Chayei Sarah: Loving Kindness

As Eliezer – though he is not named directly in Tanach, merely referred to as a servant – goes to find Yitzchak a wife from among the kindred of Avraham, his intuition tells him that he must devise a test by which to discern who will be best suited. Avraham’s instructions are simple but also quite vague: ‘go to my country, to my kindred, and take a wife for my son Yitzchak’ (Gen. 24:4). We know that G-d has already asked Avraham to leave his father’s household, his kin, to follow G-d’s path and move to Cana’an, so it seems odd that he would wish his son to marry into the society which G-d expressly asked him to leave in Lech Lecha.

‘Kindred’ must mean something different, and it can be argued that, rather than looking for a specific person, Avraham sends Eliezer in search of a woman who embodies his ideals, ideals which were innate within him in the society in which he dwelt, in which he was able to realise G-d. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks concurs with this idea, writing that ‘Abraham had not told [Eliezer] to look for any specific traits of character’[1]. Yet, how is Eliezer to know how to identify such a woman? There are so many worthy values and characteristic one could look for in a spouse – spirituality, loyalty, intellect, humour, the list goes on – yet Eliezer fixes upon one characteristic in particular. He devises a test, asking G-d to send him a woman who would share her water not only with him, but with his camels as well. The characteristic he is searching for is kindness.

Why kindness? The answer lies in the fact that the middah, ‘value’, which is ascribed to Avraham is חסד, ‘kindness’ or ‘loving kindness’. Eliezer himself uses the word, asking G-d עשה חסד עם אדני אברהם, to ‘show kindness to my master Avraham’ (Gen. 24:12), imbuing this trait with a divine aspect and making its presence all the more important in the woman who will become the next matriarch of the Jewish people. Academics concur on this reading of Avraham’s character, Yehuda Gellman citing Micha 7:20, which references G-d giving חסד to Avraham. Gellman builds on this citation, writing that the ‘hesed of Abraham [is] popularly identified with his acts of kindness’.[2]

That such a trait is embodied by this biblical figure is significant, since, as R’ Sacks writes, חסד is ‘central to the Jewish value system’, a value which can bring ‘redemption to the world and […] can change lives’.[3] It is a value which is often prized above others, the Sages of the Talmud writing in Sukkah 49b:11 that ‘acts of kindness are superior to [tzedakah – charity], since ‘acts of kindness can be performed both by his person and his money […] for poor and rich’ and ‘both for the living and the dead’. It makes sense that such an quality is attributed to Avraham, whom we have seen in Vayera opening his home to visitors, performing the mitzvah of הכנסת אורחים, despite having had his brit milah at an advanced age just days earlier.

Sarah, too, embodies חסד, partially through her marital relationship to Avraham, which allows them to act as a unit, exemplifying each other’s ideals. Einat Ramon writes that ‘various midrashic texts emphasise [this] partnership and equal status of the two founding parents’ with Bereshit Rabbah 42:3 stating that ‘everyone who bestowed loving-kindness on Sarah was privileged to bestow loving-kindness on Abraham’.[4] Ramon reads this midrashic text as equating the two with respect to this virtue, but also notes that Sarah embodies חסד in her own right. She suggests that Sarah’s loving-kindness relates to how her ‘ability to give grows as she becomes a mother’, with ‘the miracle of Sarah’s parenthood, itself an expression of divine grace, [assuming] new forms via her personality, becoming an essentialised, clear human grace that culminates in physical, personal giving that exceeds all expectation’.[5]

This idea is echoed in the Talmudic tractate Bava Metzia 87a, something which indicates that this conception of Sarah as possessing חסד just as much as Avraham pervades rabbinic literature. Avraham sees חסד in his wife, and it is no wonder that, on her death, he wishes to find someone for his son who will perpetuate this value, teaching it to another generation.

That the trait is found by Eliezer in Rivkah is clear from her actions, though the exact effort she undertakes is not entirely clear when one first reads the verse. When Eliezer asks if he can drink from her pitcher, she immediately responds שתה אדני, ‘drink my lord’ (Gen. 24:18), addressing Avraham’s servant with formality and respect. When he has finished she hastens to bring water for all his camels, which we learnt earlier are many in number, the text reading ויקח האבד עשרה גמלים, ‘the servant took ten camels’ on his journey (Gen. 24:10).

It is curious that Tanach stipulates an exact number of camels; it could have detailed ‘several’ or ‘many’, but it instead chooses to specify a number. Jack Sasson addresses this surprising insertion in his academic study of this week’s parasha, writing that whilst ‘the number of camels (ten) may seem conventional, […] it will enhance the starkness of the test that the servant will soon impose. One camel can drink up to 100 litres per session, requiring [Rivkah] to fill her single 15- to 20-litre jar half a dozen times’.[6] He writes that ‘with ten camels to water, the poor girl will have made dozens of hauls by submitting to the test’, something which informs Eliezer, and us, about ‘the future bride’s physical, mental and social fitness’.[7] Though these indicators do show us that she will be a capable bride, able to withstand the tests of travel which may be required in a life with Yitzchak, it also informs us of her innate kindness.

To put herself through such physical strain, lugging litres of water back and forth in order to fulfil and surpass the request of a stranger, is a sure indicator of her devotion to helping others, whether it she knows them or not and whether or not it is at her expense. It is no wonder, then, that she is the perfect choice for Yitzchak. Her actions by the well prove that she will embody both aspects of חסד – the loving and the kindness. Her actions and her words in this biblical episode embody the verse from Mishlei which reads, פיה פתחה בחכמה ותורה חסד על-לשונה, ‘her mouth is full of wisdom, and on her tongue is the Torah of loving-kindness’ (Prov. 31:26), a part of Tanach which expressly refers to חסד as embroidered in the foundations of Torah.

It is curious that this week’s parasha is named חיי שרה, ‘the lives of Sarah’, when in fact it opens with her death. Rather than telling us about her demise, however, Chayei Sarah shows us the values of her life, giving us the tools by which to live meaningfully in the same way as Sarah Imenu. In embodying חסד, a trait she shared so unequivocally with her husband, she is able to partake in the description of Avraham’s death, which is ‘perhaps the most serene in the Torah’.[8]Avraham dies ‘in good old age, an old man, contented’ (Gen. 25:8) with all that he has seen and done, despite the fact that the promises G-d has made to him – of land, descendants, many nations – are yet to be fulfilled. He is completely, unequivocally content.

To understand how he could possibly be happy with his lot in death, we must look to his life with Sarah. From Lech Lecha, through Vayera and to Chayei Sarah, Avraham and Sarah’s lives are centred around the pillar middah of חסד, and it is the equal presence of such a value in both their lives and characters which allows them to share a ‘serenity in the face of death that came from a profound tranquillity [and kindness] in the face of life’.[9] As R’ Sacks writes, Avraham and Sarah ‘knew [that] what makes a life satisfying is not external but internal, a sense of purpose […] of starting something that would be continued by those who came after them’.[10] They knew that it was what was inside them – their philosophy and approach of kindness, to all they came across – that needed to be perpetuated in order for the fulfilment of G-d’s promises of their people’s continuation. This is why Avraham sends Eliezer on his mission, specifying his kindred, those that shared this characteristic quality. Rivkah, physically, spiritually and emotionally strong, was aware of and anticipated the needs of strangers around her. She, like Sarah before her, held within her the possibility to perpetuate the true nature of Torah and all it hinges on: kindness.

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This week’s article is for the full Refuah Shelema of רחל לבנה בת שירלי

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[1] Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, Essays in Ethics, (2016), pg.28

[2] Yehuda Gellman, ‘And Sarah Died’ in Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought, Vol.32 No.1, (1997), pp.57-67, pg.60

[3] R’ Sacks, Essays on Ethics, pg. 29, 31

[4] Einat Ramon, ‘The Matriarchs and the Torah of Hesed (Loving-Kindness)’ in Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women’s Studies & Gender Issues No.10, (2005), pp.154-177, pg.163

[5] Ramon, pg.166

[6] Jack M. Sasson, ‘The Servant’s Tale: How Rebekah Found a Spouse’ in Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol.65 No.4, (2006), pp.241-265. Pg.251

[7] Sasson, pg.251

[8] Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, I Believe, (2022), pg.28

[9] R’ Sacks, I Believe, pg.29

[10] R’ Sacks, I Believe, pg.31