A lover at your door

November 22, 2024

Parshat Chayei Sarah

Part 1: A lover at your door 

One of the most powerful sermons I’ve heard was delivered by Rabbi Diane Cohler-Esses on a Friday night at Romemu in New York. It was a couple of years ago and I don’t remember the sources or the portion. I just remember that she painted a picture that awakened me. It was this…

You’re sitting in your home, and a lover arrives at your door. Can you picture it? 

You know she is there but you don’t get up to meet her. You stay, sitting on the couch. And she waits there, right outside your home. 

You decide to stay in that moment before. The moment of getting ready. The moment of anticipation and prolonged expectation.

In that moment, there is something charming about her waiting outside for you. You feel wanted.

You don’t need to deal with any of the hassle of what happens next. You don’t need to experience any of the euphoria or pain of her love. Nothing can go wrong. Nothing can go right. 

And so she waits in the cold while you are frozen indoors.  

Part 2: Torah context

I want to come back to this image. But first, let’s visit torah.

There’s a lot happening in the section of the Torah we read this time of year.

In last week’s portion, God finally fulfills his promise to Sarah, our matriarch, and she becomes pregnant at the ripe age of 90. She becomes mother to Isaac, named for his mother’s laughter at the improbability of his birth. But then, just a few verses later, God tells Abraham, Sarah’s husband, to sacrifice their son Isaac. To kill this child they love so dearly and waited so long for. At the last minute, before Abraham kills Isaac, God changes his mind. Says Abraham has demonstrated his loyalty and can sacrifice an animal instead. 

If you’ve heard this story before, it never fails to be disturbing. If you haven’t, I am genuinely sorry and let me know if you wanna talk after. 

This torah is messy. 

God is erratic and unpredictable. Making Sarah wait 90 years to become a mother. Asking Abraham to sacrifice his child. Granting miracles only to almost destroy them. Our ancestors are pummelled by episode after episode.  

Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac don’t exhibit much agency. They seem victims of circumstance and trauma. We don’t hear much about their emotionality or devastation. They are resigned to the chaos.

Although the story is bizarre, it is also familiar. A God who shows up sporadically. Repeated tragedy that makes us feel out of control in our own lives. Turning our emotions off to manage it all. How does it sit with you?

Part 3: Open to love

In this week’s parsha, there is something very different. 

It is time for Isaac to seek a wife and Eliezer, a servant, is sent for the task. 

A strange thing happens: everything goes perfectly. Amidst horrific stories, we have a story of simple meant-to-be-ness. Eliezer finds Isaac the right wife within moments of attempting. 

To do so, he devises a test, whereby when he sees an eligible bachelorette, he will her ask for a drink of water from a spring, and she must generously respond “Drink and I will also draw water for your camels”. 

Torah writes that Eliezer had “scarcely finished praying”, when Rebecca arrives and says the exact right thing. She passes the test, so well that Eliezer catches himself wondering if it’s too good to be true. 

Sometimes, life is surprisingly bad. And sometimes, it is surprisingly good. 

But when bad thing after bad thing happens, no wonder it’s what we come to expect.

Part 4: Back to the couch

We are all sitting on our couches. We hear the knock on the door and we can’t bear to answer it. 

What is next? Will it be more heartbreak? Will it be more pain? 

Is what’s waiting outside a horrible monster or a gentle lover? 

Part 5: Claiming our destiny

Rebekah, having been found by Eliezer, choses to immediately follow the servant back to Isaac. Instead of waiting the traditional 12 months to prepare. 

She is eager for her destiny, eager to greet her lover. 

What makes her right is not only her generosity with the water at the well, but her readiness to meet life, to meet her next step. She is a kind of unfearing that is exactly what Isaac needs right now. After so much has gone wrong. 

Part 6: Healing

I am looking everywhere for wisdom on how to navigate this time. I know many of us feel burnt out and exhausted. Shut off. 

So much keeps going wrong. 

And when the knock comes at the door we are too frozen to greet her. It is so valid. 

But the lover at our door is not only a guest. Not only a romantic potential. She is more than that. She is our destiny. Our path. Opening the door to her is a choice to accept the next step on the paths of our lives. 

Trauma makes us ungenerous. But she comes with generosity. She comes with a knowing that we are meant to be together. 

Can our exhaustion meet her generosity?

Let us open the door. Let our lover inside and share a good meal.