Tani's drash

[rhu]

Over Shabbat, Tani was reading Sefer Bereshit (Genesis) and had gotten up to the Covenant between the Parts (Gen. 15). He exclaimed, "It's all Avraham's fault!"

"What is?" I asked.

"The slavery in Egypt."

"How so?"

"God promised Avraham that his descendants would inherit the land of Israel, right? And Avraham kept pestering God: 'How do I know that will happen? I don't have children yet.' So God gave him the vision between the animal parts, and started off with 'Know for sure that your children shall be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and they will be slaves there for four hundred years.' If Avraham hadn't doubted God, and hadn't insisted on proof, God wouldn't have said we had to be slaves in Egypt and so maybe we wouldn't have been."

Now, I had never heard that interpretation before. I took out my Torat Chayyim which contains all the major commentaries, and none of them said anything like this. But the Artscroll translation of Bereshit does mention this:

True, one view in the Talmud (Nedarim 32a) cites as a reason that Abraham's descendants were doomed to Egyptian servitude, that be asking for a sign he went to far in testing God's attributes (i.e. promises).

Artscroll quickly backs off from this view, because they follow the hagiographic approach to the patriarchs (*sigh*), but we had our citation. BT Nedarim 32a says

Rabbi Abbahu said in the name of Rabbi Eleazer: Why was Avraham our Father punished and his children doomed to Egyptian servitude? ... Shmuel said: Because he went too far in testing the attributes (=promises) of God, as it is written, "How shall I know that I shall inherit [the land]?" (Gen 15)

After we'd done this research, Tani said, "I'm not sure which would have made me more proud: coming up with a completely new insight or coming up with one that isn't common but the rabbis of the Talmud had thought of."

Comments

[gingicat]

Go Tani!

[hatam-soferet.livejournal.com]

Go Tani!

And, anyone can think like a maverick, but not everyone can think like the Talmud.

[cellio]

Good job!

There's probably plenty of "fault" to go around, so maybe we don't need to pile it all on Avraham. For example, how would we have gotten there if Yosef's brothers hadn't sold him? Another way, presumably -- and so, if Avraham hadn't pushed but God wanted us to be there so we could be redeemed from there, then another path would have emerged.

[oma-greene.livejournal.com]

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

[vettecat.livejournal.com]

Very cool!