Parashat Vayera - First Aliyah
Read the biblical text and try to understand it on your own, before reading the commentary.
God appears to Abraham, but the Torah does not immediately tell us what He says to him. Instead, three men appear, and Abraham runs to meet them. Revelation and hospitality are woven together from the very opening of the parashah. How is welcoming guests connected to the encounter with God?
Whom does Abraham ask to wait?
al na ta’avor me’al avdecha
Translation: Please do not pass by your servant.
Excerpt from Genesis 18:3
Rashi offers two readings. In the first, Abraham addresses the greatest of the guests: if he stays, his companions will stay too. In the second, Abraham addresses God and asks Him to wait until he brings the guests in. According to this reading, the request was spoken before he ran toward them, even though it is written afterward. Rashi on Genesis 18:3
The second reading gives the running a surprising meaning: Abraham is standing before God, and yet he turns to welcome those who have come. The water for washing their feet, the rest under the tree and the food all find a place within this encounter.
Abraham runs himself
ve’el habakar ratz Avraham
Translation: And Abraham ran to the herd.
Excerpt from Genesis 18:7
Abraham offers a little water and bread, and then prepares a meal for the guests. The Torah lingers on the movement: he hurries to Sarah, asks her to hurry and runs to the herd.
Ramban explains that the verse tells of the running “to show how great was his eagerness for generosity.” Abraham is a man of standing with servants, old and weakened by his circumcision, and yet he goes himself to hasten the baking of the bread and to choose a good calf for his guests. Sarah and the young man share in the preparations, but he does not leave the care of the guests in their hands alone. Ramban on Genesis 18:7
His generosity also shows in the effort he puts in. He has others to whom he could hand the work, and he wants to be involved in it himself.
What did Sarah hear in the news?
In the midst of the hospitality the news arrives: Sarah will have a son. She hears it from the entrance of the tent and laughs within herself. Before the laughter, the Torah mentions the old age of Abraham and Sarah and the fact that the way of women had ceased for Sarah. The news stands against the physical reality she knows. Genesis 18:10-12
Ramban, in his commentary on verse 15, explains that Sarah did not know the guests were angels, and perhaps did not even see them. This helps explain why their words did not reach her as a divine promise. Even so, Ramban interprets her laughter as mockery and keeps the criticism in full: she should have believed, or said: Amen, so may God do. Ramban on Genesis 18:15
hayipale me’Adonai davar
Translation: Is anything too wondrous for God?
Excerpt from Genesis 18:14
The question returns the news to the One who can fulfill it. The old age described in the verses does not disappear, and the promise is directed precisely at what seems impossible within it. The aliyah ends with the setting of a time and a repetition of the promise to Sarah.