custom that the oldest inherits, the oldest gets the blessing, the oldest is the one 00:35:57.000 --> 00:35:59.000 Through whom the lineage flows, 00:35:59.000 --> 00:36:06.000 And first, we had, uh, Ishmael and Yitzchak, and Ishmael is older, and he does not 00:36:06.000 --> 00:36:09.000 prevail. Um… 00:36:09.000 --> 00:36:12.000 And… let's see what happens in the next generation, but um… 00:36:12.000 --> 00:36:15.000 Spoiler alert, it happens again. 00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:16.000 So what's that about? 00:36:16.000 --> 00:36:18.000 Isaac's kids, Jacob's kids, 00:36:18.000 --> 00:36:22.000 Um, Amram's kids. 00:36:22.000 --> 00:36:27.000 One of them was Moses, who had an older brother not so much in charge, right? 00:36:27.000 --> 00:36:30.000 So, there's something about 00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:36.000 Judaic life and our traditions and our lineage that is inverting 00:36:36.000 --> 00:36:40.000 the… the culture, the paradigm, the custom, 00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:42.000 of whatever is happening. 00:36:42.000 --> 00:36:49.000 It's… it's almost transgressive. 00:36:49.000 --> 00:36:56.000 And it's appearing over and over and over again. 00:36:56.000 --> 00:36:58.000 Not to be, you know… 00:36:58.000 --> 00:37:03.000 punny, but the… the whole higher power thing, like, this is really… 00:37:03.000 --> 00:37:04.000 Oh, yeah. 00:37:04.000 --> 00:37:09.000 you know, having… there's… we're answering to a higher power… excuse me. 00:37:09.000 --> 00:37:15.000 And also about lifting your eyes, that always touches me so much, and to see that thread. 00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:26.000 And I… it's like that mutuality between adenoir, the divine energy and the person. There's, as we were saying, a sacredness and a sacred connection. 00:37:26.000 --> 00:37:28.000 Pardon me. 00:37:28.000 --> 00:37:29.000 Beautiful. 00:37:29.000 --> 00:37:31.000 Yeah, this was a beautiful passage. 00:37:31.000 --> 00:37:36.000 And we thought it was just, here come the camels. 00:37:36.000 --> 00:37:38.000 Oh, no. Let's keep going. 00:37:38.000 --> 00:37:41.000 This is the Rocchbaum now. This is… 00:37:41.000 --> 00:37:51.000 Rashi's grand. 00:37:51.000 --> 00:37:56.000 So he's gonna sort of jump on what Rashi said, and just for time, I'll take us through this. 00:37:56.000 --> 00:38:00.000 They're gonna call to Rivka. They called to Rivka and said, do you want to go? 00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:04.000 This is just common courtesy. Come on, Grandpa. 00:38:04.000 --> 00:38:14.000 This is not such a big deal. God had already desired this, God already made the shedduch, God already agreed. 00:38:14.000 --> 00:38:26.000 And it literally says that. Hakadosh Baruch Hu Chafetzi Vukze, he's… God has already desired this part… this pairing, this partnership. It's already been set up. 00:38:26.000 --> 00:38:30.000 But there's something important about agency. 00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:35.000 There's an old line for those of us who 00:38:35.000 --> 00:38:39.000 struggle with the question of where is God in this, and… 00:38:39.000 --> 00:38:44.000 how can God know if we have free will? 00:38:44.000 --> 00:38:48.000 And the line is, everything is foreseen, 00:38:48.000 --> 00:38:53.000 And we have free will. 00:38:53.000 --> 00:38:56.000 Just that God already knows what we're gonna choose. 00:38:56.000 --> 00:38:59.000 in that understanding. 00:38:59.000 --> 00:39:04.000 Right? So even if you believe in a deterministic God, 00:39:04.000 --> 00:39:08.000 Here's the Rauschbaum coming and saying, 00:39:08.000 --> 00:39:10.000 Her agency matters. 00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:16.000 Which is not something that one expects to find in the 12 00:39:16.000 --> 00:39:22.000 century. 00:39:22.000 --> 00:39:25.000 So you're gonna go with them? 00:39:25.000 --> 00:39:34.000 Or are you gonna wait for someone else to come and bring you after, you know, 10 months, or a year, or whatever, that custom to prepare yourself, right? 00:39:34.000 --> 00:39:37.000 What are you gonna… are you waiting for somebody else? CEO? 00:39:37.000 --> 00:39:40.000 Carpegium sees the day. 00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:45.000 This is Rabbi Robin Williams, right? 00:39:45.000 --> 00:39:49.000 I needed to look up a word here. And so, of course I'll go! 00:39:49.000 --> 00:39:53.000 I don't need to delay preparing my what? 00:39:53.000 --> 00:39:57.000 Trusseau, come on, that's a common word. 00:39:57.000 --> 00:39:59.000 Maybe it's not a common word. It's… it's the… 00:39:59.000 --> 00:40:02.000 Wasn't… wasn't he, like, an oceanographer? 00:40:02.000 --> 00:40:06.000 He has Jacques Trousseau. 00:40:06.000 --> 00:40:07.000 Yeah, I know that. 00:40:07.000 --> 00:40:10.000 Yeah, so it's a hope chest, right? It's the things that she would have brought with her. 00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:11.000 Right. 00:40:11.000 --> 00:40:13.000 But does that mean… 00:40:13.000 --> 00:40:17.000 Does that mean she needn't bother with it, or does that mean it's already prepared? 00:40:17.000 --> 00:40:25.000 Unclear. 00:40:25.000 --> 00:40:31.000 She doesn't need to inhibit herself in time. She's gonna have the trosseau. 00:40:31.000 --> 00:40:36.000 But it's gonna be, boom, right there! 00:40:36.000 --> 00:40:40.000 Of course! 00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:43.000 God foreordained it. 00:40:43.000 --> 00:40:44.000 Does it also mean that 00:40:44.000 --> 00:40:52.000 Difficulty. 00:40:52.000 --> 00:40:53.000 Right. Maybe. 00:40:53.000 --> 00:40:55.000 you know, the material things aren't as important, and she's… she has that spirituality and connection with what's… what needs to be done. 00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:58.000 Maybe we're now reading into that. 00:40:58.000 --> 00:40:59.000 Yeah. 00:40:59.000 --> 00:41:02.000 As we must, because it's our Midrash on this Midrash on someone else's Midrash, right? 00:41:02.000 --> 00:41:05.000 Absolutely. Um, 00:41:05.000 --> 00:41:06.000 I… 00:41:06.000 --> 00:41:11.000 Do you have any idea? I'm sorry, but I just need to know if you… if you have any idea how old she is. 00:41:11.000 --> 00:41:12.000 Hang on to that! 00:41:12.000 --> 00:41:18.000 We are… that's a great question, and we're not going to answer it, because a couple of Midrash are going to give us some very different answers. 00:41:18.000 --> 00:41:21.000 Hang on to that, please. 00:41:21.000 --> 00:41:23.000 But the fact that you're asking the question, 00:41:23.000 --> 00:41:24.000 Yeah. 00:41:24.000 --> 00:41:25.000 Beautiful. 00:41:25.000 --> 00:41:28.000 Yeah, you're asking a question that the ancients asked. 00:41:28.000 --> 00:41:31.000 And boy, did they ask it. 00:41:31.000 --> 00:41:38.000 Yep. I'll be fascinated to see your faces as we go into that. For a woman's commentary, I think it was Marcy, 00:41:38.000 --> 00:41:44.000 Uh, Marcia, you sort of precogged this. So, are you able to read this? 00:41:44.000 --> 00:41:47.000 On screen? 00:41:47.000 --> 00:41:53.000 A woman's commentary? 00:41:53.000 --> 00:42:00.000 Mm, okay. 00:42:00.000 --> 00:42:06.000 I will go. Michael's decision to leave her homeland and her family. 00:42:06.000 --> 00:42:11.000 Go to a new place… And then with a man unknown to her. 00:42:11.000 --> 00:42:16.000 is reminiscent of Avraham. Left everything behind him. 00:42:16.000 --> 00:42:26.000 In order to fulfill a divine command. Women's contribution to the fulfillment of national destiny. 00:42:26.000 --> 00:42:31.000 Finds its expression not only. In their role as childbearers. 00:42:31.000 --> 00:42:36.000 But also, in their ability to take bold and vital action. 00:42:36.000 --> 00:42:42.000 At critical moments. Rivka's actions will later find an echo. 00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:48.000 In Ruth, leaving her father. Mother and land of her own accord. 00:42:48.000 --> 00:42:54.000 When Ruth joins her fate. With that of her mother-in-law, Naomi. 00:42:54.000 --> 00:43:05.000 And subsequently, Mary's Naomi's kinsman Boas. Ruth 2 contributes to fulfilling the national destiny in that King David. 00:43:05.000 --> 00:43:08.000 Would be the future offspring. of that union. 00:43:08.000 --> 00:43:10.000 making Rivka… 00:43:10.000 --> 00:43:14.000 the spiritual progenitor 00:43:14.000 --> 00:43:15.000 Yeah. 00:43:15.000 --> 00:43:22.000 Of these. 00:43:22.000 --> 00:43:25.000 So when, in the Amida, 00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:28.000 We offer Baruch Hatta adonai. 00:43:28.000 --> 00:43:35.000 Erica hide and god of our fathers and mothers, god of Avraham, God of Yitzchak, and God of Jacob. 00:43:35.000 --> 00:43:39.000 Alohe, Sarah, God of Sarah. 00:43:39.000 --> 00:43:42.000 Tell me about the god of Rivka. 00:43:42.000 --> 00:43:48.000 The God of I will go. 00:43:48.000 --> 00:43:52.000 The god of here we go. 00:43:52.000 --> 00:43:55.000 We'll get to Rafael and Leah another week. 00:43:55.000 --> 00:43:59.000 Tune in next week when we keep going on. 00:43:59.000 --> 00:44:00.000 What was Yitrak doing? 00:44:00.000 --> 00:44:01.000 Okay. 00:44:01.000 --> 00:44:08.000 So we've got… we've got a look at what Yitzchak was doing, and then we're going to return to the moment of their meeting. 00:44:08.000 --> 00:44:13.000 But before we can dive into what happened when they saw each other, 00:44:13.000 --> 00:44:16.000 We have to look at what exactly was he up to. 00:44:16.000 --> 00:44:18.000 And why was he there? 00:44:18.000 --> 00:44:23.000 Hang on to your hats. 00:44:23.000 --> 00:44:32.000 So Yitzhak goes out last Suach in the field toward the turn of evening, and he lifts his eyes, and he sees. Okay, so we left untranslated Lasuach. 00:44:32.000 --> 00:44:36.000 The chiskuni in the 1200s. 00:44:36.000 --> 00:44:41.000 A little bit like Joan asking, how old was Rivka? 00:44:41.000 --> 00:44:43.000 begs the question, 00:44:43.000 --> 00:44:46.000 Where was Jitzrak? 00:44:46.000 --> 00:44:52.000 for this. And Torah doesn't tell us. 00:44:52.000 --> 00:44:55.000 And so the Hiskuni imagines that he'd left 00:44:55.000 --> 00:44:58.000 Gunn Aiden, the Garden of Eden. 00:44:58.000 --> 00:45:01.000 Where he was from the Akedah 00:45:01.000 --> 00:45:06.000 Until now, 3 years later. 00:45:06.000 --> 00:45:15.000 Remember that there is a midrush that says that at the moment of the Akedah, the moment, right, he's bound on the altar, and Abraham's lifted the knife, 00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:18.000 Let his soul flies from his body. 00:45:18.000 --> 00:45:23.000 He actually dies, and he goes, and he winds up in the Garden of Eden. 00:45:23.000 --> 00:45:28.000 And he spends apparently 3 years there, healing before… 00:45:28.000 --> 00:45:32.000 returning to this life in this moment. 00:45:32.000 --> 00:45:35.000 So that's one imagination. 00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:39.000 So what do we know about… so, tell me about this Yitzchak. 00:45:39.000 --> 00:45:41.000 What do we know about Yitzhak? 00:45:41.000 --> 00:45:48.000 I wanted to add Rabbi Gershon Winkle teaching, that he went to the Mystery School of Shem and Eber. 00:45:48.000 --> 00:45:50.000 For those 3 years. 00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:58.000 Oh, we will get to Shem and Eber next week, I think. 00:45:58.000 --> 00:46:02.000 Is this 3 years our time, or 3 years mystical time? 00:46:02.000 --> 00:46:04.000 Who knows? 00:46:04.000 --> 00:46:09.000 What's the difference, Cheryl? 00:46:09.000 --> 00:46:13.000 You know, he then got off of the altar. 00:46:13.000 --> 00:46:14.000 Mmm… 00:46:14.000 --> 00:46:18.000 I went home so it's some… so I'm thinking mystical time. 00:46:18.000 --> 00:46:27.000 So what does that mean? 00:46:27.000 --> 00:46:28.000 What do you mean, what do you mean, what do you mean? 00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:32.000 What do you mean? What does it mean? 00:46:32.000 --> 00:46:38.000 It means he was connected and in communion with God. 00:46:38.000 --> 00:46:39.000 Beautiful. 00:46:39.000 --> 00:46:42.000 I've always… I've always wondered about Yitzhak, I mean… 00:46:42.000 --> 00:46:45.000 Dad and God have this thing, and they… 00:46:45.000 --> 00:46:51.000 Tie up on the altar, and… 00:46:51.000 --> 00:46:54.000 Then again, how old was Yitzhak when that happened? 00:46:54.000 --> 00:46:57.000 question mark. 00:46:57.000 --> 00:46:59.000 26, I thought. Some say 3. 00:46:59.000 --> 00:47:03.000 Some say 26, some say 37. 00:47:03.000 --> 00:47:06.000 Some say a child. 00:47:06.000 --> 00:47:07.000 Right? Boy, it is a very different story. 00:47:07.000 --> 00:47:10.000 Oh. Yeah. 00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:16.000 Yep, I see 37 in the chat. It's a very different story if we imagine Yitzchak bound to the altar as a toddler? 00:47:16.000 --> 00:47:17.000 Mm-hmm. 00:47:17.000 --> 00:47:18.000 or as a youth, 00:47:18.000 --> 00:47:21.000 How old… how was his brother? How old is his brother? 00:47:21.000 --> 00:47:23.000 Older. 00:47:23.000 --> 00:47:30.000 We don't… off the top of my head, I don't remember, but I… that we can figure out. 00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:31.000 I should know the answer to that question. I will look it up. 00:47:31.000 --> 00:47:34.000 Because he came first. 00:47:34.000 --> 00:47:35.000 I'm wondering if he's… 00:47:35.000 --> 00:47:41.000 I also have to add, um… That… it's not the sacrifice of Isaac, it's the binding of Isaac. 00:47:41.000 --> 00:47:42.000 Great. 00:47:42.000 --> 00:47:43.000 True? 00:47:43.000 --> 00:47:53.000 And… and there is a midrash that says, um… That Abraham brought him there to make the connection with divine energy, not to kill him. 00:47:53.000 --> 00:47:59.000 Great! So, be Yitzchak for a second, right? 00:47:59.000 --> 00:48:02.000 Everything's connected in Midrash, so… 00:48:02.000 --> 00:48:14.000 What's been your experience? Hi, Dad and God had a thing, and you got tied up, and maybe you also knew it was a kabuki dance, or maybe you got scared because something about God and dad tying you up, and a knife, and… 00:48:14.000 --> 00:48:19.000 Your soul goes by, and… 00:48:19.000 --> 00:48:22.000 We don't want to… 00:48:22.000 --> 00:48:23.000 Uh-huh. 00:48:23.000 --> 00:48:28.000 Yes, there's a freeze frame there? In the conversation between, uh, Adonai and, uh. 00:48:28.000 --> 00:48:37.000 Overall, they're just like. Frozen while the soul goes and hangs out for 3 years. 00:48:37.000 --> 00:48:38.000 Right? 00:48:38.000 --> 00:48:41.000 And then comes back, and then time starts up again? 00:48:41.000 --> 00:48:45.000 Maybe? 00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:49.000 I see Deanna's hand, and then we've got… we've got a lot of goodies to… 00:48:49.000 --> 00:48:53.000 To move through. 00:48:53.000 --> 00:49:05.000 Well, I love that Cheryl asked that question about the mystical time, and… Um, it makes sense to me that it would be mystical time because he's on an altar, regardless of his age. He's on the altar. 00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:08.000 Of course, that's where something like that could happen. 00:49:08.000 --> 00:49:20.000 And, um… I've been trained in Wicca, among many other modalities, and in Wicca, when we do ceremony, we… when part of the incantation is that you say, we are now. 00:49:20.000 --> 00:49:25.000 Uh, between the worlds beyond the bounds of time. 00:49:25.000 --> 00:49:31.000 And in ritual space, that is where magic things happen. 00:49:31.000 --> 00:49:32.000 Beautiful. 00:49:32.000 --> 00:49:35.000 beyond the bounds of time. 00:49:35.000 --> 00:49:40.000 Yeah, can I also add that in many, um… Buddhist practices before. 00:49:40.000 --> 00:49:45.000 You do anything, you must prepare the space, the creation of sacred space. 00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:50.000 is more important. Even than the actual. 00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:55.000 saying of a prayer, because it takes intention and motivation. 00:49:55.000 --> 00:50:02.000 true mindfulness. to know what you are doing, and it's about cleaning the space and preparing the space. 00:50:02.000 --> 00:50:07.000 And I'm finding the same thing feels correct to me in Judaism. 00:50:07.000 --> 00:50:17.000 That the prayer itself is. almost… it's just the… cherry on top of the cake, but to build the cake. 00:50:17.000 --> 00:50:22.000 It's so meaningful. creating sacred space. 00:50:22.000 --> 00:50:25.000 Okay, sock cleaning sounding of you. 00:50:25.000 --> 00:50:36.000 And notice here that we are… he's Lasuaf in the field, and so there's something maybe sacred about that space of the great outdoors. 00:50:36.000 --> 00:50:38.000 Yeah, just in the interest of time. 00:50:38.000 --> 00:50:41.000 Yeah, let's keep us moving. We've got… we've got some goodies. 00:50:41.000 --> 00:50:49.000 Yeah, so Yitzhak came from going. That's literally what it said. It doesn't just say he goes out. 00:50:49.000 --> 00:50:56.000 He came from going by the Yitzhag ba meet bow. 00:50:56.000 --> 00:50:59.000 Where did he come from going? 00:50:59.000 --> 00:51:03.000 And in Genesis Rabba, he came back from 00:51:03.000 --> 00:51:07.000 Death. 00:51:07.000 --> 00:51:11.000 He came from this place called Beirlechair'i. Thank you, Joan, for… 00:51:11.000 --> 00:51:15.000 you know, toothing your way through that when we first read. The air. 00:51:15.000 --> 00:51:16.000 well… 00:51:16.000 --> 00:51:19.000 Well, Lachai. 00:51:19.000 --> 00:51:23.000 Life, living, 00:51:23.000 --> 00:51:25.000 One who sees me. 00:51:25.000 --> 00:51:27.000 Yeah… 00:51:27.000 --> 00:51:32.000 That is the name of the place where Hagar… 00:51:32.000 --> 00:51:36.000 It has an encounter. 00:51:36.000 --> 00:51:41.000 The well of the one who sees me. 00:51:41.000 --> 00:51:46.000 Amber, Hagar and Ishmael go out. 00:51:46.000 --> 00:51:49.000 are sent out, and there's a well of water. 00:51:49.000 --> 00:51:51.000 Miraculously, 00:51:51.000 --> 00:51:53.000 And so what is Yitzchak do? 00:51:53.000 --> 00:51:57.000 He goes to get H'ghar back. 00:51:57.000 --> 00:52:07.000 brings Avrah, bring Hagar back to Avraham as she sat by the well and said to the one who enlivens, See me! 00:52:07.000 --> 00:52:12.000 In Agar's case, see me in my misery. Why is… 00:52:12.000 --> 00:52:21.000 Yitzach going to get H'ghar back for Abraham? 00:52:21.000 --> 00:52:26.000 So what is our Parsha called again this week, anybody? 00:52:26.000 --> 00:52:27.000 Kaye who? 00:52:27.000 --> 00:52:29.000 It's written at the top of the screen. 00:52:29.000 --> 00:52:30.000 The life of Sarah, and it begins with what? 00:52:30.000 --> 00:52:31.000 The life of Sarah. 00:52:31.000 --> 00:52:33.000 Well, Sarah. 00:52:33.000 --> 00:52:36.000 The death of Sarah. 00:52:36.000 --> 00:52:44.000 Which is what follows immediately upon the Akedah, and so from this, our tradition understands that Sarah died at the moment of the Akedah. 00:52:44.000 --> 00:52:47.000 Or when Avram called her, 00:52:47.000 --> 00:52:53.000 And said, Oy, what a day I had today! 00:52:53.000 --> 00:52:54.000 That's okay, darling. 00:52:54.000 --> 00:52:55.000 I almost killed our kid! Or maybe she had a vision. 00:52:55.000 --> 00:53:02.000 There's a Midrash that says she had a vision, or that Hasatan appeared to her and told her, well, your husband just killed your kid. 00:53:02.000 --> 00:53:06.000 And her soul departed on the spot. 00:53:06.000 --> 00:53:07.000 So what… 00:53:07.000 --> 00:53:08.000 So maybe he's… 00:53:08.000 --> 00:53:13.000 Or her job was done because Yitzak was now connected with the divine. 00:53:13.000 --> 00:53:14.000 All of this. 00:53:14.000 --> 00:53:16.000 I love how you're redeeming that terrible moment, Delia. That's beautiful. 00:53:16.000 --> 00:53:17.000 Right. So, you have to… 00:53:17.000 --> 00:53:23.000 Yeah. Well, because there is a… I won't go on with time, okay, I'll let it go. 00:53:23.000 --> 00:53:32.000 So thank you. So, Yo Yitzrak goes to try to get Hagar. Why? 00:53:32.000 --> 00:53:37.000 Because his dad's a widower now? 00:53:37.000 --> 00:53:43.000 I was gonna say, because, uh, yes, exactly, he's alone, and this was his first. 00:53:43.000 --> 00:53:44.000 wife and son. 00:53:44.000 --> 00:53:51.000 Uh-huh. So, let's see if we got this. Yitzhak is in grief for his mom. Avram goes… 00:53:51.000 --> 00:53:56.000 sends Eleazar to get Yitzchak a wife because he's in grief. Yitzhak 00:53:56.000 --> 00:53:59.000 is going now to go get Avraham, his wife, 00:53:59.000 --> 00:54:02.000 Because he's in great… aww. 00:54:02.000 --> 00:54:06.000 They're taking care of each other in the best way they know how. 00:54:06.000 --> 00:54:07.000 Yeah. 00:54:07.000 --> 00:54:08.000 Men. 00:54:08.000 --> 00:54:09.000 But can it… And can it also be that… Your talk is… It'd also be that Yitzah is helping. 00:54:09.000 --> 00:54:13.000 Right. 00:54:13.000 --> 00:54:17.000 Overcome. I'm not great act on his father's part. 00:54:17.000 --> 00:54:18.000 True. 00:54:18.000 --> 00:54:20.000 It's like a mitzvah to have her come back. 00:54:20.000 --> 00:54:21.000 Or maybe on his mother's part, because it was… 00:54:21.000 --> 00:54:24.000 So… On his mother's part, yeah. 00:54:24.000 --> 00:54:25.000 It was Shara who said, get rid of that woman. 00:54:25.000 --> 00:54:26.000 And yeah, she kicked them out. 00:54:26.000 --> 00:54:28.000 Yeah, on both. Yeah, yeah. 00:54:28.000 --> 00:54:32.000 So maybe there's a tycoon here. 00:54:32.000 --> 00:54:33.000 Yeah, there's a lot here. 00:54:33.000 --> 00:54:34.000 Feels like that to me. 00:54:34.000 --> 00:54:40.000 So, Yitzhak goes out, La Surach, at the turn of evening. 00:54:40.000 --> 00:54:44.000 Midrash is now understanding this as prayer. 00:54:44.000 --> 00:54:47.000 From Psalms. And we pour out, we pour 00:54:47.000 --> 00:54:53.000 pour out, to pray in Hebrew is another heat verb. 00:54:53.000 --> 00:54:54.000 It's a reflexive. 00:54:54.000 --> 00:54:58.000 It's another reflexive verb, right? We pray ourselves. 00:54:58.000 --> 00:55:04.000 Like, pouring ourselves out. 00:55:04.000 --> 00:55:10.000 But Ibn Ezra says that Lasuach is to walk among the bushes. 00:55:10.000 --> 00:55:17.000 And now you need to look at this Hebrew root. 00:55:17.000 --> 00:55:19.000 That valve in the middle? 00:55:19.000 --> 00:55:22.000 Grammatically sometimes becomes a VAV. 00:55:22.000 --> 00:55:24.000 It is above. 00:55:24.000 --> 00:55:27.000 It just looks like Evolve. Oh, no, wait, it is Evolve. 00:55:27.000 --> 00:55:31.000 Right? I mean, sometimes a yard, sorry. 00:55:31.000 --> 00:55:34.000 Right, so sometimes in Hebrew, that vav 00:55:34.000 --> 00:55:39.000 becomes a Yud. 00:55:39.000 --> 00:55:42.000 My apologies. And then Lasuach becomes Lasiach. 00:55:42.000 --> 00:55:45.000 Which could mean to converse, but a… but… 00:55:45.000 --> 00:55:47.000 Siach… 00:55:47.000 --> 00:55:49.000 is literally a bush. 00:55:49.000 --> 00:55:54.000 under one of the bushes. 00:55:54.000 --> 00:55:57.000 That's a line from… from our Torah reading. 00:55:57.000 --> 00:56:02.000 First day Rosh Hashanah, when Hagar and Ishmael are sent out. 00:56:02.000 --> 00:56:09.000 She places the baby under one of the sechim, under a bush, because she cannot bear to see him die. 00:56:09.000 --> 00:56:12.000 So, literally, he's bushwhacking. 00:56:12.000 --> 00:56:16.000 He's going for a nature romp. 00:56:16.000 --> 00:56:21.000 So, we've got prayer, we've got pouring out, we've got taking a walk. 00:56:21.000 --> 00:56:24.000 And the chiskuni now goes, 00:56:24.000 --> 00:56:31.000 He's literally becoming like the vegetation in the fields. 00:56:31.000 --> 00:56:32.000 Yeah, Joan. 00:56:32.000 --> 00:56:37.000 I was gonna say, it sounds like he's lost for the moment. 00:56:37.000 --> 00:56:38.000 Yeah… 00:56:38.000 --> 00:56:46.000 And so… and so this would be a transition. We all do this. 00:56:46.000 --> 00:56:47.000 Right. 00:56:47.000 --> 00:56:51.000 At times when we're nowhere. And so that… that would tell us that something. 00:56:51.000 --> 00:56:55.000 That a decision's going to be made. 00:56:55.000 --> 00:56:59.000 And we know that because we see the big story. 00:56:59.000 --> 00:57:03.000 But if you're in the middle of it, you don't know that. 00:57:03.000 --> 00:57:08.000 you're bushwhacking, you're having your lost night of the soul, you're having your dark forest, writes Adam. 00:57:08.000 --> 00:57:13.000 Right? If only we could hold in real time 00:57:13.000 --> 00:57:18.000 that this dark night, this sense of being lost, 00:57:18.000 --> 00:57:30.000 is actually useful, is actually part of the path, it isn't the end of the path, that there's more path forward from there, um, to continue what Adam wrote, that the right path 00:57:30.000 --> 00:57:33.000 is… is going to appear. 00:57:33.000 --> 00:57:37.000 that there's something about moving 00:57:37.000 --> 00:57:38.000 Yeah. 00:57:38.000 --> 00:57:52.000 Literally, if you're walking or praying or meditating, or whatever, a spiritual practice of some kind, precisely in the depth, the dark, the lost, the death, the whatever, 00:57:52.000 --> 00:57:59.000 makes it possible for that next thing to come. If only we could know that in real time. 00:57:59.000 --> 00:58:03.000 it might help to ease that felt sense of dark. 00:58:03.000 --> 00:58:08.000 And sometimes we know it here, but we can't feel it here. 00:58:08.000 --> 00:58:10.000 Right. 00:58:10.000 --> 00:58:11.000 Right. 00:58:11.000 --> 00:58:14.000 And now we're going to get to what James… 00:58:14.000 --> 00:58:16.000 This is the hero's journey. Yeah. 00:58:16.000 --> 00:58:17.000 What James predicted. 00:58:17.000 --> 00:58:18.000 I just have a quick one, I'm sorry. 00:58:18.000 --> 00:58:19.000 Yeah, Iris. And then we'll get to it. 00:58:19.000 --> 00:58:25.000 So, what I'm feeling also is that all of that meditation and space 00:58:25.000 --> 00:58:28.000 With nature and the bush. 00:58:28.000 --> 00:58:31.000 that… to hear God's voice, that the burning bush, and so… 00:58:31.000 --> 00:58:32.000 Uh-huh. 00:58:32.000 --> 00:58:34.000 Yeah, it just connect that way for me, so… 00:58:34.000 --> 00:58:38.000 Absolutely. Why didn't God's voice 00:58:38.000 --> 00:58:42.000 up here in big neon lights. 00:58:42.000 --> 00:58:44.000 Yeah. 00:58:44.000 --> 00:58:51.000 Well, it did. There was this burning flame, but other people passed it by, and not Moshe. Moshe had a turn. We'll get there, tune in. 00:58:51.000 --> 00:58:54.000 to Parshat Shemot. 00:58:54.000 --> 00:58:56.000 We'll get there. 00:58:56.000 --> 00:59:00.000 So, Rabbi Rachel just mentioned, alright, now we're gonna… 00:59:00.000 --> 00:59:02.000 converse with God. 00:59:02.000 --> 00:59:06.000 What does it mean to converse with God? 00:59:06.000 --> 00:59:09.000 By the way. Show of hands. 00:59:09.000 --> 00:59:13.000 Just for giggles. How many of us… 00:59:13.000 --> 00:59:22.000 would say, in our own way, whatever it means to us that we have heard the voice of God. 00:59:22.000 --> 00:59:23.000 Me too. 00:59:23.000 --> 00:59:40.000 Yeah, some of us… some of us are yes, some of us are not raising our hands, and I loved a couple of us who were like, well, I can't raise my hand, but I can't not raise my hand, so it's kind of like this. 00:59:40.000 --> 00:59:44.000 That's easier to know what it is we're saying. 00:59:44.000 --> 00:59:47.000 harder to know what God is saying. 00:59:47.000 --> 00:59:49.000 If one of us were to walk into synagogue, 00:59:49.000 --> 00:59:57.000 And say, God told me to tell you! 00:59:57.000 --> 01:00:03.000 And yet, a majority of us put our hands up. So, let's get into that. 01:00:03.000 --> 01:00:07.000 Reb Nachman says… James says it's not a spoken word. 01:00:07.000 --> 01:00:09.000 Okay. It's something deeper. 01:00:09.000 --> 01:00:13.000 Okay. Okay. 01:00:13.000 --> 01:00:22.000 When the Blessed One aids one's hithba de dut, thank you, James, then Hitba de dutoute is like speaking to a friend. 01:00:22.000 --> 01:00:25.000 This is very different already from… 01:00:25.000 --> 01:00:32.000 Dear God, the one who, and all the prefatory words, and all the raha, 01:00:32.000 --> 01:00:37.000 All that liturgy, it isn't coming from a book. 01:00:37.000 --> 01:00:38.000 Coming from the heart. 01:00:38.000 --> 01:00:42.000 It isn't stylized. 01:00:42.000 --> 01:00:48.000 It's just like talking to a friend on the phone. 01:00:48.000 --> 01:00:51.000 And the best place to go, he writes in Sichat Haran, 01:00:51.000 --> 01:00:56.000 See? Sichot, conversations of Ha, the Ran, Reb Nachman. 01:00:56.000 --> 01:01:01.000 The best place to go to seclude yourself and meditate is in the meadows outside the city. 01:01:01.000 --> 01:01:04.000 If you live in Williamstown, Massachusetts, 01:01:04.000 --> 01:01:05.000 That's easy. 01:01:05.000 --> 01:01:06.000 That's easy. Go to a grassy field. 01:01:06.000 --> 01:01:11.000 Everyone who doesn't live in Williamstown, come visit us anytime. We've got lots of meadows. 01:01:11.000 --> 01:01:14.000 Go to a grassy field for the grass. 01:01:14.000 --> 01:01:19.000 will awaken your heart. 01:01:19.000 --> 01:01:23.000 They had synagogues back then. 01:01:23.000 --> 01:01:28.000 What's Nachman going for? 01:01:28.000 --> 01:01:31.000 Was he anti-Synagogue? 01:01:31.000 --> 01:01:33.000 Well, maybe. 01:01:33.000 --> 01:01:34.000 Deanna? 01:01:34.000 --> 01:01:39.000 It's a direct connection. to God through nature. 01:01:39.000 --> 01:01:41.000 Hmm. 01:01:41.000 --> 01:01:42.000 Right. 01:01:42.000 --> 01:01:45.000 Hmm. Hmm. Nancy. 01:01:45.000 --> 01:01:50.000 I was gonna say a walk with God. 01:01:50.000 --> 01:01:59.000 I think it was Rabbi Nachman that his student asked him, if you say God is the same everywhere, how come you have to go out to the woods to pray? 01:01:59.000 --> 01:02:02.000 And he answered, God is the same everywhere, but I'm not. 01:02:02.000 --> 01:02:03.000 I'm not, right? 01:02:03.000 --> 01:02:05.000 That's a great one. 01:02:05.000 --> 01:02:08.000 It's a great one. So, here is… 01:02:08.000 --> 01:02:10.000 The prayer of Nachman, 01:02:10.000 --> 01:02:16.000 Which many of us may have encountered at the Tu Bishvat Seder. 01:02:16.000 --> 01:02:17.000 Right, when we're… 01:02:17.000 --> 01:02:24.000 Which is an aid of Hippo de Dutoute. It is not Hippo de Dutoute, with someone who has spoken about Hippod. 01:02:24.000 --> 01:02:26.000 like to offer this. 01:02:26.000 --> 01:02:29.000 someone, perhaps… 01:02:29.000 --> 01:02:38.000 whose name rhymes with shmames Berlinger. 01:02:38.000 --> 01:02:48.000 Oh, let's see… Mass for the world, teach me to be alone. Let it be my custom to go outdoors each day among the trees and grass, among all growing things. 01:02:48.000 --> 01:02:53.000 And there may I be alone and enter into prayer to talk with the one to whom I belong. 01:02:53.000 --> 01:02:55.000 May I express there everything in my heart? 01:02:55.000 --> 01:03:00.000 And may all the foliage of the field, all grasses, trees, and plants, 01:03:00.000 --> 01:03:05.000 Awake at my coming to send the powers of their life into the words of my prayer, 01:03:05.000 --> 01:03:10.000 So that my prayer and speech are made whole through the life and spirit of all growing things. 01:03:10.000 --> 01:03:13.000 Which are made as one by their transcendent source. 01:03:13.000 --> 01:03:18.000 May I then pour out the words of my heart before you like water? 01:03:18.000 --> 01:03:21.000 Good day, Bob, Abe. 01:03:21.000 --> 01:03:23.000 I mean, it's gorgeous, isn't it? 01:03:23.000 --> 01:03:26.000 Ha, El Hagadol, hagi- 01:03:26.000 --> 01:03:31.000 Huh? 01:03:31.000 --> 01:03:36.000 Maybe sometimes we need all of those words and all of that framework, and all of that… 01:03:36.000 --> 01:03:41.000 liturgical preparation to pray, and sometimes it's… 01:03:41.000 --> 01:03:46.000 My heart needs to talk to the heart of the world. 01:03:46.000 --> 01:03:51.000 And the best way I know how to do that is walking in the fields. 01:03:51.000 --> 01:03:56.000 This is another way to do bear. 01:03:56.000 --> 01:03:57.000 Lachai. 01:03:57.000 --> 01:03:58.000 Lehigh Roe E. 01:03:58.000 --> 01:04:01.000 Row E. 01:04:01.000 --> 01:04:03.000 well of them. 01:04:03.000 --> 01:04:10.000 Living one who sees me. 01:04:10.000 --> 01:04:12.000 Try it. 01:04:12.000 --> 01:04:15.000 When we teach people to doot, 01:04:15.000 --> 01:04:18.000 It typically… we invite people. 01:04:18.000 --> 01:04:20.000 to go 01:04:20.000 --> 01:04:22.000 out. 01:04:22.000 --> 01:04:24.000 rules… 01:04:24.000 --> 01:04:27.000 go something like this. 01:04:27.000 --> 01:04:32.000 You go out. We recommend going someplace where you are, quote, alone. 01:04:32.000 --> 01:04:34.000 So you don't feel inhibited. 01:04:34.000 --> 01:04:37.000 If you do this in the supermarket, 01:04:37.000 --> 01:04:41.000 People will look at you funny. 01:04:41.000 --> 01:04:45.000 You then speak aloud. 01:04:45.000 --> 01:04:46.000 Not… yeah, you can. 01:04:46.000 --> 01:04:48.000 Quietly. But it has to be allowed. 01:04:48.000 --> 01:04:49.000 So you… 01:04:49.000 --> 01:04:51.000 You need to hear yourself say the words. 01:04:51.000 --> 01:04:53.000 Not in your head. 01:04:53.000 --> 01:04:54.000 Not, here's what I would say if I were saying. 01:04:54.000 --> 01:04:56.000 Mm-hmm. 01:04:56.000 --> 01:04:57.000 But actually say it. 01:04:57.000 --> 01:05:01.000 Not thinking it is enough. You actually have to put it out your mouth. 01:05:01.000 --> 01:05:07.000 You do not prepare, you do not take notes. 01:05:07.000 --> 01:05:11.000 And once you start, you don't… 01:05:11.000 --> 01:05:13.000 Stop. For… 01:05:13.000 --> 01:05:18.000 some period of time. Now, Nachman would do this for an hour. 01:05:18.000 --> 01:05:21.000 We recommend 5 to 10 minutes. 01:05:21.000 --> 01:05:24.000 And even if… 01:05:24.000 --> 01:05:31.000 You don't know what to say, and you end up saying, what the hell were Rabbi Rachel and Rabbi David telling me to do? 01:05:31.000 --> 01:05:36.000 Were they on crack when they told me to do this? Why am I even listening to them? But you keep it 01:05:36.000 --> 01:05:37.000 Do it anyway. 01:05:37.000 --> 01:05:40.000 going. 01:05:40.000 --> 01:05:44.000 Try not to judge what you say, just say. 01:05:44.000 --> 01:05:48.000 to use the phrase of Reb Zalman. 01:05:48.000 --> 01:05:50.000 The teacher of our teachers. 01:05:50.000 --> 01:05:58.000 When you're done, don't hang up the phone so fast. 01:05:58.000 --> 01:06:02.000 It isn't that there is no communal power in prayer. 01:06:02.000 --> 01:06:06.000 or power and communal prayer, there is. 01:06:06.000 --> 01:06:10.000 This is different. 01:06:10.000 --> 01:06:16.000 And there are ways to do both, but for now… 01:06:16.000 --> 01:06:22.000 We want to invite you to try this sometimes. Again, this is directly from Rebnahman. 01:06:22.000 --> 01:06:30.000 Questions about Hippo de Dut, because then we have to ask what Rivka saw. 01:06:30.000 --> 01:06:36.000 Now we know what Yitzhak was doing. 01:06:36.000 --> 01:06:37.000 Questions or comments? 01:06:37.000 --> 01:06:41.000 Remember also that you can always reach to either one of us. 01:06:41.000 --> 01:06:48.000 At a later moment about this, because we're here for that. 01:06:48.000 --> 01:06:53.000 Corinne, you can go out in the field anytime, Miss Tropical Island Mauritius. 01:06:53.000 --> 01:07:02.000 That's what I try to do. Just, I was thinking during ill, when we say the king, God is in the fields. 01:07:02.000 --> 01:07:11.000 Figurative meaning of that, that you kind of… go out in the field to meet God? Is it literally or figuratively? What's the meaning? 01:07:11.000 --> 01:07:12.000 Right. So… 01:07:12.000 --> 01:07:14.000 Yes, both. 01:07:14.000 --> 01:07:16.000 Rachel, you want that one? 01:07:16.000 --> 01:07:21.000 Oh, right, so remember, for those for whom this may not be ringing a bell, the month of Elul, 01:07:21.000 --> 01:07:23.000 the months leading up to Rosh Hashanah. 01:07:23.000 --> 01:07:32.000 is when tradition says the king is in the field. We imagine God as a king, as a sovereign, transcendent, far away, unreachable, 01:07:32.000 --> 01:07:34.000 But during Elul, 01:07:34.000 --> 01:07:38.000 God is walking in the fields with us. 01:07:38.000 --> 01:07:44.000 And some have a custom of literally walking in the fields, particularly during… during Elul, 01:07:44.000 --> 01:07:47.000 to engage in heat bodhadut, to talk with God. 01:07:47.000 --> 01:07:50.000 Because God is here with us. 01:07:50.000 --> 01:07:55.000 And it can also be metaphorical, metaphysical, you don't need to be in a literal field. 01:07:55.000 --> 01:07:57.000 It doesn't… you don't need to be able to walk. 01:07:57.000 --> 01:08:06.000 that God, asterisk, whatever that means, is with us here in creation, in a deeper way. 01:08:06.000 --> 01:08:10.000 Or maybe, like the story goes, God is everywhere, but we're present in a deeper way. 01:08:10.000 --> 01:08:11.000 We're different, yeah. Yeah. 01:08:11.000 --> 01:08:12.000 Maybe it's about us. 01:08:12.000 --> 01:08:22.000 Yeah, I would just add to that that there are times in life when we feel that if there is a God at all, God is very, very, very, very far away. 01:08:22.000 --> 01:08:23.000 Yes. 01:08:23.000 --> 01:08:27.000 And it's really important as we head toward the Jewish high holidays to invoke 01:08:27.000 --> 01:08:33.000 A quality of divinity, a presence, that isn't far away. 01:08:33.000 --> 01:08:41.000 Because that is really useful to opening our hearts, to empowering us to look within ourselves, to do tshuva, to… 01:08:41.000 --> 01:08:50.000 All of that. And so we say HaMelech Besadeh, the king is in the fields, as opposed to, you know, up in that castle over there with a moat and guards and 01:08:50.000 --> 01:08:54.000 And all that. The king comes right here. 01:08:54.000 --> 01:08:59.000 It's the Avinuhef of Avinu Mulkeenu. 01:08:59.000 --> 01:09:00.000 Right? Our intimate relation 01:09:00.000 --> 01:09:01.000 Yeah. 01:09:01.000 --> 01:09:03.000 Our distant sovereign. 01:09:03.000 --> 01:09:04.000 Beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful. 01:09:04.000 --> 01:09:09.000 Both hand. 01:09:09.000 --> 01:09:10.000 Yeah. 01:09:10.000 --> 01:09:12.000 I see a bunch of hands, and I also want to move into what Rivka saw. James and then Cheryl, and then we'll talk Rivka. 01:09:12.000 --> 01:09:15.000 So, I know the traditionally, 01:09:15.000 --> 01:09:18.000 The heat load is… 01:09:18.000 --> 01:09:20.000 an actual talking. 01:09:20.000 --> 01:09:21.000 verbal. 01:09:21.000 --> 01:09:23.000 Yes. 01:09:23.000 --> 01:09:29.000 I have found that I do this without the words. 01:09:29.000 --> 01:09:32.000 It's just, um… 01:09:32.000 --> 01:09:34.000 It's like an attention. 01:09:34.000 --> 01:09:37.000 the things. It's just a feeling of things. 01:09:37.000 --> 01:09:41.000 And I do the… it's that… that thing I've talked about with you before. 01:09:41.000 --> 01:09:43.000 Rabbi David, about… 01:09:43.000 --> 01:09:50.000 communicating at a level that is not verbal, it is not vocal. 01:09:50.000 --> 01:09:54.000 It's just straight-up communion overlapping of… 01:09:54.000 --> 01:09:55.000 Yeah. 01:09:55.000 --> 01:10:00.000 of consciousness and so forth. 01:10:00.000 --> 01:10:01.000 Yes? 01:10:01.000 --> 01:10:03.000 Same thing, just without the specific words. 01:10:03.000 --> 01:10:06.000 to do it. But it's the same meaning. 01:10:06.000 --> 01:10:08.000 Yes and. 01:10:08.000 --> 01:10:12.000 neurobiologists also know? 01:10:12.000 --> 01:10:15.000 that sometimes… 01:10:15.000 --> 01:10:18.000 We activate different things. 01:10:18.000 --> 01:10:22.000 And we integrate in different ways when we bring 01:10:22.000 --> 01:10:26.000 things into our other senses. 01:10:26.000 --> 01:10:29.000 to speak, to hear, to feel. 01:10:29.000 --> 01:10:33.000 feel. Some emotions… 01:10:33.000 --> 01:10:37.000 end up being integrated, expressed, 01:10:37.000 --> 01:10:41.000 things get opened up, things get messed up and get cleaned up. 01:10:41.000 --> 01:10:43.000 So I would invite those of us 01:10:43.000 --> 01:10:48.000 who have a spiritual practice like this, but don't verbalize it. 01:10:48.000 --> 01:10:57.000 Try it, and not just once. Do what they say over the arc of some period of time. We tend to recommend 5 to 10 minutes a day. 01:10:57.000 --> 01:10:59.000 for a month. 01:10:59.000 --> 01:11:03.000 Let's see what happens. There may be an arc to the experience. 01:11:03.000 --> 01:11:09.000 And if it doesn't, quote, work for you, it doesn't, quote, work for you, although we would be curious what's the what. 01:11:09.000 --> 01:11:12.000 It isn't… it's a tool. 01:11:12.000 --> 01:11:14.000 It's a tool. 01:11:14.000 --> 01:11:17.000 So, Cheryl, and then I'm going to take us into Rivka, because time is growing short. 01:11:17.000 --> 01:11:20.000 And James, we can talk… we can talk offside. 01:11:20.000 --> 01:11:26.000 Um, one of the things. I really love about Reb Nachman is. 01:11:26.000 --> 01:11:34.000 Obviously, the mystical… stuff underneath a lot of the words. However, also. 01:11:34.000 --> 01:11:41.000 it's so practical. And I think that that dual function of pretty much everything that I've read. 01:11:41.000 --> 01:11:50.000 That we've shared here. Um, some people… I think the saying, go out of your home. 01:11:50.000 --> 01:11:59.000 is put aside your daily to-do list. Some… it's very hard for some people to stop that kind of thing. 01:11:59.000 --> 01:12:05.000 Unless they literally walk away from it and put themselves in a place. 01:12:05.000 --> 01:12:12.000 Where nothing is demanded of them, or nothing they feel they need to do. 01:12:12.000 --> 01:12:19.000 It's just about that moment, and sometimes. Literally taking yourself out of that. 01:12:19.000 --> 01:12:26.000 Experience of home or work. is… it's a practical response to an. 01:12:26.000 --> 01:12:31.000 innate, um… spiritual need. 01:12:31.000 --> 01:12:33.000 Beautiful. 01:12:33.000 --> 01:12:39.000 We're going to shift gears a little bit, because we've got a handful of things yet. 01:12:39.000 --> 01:12:41.000 To see on this page and on the next. 01:12:41.000 --> 01:12:48.000 So, Rivka lifted her eyes and saw Gitzcot, she got off the camel and said to the servant, Who is that man walking in the field? 01:12:48.000 --> 01:12:53.000 The servant said that is my master, so she took her veil and covered herself. 01:12:53.000 --> 01:12:55.000 We had a bunch of questions about this earlier. 01:12:55.000 --> 01:12:57.000 So, Rambun… 01:12:57.000 --> 01:12:59.000 is going to say, 01:12:59.000 --> 01:13:06.000 In my view, in Rivka, seeing someone walking in the field to greet her hastening on the road and walking in the field toward them, 01:13:06.000 --> 01:13:09.000 She knew that he was coming to see them and greet them. 01:13:09.000 --> 01:13:15.000 Or to host them. So she did as was ethically proper for women, and she stood 01:13:15.000 --> 01:13:16.000 Modestly. 01:13:16.000 --> 01:13:19.000 In Hebrew, it's the ut. 01:13:19.000 --> 01:13:22.000 There's that word. 01:13:22.000 --> 01:13:26.000 Right? So, Yitzhak knew 01:13:26.000 --> 01:13:30.000 Because he was he boda-duting, 01:13:30.000 --> 01:13:33.000 Time to look up. 01:13:33.000 --> 01:13:38.000 And Rivka, sort of, 01:13:38.000 --> 01:13:40.000 And they locked… 01:13:40.000 --> 01:13:41.000 Okay, and now I'm gonna do that cultural thing. 01:13:41.000 --> 01:13:43.000 words. 01:13:43.000 --> 01:13:45.000 Yeah, Nancy's looking to see what means. Right. 01:13:45.000 --> 01:13:47.000 Yeah, please use words. 01:13:47.000 --> 01:13:51.000 Right. Okay. 01:13:51.000 --> 01:14:01.000 Don't pay attention to… oh, no, no, maybe… Hey, Joe, you want to read the start of the chiskuni? You might enjoy this one. 01:14:01.000 --> 01:14:02.000 Yeah. 01:14:02.000 --> 01:14:06.000 Thanks, I'm sure. She, uh, we've got Soyuzak. 01:14:06.000 --> 01:14:17.000 She got off the camel, she saw him handsome, tall, and well-confidence, powerfully walking across unwalked fields. That's important. She felt ashamed. 01:14:17.000 --> 01:14:29.000 She was small, just 3 years old. I'm not sure in what base, and believed him to be a rapist or armed robber. She became terrified and fell. 01:14:29.000 --> 01:14:30.000 Okay, Elma's… 01:14:30.000 --> 01:14:31.000 Off her camel. 01:14:31.000 --> 01:14:35.000 And what base is a great question, but as far as we can tell, he really means three. 01:14:35.000 --> 01:14:37.000 Elma just went… 01:14:37.000 --> 01:14:47.000 What? There is a midrush… remember that there's a teaching that says that Sarah died at the moment of the Akedah? 01:14:47.000 --> 01:14:49.000 Which we know was 3 years ago. 01:14:49.000 --> 01:14:52.000 from one of the things we read earlier. 01:14:52.000 --> 01:15:00.000 And there is a midrush that says that at the moment that Sarah's soul left this world, Rivka's soul entered this world, because 01:15:00.000 --> 01:15:03.000 God couldn't leave the world without 01:15:03.000 --> 01:15:06.000 this particular caliber of soul. 01:15:06.000 --> 01:15:13.000 And if that is so, then Rivka was born at the moment that Sarah died, perhaps she is a reincarnation of Sarah, 01:15:13.000 --> 01:15:17.000 And therefore, she can only be 3 years old. 01:15:17.000 --> 01:15:22.000 Yep. In last week's Parsha, we saw her as apparently a grown woman. 01:15:22.000 --> 01:15:25.000 Watering a whole flock of camels. 01:15:25.000 --> 01:15:31.000 And earlier this… today, we saw her agree to go and get married, not so worried about her trousseau. 01:15:31.000 --> 01:15:37.000 So, all of these Midrash do not necessarily make sense together. 01:15:37.000 --> 01:15:39.000 In one of our envisionings, 01:15:39.000 --> 01:15:44.000 She was 3. She fell off the camel because she saw a strange guy walking across the field. 01:15:44.000 --> 01:15:50.000 And Nancy wants to hide underneath her table. 01:15:50.000 --> 01:15:55.000 But there are times. When we are reduced to our most. 01:15:55.000 --> 01:15:59.000 elemental baby self. And at a time like this. 01:15:59.000 --> 01:16:02.000 Oh, I love that. 01:16:02.000 --> 01:16:03.000 Her inner child. 01:16:03.000 --> 01:16:16.000 And that I would say… Your inner child, exactly. And you… and so you… you veil yourself, and you take a step back. 01:16:16.000 --> 01:16:22.000 So, but the… 01:16:22.000 --> 01:16:23.000 Uh, maybe get a little… 01:16:23.000 --> 01:16:24.000 Um, and she's terrified, fell over a camel. Well, you know, you… You look for… you look forward to certain things, and when they appear on the horizon. 01:16:24.000 --> 01:16:27.000 It's absolutely diminishing. 01:16:27.000 --> 01:16:32.000 So, oh, I love that. Diminishing all the way down to 3. So, the word for… 01:16:32.000 --> 01:16:37.000 getting off the camel is actually fell. 01:16:37.000 --> 01:16:42.000 Which is an odd word for Tori to use here. 01:16:42.000 --> 01:16:44.000 Yeah, cheap, cheap. 01:16:44.000 --> 01:16:46.000 She didn't get off her camel, she went… 01:16:46.000 --> 01:16:48.000 She didn't dismount, she fell. 01:16:48.000 --> 01:16:55.000 This is the National Lampoon version. 01:16:55.000 --> 01:16:56.000 The Mel Brooks version. 01:16:56.000 --> 01:16:58.000 Yes. 01:16:58.000 --> 01:17:01.000 She sees him from a distance, and… 01:17:01.000 --> 01:17:04.000 Maybe… maybe she's falling for him. 01:17:04.000 --> 01:17:10.000 Haha. But that joke gets made by the sages too, that doesn't just work in English. 01:17:10.000 --> 01:17:15.000 So, there's something going on here. 01:17:15.000 --> 01:17:17.000 And because this is such a… 01:17:17.000 --> 01:17:20.000 pun intended, pregnant moment. 01:17:20.000 --> 01:17:26.000 Every bit of this is being mined for meaning. 01:17:26.000 --> 01:17:29.000 Okay, let's try again. 01:17:29.000 --> 01:17:35.000 Now, here's the Khiskuni saying, or maybe it's this. 01:17:35.000 --> 01:17:40.000 So he's not convinced himself of this whole 3 years old thing. 01:17:40.000 --> 01:17:48.000 But it sort of would make sense if there's some element of Sarah in here that is now in Rivka, 01:17:48.000 --> 01:17:54.000 Boy howdy, Freud is having a moment. 01:17:54.000 --> 01:18:00.000 But wasn't Yitzak also thought to be 3? With some… and some thoughts? 01:18:00.000 --> 01:18:04.000 Not anymore. 01:18:04.000 --> 01:18:05.000 Right, right, right, right. 01:18:05.000 --> 01:18:06.000 No, not… as the Akedah. 01:18:06.000 --> 01:18:12.000 Right, so there's… what's going on here? Okay, so here's this Devarakher, another view. 01:18:12.000 --> 01:18:15.000 That this whole thing is distorted. 01:18:15.000 --> 01:18:16.000 This is all wrong. 01:18:16.000 --> 01:18:20.000 Because this is all wrong. In fact, even Torah is scrambled. 01:18:20.000 --> 01:18:24.000 Why would she get off the camel before knowing who he is? 01:18:24.000 --> 01:18:33.000 Which is why she asked the servant, who's this guy? Who's this man walking in the field? So why would you get off the camel and then ask? 01:18:33.000 --> 01:18:39.000 And so when the servant said, he's my master, THEN she got off the camel, even though 01:18:39.000 --> 01:18:42.000 Taurus says she got off the camel already. 01:18:42.000 --> 01:18:50.000 Somebody screwed up this piece of Torah. Khizkuni is saying Torah is wrong. 01:18:50.000 --> 01:18:56.000 careful, the lightning is about to strike you, sir. 01:18:56.000 --> 01:18:57.000 I'm saying that Jesus Kuni is saying the Torah is wrong. 01:18:57.000 --> 01:19:01.000 You said Torah is wrong? 01:19:01.000 --> 01:19:06.000 Kriskuni is trying to reorder this so that it makes sense to him. 01:19:06.000 --> 01:19:08.000 There's no before and after in Torah. 01:19:08.000 --> 01:19:10.000 Maybe it did happen the other way around. 01:19:10.000 --> 01:19:14.000 Right? He's struggling. He's really struggling! 01:19:14.000 --> 01:19:20.000 You don't see this kind of minrosh very often. 01:19:20.000 --> 01:19:34.000 One of the basic principles of Midrash is you have to accept Torah Stam as she is. Otherwise, you're not just making up a story, you're making up a Torah, and that's a little above our pay grade. 01:19:34.000 --> 01:19:40.000 So this just testifies, so if you're wigged out by 3 years old, and Diana said, 01:19:40.000 --> 01:19:43.000 Is there anything happening in the news about that right now? Um, hmm… 01:19:43.000 --> 01:19:44.000 Yeah… 01:19:44.000 --> 01:19:46.000 Yeah, right? 01:19:46.000 --> 01:19:52.000 Here's Chris Cuni himself saying, I'm struggling with this. 01:19:52.000 --> 01:19:54.000 And the more you struggle, the more… 01:19:54.000 --> 01:19:57.000 it says Dal Shaney, explain me. 01:19:57.000 --> 01:20:03.000 Yeah, Cheryl. 01:20:03.000 --> 01:20:12.000 Receptive Gilgul. Sarah could have… Come to join Rivka's soul. 01:20:12.000 --> 01:20:13.000 Hmm. 01:20:13.000 --> 01:20:17.000 At an older age. And it's an important piece because. 01:20:17.000 --> 01:20:23.000 I think that if… Sarah was being reincarnated. 01:20:23.000 --> 01:20:31.000 Um, it's not quite the same thing. Your goal is when a soul comes to help someone through. 01:20:31.000 --> 01:20:39.000 Period of time where there's something that. They need help with. It's a spiritual assistance. 01:20:39.000 --> 01:20:45.000 So, that could kind of work. Here, and it doesn't mean that Sorell would have to stay. 01:20:45.000 --> 01:20:49.000 Midrash on Midrash on Midrash. 01:20:49.000 --> 01:20:50.000 On Midrash. 01:20:50.000 --> 01:20:52.000 Through her lifetime. 01:20:52.000 --> 01:20:55.000 Joan, last comment, and then we're gonna make a run at finishing this. 01:20:55.000 --> 01:21:05.000 And to add to what Cheryl just said, this to me looks like… Humility. And so, in humility, you come down. 01:21:05.000 --> 01:21:11.000 from your camel. And you cover yourself, and you await. 01:21:11.000 --> 01:21:12.000 So, what's the big event? 01:21:12.000 --> 01:21:15.000 a big event. 01:21:15.000 --> 01:21:16.000 the big… 01:21:16.000 --> 01:21:18.000 So the Sforno says… 01:21:18.000 --> 01:21:25.000 She covered herself, because she was afraid to gaze, much like Moshe hid his face. 01:21:25.000 --> 01:21:31.000 Anybody have any idea what Moshe was hiding his face from seeing? 01:21:31.000 --> 01:21:32.000 Nancy is saying, 01:21:32.000 --> 01:21:35.000 Nancy, you're muted. 01:21:35.000 --> 01:21:36.000 God. 01:21:36.000 --> 01:21:37.000 Getting burned up by the divine a suntan. The Holy Glove. 01:21:37.000 --> 01:21:38.000 God… 01:21:38.000 --> 01:21:43.000 Right. The Divine Suntan, the divine radiation that you get from seeing God, right? Moshe has said, 01:21:43.000 --> 01:21:45.000 Yeah, yeah. Holy Glow. 01:21:45.000 --> 01:21:52.000 God, show me… I want to see your face, and God says, you can't see my face and live. 01:21:52.000 --> 01:21:57.000 Right? Right. Lahabit. He… he… 01:21:57.000 --> 01:21:58.000 This is the burning bush. 01:21:58.000 --> 01:22:00.000 Mm-hmm. 01:22:00.000 --> 01:22:03.000 Literally the burning bush. So… 01:22:03.000 --> 01:22:06.000 Here is Midrash saying, 01:22:06.000 --> 01:22:09.000 Rivka is just like Avraham. 01:22:09.000 --> 01:22:11.000 RIFCA is just like Sarah. 01:22:11.000 --> 01:22:12.000 Because, just like most of it. 01:22:12.000 --> 01:22:17.000 Rivka is just like Moses! 01:22:17.000 --> 01:22:21.000 Imputing to her profound spirituality 01:22:21.000 --> 01:22:27.000 In the seemingly most mundane of things. 01:22:27.000 --> 01:22:29.000 What if we could do? 01:22:29.000 --> 01:22:32.000 do that in our most mundane… 01:22:32.000 --> 01:22:46.000 things. As if, when we approach someone, they're like an angel of God. 01:22:46.000 --> 01:22:48.000 Not bad. Not bad, not bad. 01:22:48.000 --> 01:22:52.000 So, now let's pick up a few pieces of… 01:22:52.000 --> 01:22:54.000 Specifically, Women's Midrash. 01:22:54.000 --> 01:22:59.000 move through these materials. Someone want to read from the Darshuni. 01:22:59.000 --> 01:23:02.000 And you'll see here some of these midrashim 01:23:02.000 --> 01:23:06.000 now finding different kinds of expression. 01:23:06.000 --> 01:23:15.000 Wiley Rebecca recounts what an awful journey it was after an endless camel trek to reach a home and a husband I'd never seen, 01:23:15.000 --> 01:23:20.000 I finally caught a glimpse of my husband-to-be walking in the field toward evening. 01:23:20.000 --> 01:23:26.000 What immediately struck me was how much older he was than I'd imagined, and how bent over. 01:23:26.000 --> 01:23:30.000 As if he'd been carrying a heavy load all his life. 01:23:30.000 --> 01:23:38.000 Out of respect for him, I hurried to dismount from my camel, but I was sick at heart. 01:23:38.000 --> 01:23:39.000 Keep going. 01:23:39.000 --> 01:23:41.000 The rabbis offer their version. 01:23:41.000 --> 01:23:52.000 Rabbi Rebecca is so overcome by fatigue, frayed nerves, and erotic excitement, that she falls off her camel. As it is written, she alighted from her camel. 01:23:52.000 --> 01:23:55.000 Indeed, the Hebrew word 01:23:55.000 --> 01:23:59.000 Vatipol literally means to fall down. 01:23:59.000 --> 01:24:04.000 Rebecca fires back. Why don't you try spending a few days riding a camel? 01:24:04.000 --> 01:24:08.000 Anyway, once I'd made sure that this stranger was Isaac, 01:24:08.000 --> 01:24:10.000 I veiled myself. 01:24:10.000 --> 01:24:18.000 Our mother's comment. As in the earlier scene at the well, Rebecca acts spontaneously, responding to her own heart. 01:24:18.000 --> 01:24:24.000 For although she is otherwise spirited and bold, here she restrains herself. 01:24:24.000 --> 01:24:29.000 And behaves with modesty, covering herself before her future husband. 01:24:29.000 --> 01:24:37.000 But Rebecca demures, just as I asserted my own will in agreeing to the marriage, so here I asserted myself 01:24:37.000 --> 01:24:40.000 In meeting Isaac eye to eye. 01:24:40.000 --> 01:24:45.000 That's why Eleazar identified Isaac as his master, not mine. 01:24:45.000 --> 01:24:55.000 Because in me, Isaac had more than… had more than met his match. 01:24:55.000 --> 01:24:58.000 And in fact, in next week's Torah portion… 01:24:58.000 --> 01:25:03.000 Rivka is going to be the first one to have a question 01:25:03.000 --> 01:25:09.000 and go to God directly to get an answer. 01:25:09.000 --> 01:25:14.000 Talk about agency. RIFCA is being set up here 01:25:14.000 --> 01:25:18.000 As almost a tikkun for Sarah. 01:25:18.000 --> 01:25:26.000 Sarah doesn't relate directly to God, but Rivka will. 01:25:26.000 --> 01:25:28.000 We happened to skip. 01:25:28.000 --> 01:25:34.000 this piece in the Dershuni, it's brief. Does anybody want it? 01:25:34.000 --> 01:25:36.000 This takes a bit of a different view. 01:25:36.000 --> 01:25:43.000 I'll read it. And she took the veil and covered up. 01:25:43.000 --> 01:25:48.000 She dropped to the ground, took her veil, and covered her face. 01:25:48.000 --> 01:25:55.000 Partitioning her from her husband. So that none of her waves and breakers can surge. 01:25:55.000 --> 01:26:02.000 Psalms toward him. And whatever flaw she may have, he wouldn't accept. 01:26:02.000 --> 01:26:12.000 Rebecca did, as all women do. A candle burned in the tent from one Sabbath eve to the next. 01:26:12.000 --> 01:26:13.000 In her dough, it should say, sorry. 01:26:13.000 --> 01:26:14.000 In her dough, sorry. 01:26:14.000 --> 01:26:21.000 There was blessing to be found her dough. So, and a cloud rested atop the tent as it was in Sarah's days. 01:26:21.000 --> 01:26:27.000 Rebecca comforts Isaac on the death of his mother, but there is no comfort for her. 01:26:27.000 --> 01:26:32.000 I wondered about that. That was something I forgot to say earlier when we read that piece, that. 01:26:32.000 --> 01:26:42.000 It ends with her comforting him and him being glad about that, and what about her? 01:26:42.000 --> 01:26:43.000 So that's something that Hagit Rappel 01:26:43.000 --> 01:26:45.000 There was no mention of her. 01:26:45.000 --> 01:26:49.000 Notices also, and many of the images in this 01:26:49.000 --> 01:26:55.000 are taken from classical Midrash. There's a classical Midrash that says that there was a light 01:26:55.000 --> 01:26:57.000 in the tent, in Sarah's tent. 01:26:57.000 --> 01:27:01.000 From one Shabbat to the next, but when she died, the light went out. 01:27:01.000 --> 01:27:05.000 And when Rivka came, the light came back. 01:27:05.000 --> 01:27:08.000 So, once again, 01:27:08.000 --> 01:27:10.000 We'll close with… 01:27:10.000 --> 01:27:16.000 something new that came through me this week on account of all of this learning that we've been doing. 01:27:16.000 --> 01:27:21.000 And this is a different take than the one that some of you might have seen on my blog earlier. 01:27:21.000 --> 01:27:24.000 Rebecca Vales. 01:27:24.000 --> 01:27:28.000 You walked among the trees, cloaked in contemplation. 01:27:28.000 --> 01:27:32.000 Singing softly, lit from within. 01:27:32.000 --> 01:27:36.000 I wrapped myself in a veil to reach inward. 01:27:36.000 --> 01:27:39.000 To find my own godspark. 01:27:39.000 --> 01:27:45.000 And as I inhaled God's breath lifted the flames within me. 01:27:45.000 --> 01:27:47.000 Helping my light grow. 01:27:47.000 --> 01:27:57.000 To meet yours. To be your match. 01:27:57.000 --> 01:28:04.000 Oh, mesh, you mean as in equal, or match as strike the match and light the spark up some more. 01:28:04.000 --> 01:28:07.000 Yes! 01:28:07.000 --> 01:28:08.000 Yes, both. And thank you for seeing that. 01:28:08.000 --> 01:28:12.000 Yay! 01:28:12.000 --> 01:28:16.000 One of the things that struck me in this learning is that we've got 01:28:16.000 --> 01:28:20.000 This vision of Yitzhak doing Hit Boradut. 01:28:20.000 --> 01:28:24.000 But when I think of veiling myself, I think of going under my tallit. 01:28:24.000 --> 01:28:27.000 For my own Hit Bodhadut, 01:28:27.000 --> 01:28:33.000 And so, I thought, why not Rivka? 01:28:33.000 --> 01:28:37.000 So an invitation everybody to… 01:28:37.000 --> 01:28:39.000 do that. 01:28:39.000 --> 01:28:41.000 do that. 01:28:41.000 --> 01:28:45.000 Your Shabbat can take many forms. 01:28:45.000 --> 01:28:49.000 Maybe it's Hippodut, maybe it's… 01:28:49.000 --> 01:28:53.000 Lifting up your own agency and relationship with 01:28:53.000 --> 01:28:58.000 the one who sent you. 01:28:58.000 --> 01:29:01.000 May the Shabbat be Lashem Shamayim for the sake of heaven. 01:29:01.000 --> 01:29:04.000 But also… 01:29:04.000 --> 01:29:08.000 Mashem Yu. 01:29:08.000 --> 01:29:10.000 It's our custom to stay on after… 01:29:10.000 --> 01:29:13.000 afterwards, for anyone who wants to schmooze. 01:29:13.000 --> 01:29:19.000 but shalom to everybody. Tune in next week. 01:29:19.000 --> 01:29:25.000 Let's just call it a pregnant Parsha, shall we? 01:29:25.000 --> 01:29:28.000 Parshat told Dot coming up. 01:29:28.000 --> 01:29:34.000 stop the recording here, and we'll stay on Shabbat Shalom, everybody.