Try to See it My Way

By Rabbi Joshua (perspectively known as The Hoffer) Hoffman

The beginning of this week's parsha describes at length the efforts that Avraham made to purchase a burial plot for his wife Sarah. As we have mentioned in the past, Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik, zt'l, explained this lengthy treatment serves to emphasize the importance of a Jew being buried in a Jewish cemetery, and to teach us that a Jew retains his Jewish identity even after he dies. Based on this explanation of the parsha, Rav Soloveitchik ruled that a Jewish soldier should not be buried in Arlington National Cemetery. The importance of this teaching of Rav Soloveitchik was driven home to me in a unique way several years ago when, together with Rabbi Hershel Reichman, a Rosh Yeshiva in Yeshiva University's RIETS, I visited Rav Ephraim Oshry, zt'l,who was the rabbi of the Kovno ghetto during the Holocaust years, and wrote a multi-volume work, MiMa'amakim, presenting some of the halachic inquiriues that he had to deal wiith at that time.

We visited Rav Oshry New York's Lower East Side not long before he died We asked Rav Oshry a wide range of questions, and his answers were quite interesting. What struck me most, however, was the answer he gave me when I asked him if he remembered Rabbi Meir Juzint, zt'l, associate dean of students at Hebrew Theological College in Chicago and an instructor ay the Chicago Jewish Academy, who had been together with him in yeshivas Slobodka in pre-war Poland, and had been a survivor of Bergen - Belsen. Rav Oshry said that he did know him, and asked 'what's with him?" I answered that he had passed away, and, in response, Rav Oshry said "he was zocheh to a kever Yisroel," meaning, he was privileged to have a Jewish burial. While we usually take it as a given that a Jew is buried in a Jewish cemetery and don't think that much about it, from Rav Oshry's perspective, it was a great thing, having seen so many Jews who perished without receiving a Jewish burial. When reading this parsha, then, it would be worthwhile to view it from the perspective of the many tragic eras in Jewish history that our people have endured, to remind us of how impotent a Jewish burial really is.

The perspective of the Holocaust can also give us a deeper appreciation of the very first verse of our parsha, describing the lifetime of Sarah: " The lifetime of Sarah was one hundred years and twenty years and seven years; the years of Sarah's life" (Bereishis, 23:1) Rashi, citing the midrash, says that the years are broken down this way to indicate that when Sarah was one-hundred years old, she was as free of sin as when she was twenty, and that when she was twenty, she was as beautiful as a seven year old. The ending of the verse,' the years of Sarah's life,' says Rashi, based on a midrash, teaches us that all of her years were equally good. Rabbi Kalonymus Kalmish Shapiro,Hy'd, who was a Chassidic Rebbe in Piaseczno, Poland, and perished in the Warsaw ghetto, commented on this verse in a sermon that he delivered in 1939, before the ghetto was established, and which is included in his work Eish Kodesh (Sacred Fire), which survived the war. He noted that Sarah was praised by the Torah more than any other righteous person. Even though the years of Avraham are broken up by the Torah in the same way that those of Sarah are, the verse in regard to Avraham's death does not end with a phrase similar to that mentioned in regard to Sarah.

Rav Shapiro then referred to the statement of Rashi that the section on Sarah's death was juxtaposed to the previous section, on the akeidah, to indicate that Sarah died of anguish when she heard of the incident of the akeidah. Her initial grief over the incident effected her so much that she did not remain alive long enough to find out that Yitzchak did not, in fact ,die. Taken together, these verses, and the midrashim on them, teach us that even though Sarah was completely righteous throughout her life, still, she was not able to withstand the anguish caused by the report of the akeidah, and she expired as a result Sarah, continued Rabbi Shapiro, should not be blamed for allowing her emotions to overcome her to the extent that she died out of grief, because she did so in order to assist the Jewish people in the future, by standing as a constant reminder to God not to bring too much grief to his beloved nation. That is why the verse ends by saying," the years of the life of Sarah', indicating that even in death, her years were all good. . While it is hard for us, today, to absorb the full meaning of Rav Shapiro's teaching in respect to this verse, certainly from the perspective of someone speaking to an audience that was undergoing untold suffering, his words delivered a message of comfort. Moreover, his teaching should sensitize us to the feelings of others, and to be careful not to cause someone else any anguish, because we can never know what that person has been experiencing, and how damaging any further anguish can be.