Parasha Beresheit: Genesis 1:01 - 6:08
"Who's on First?"
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For your Shabbat table discussion, two important questions are asked in this week's Torah portion: God asks Adam, "Where art thou?" Cain asks God, "Am I my brother's keeper?"
How would we as individuals, and as a community, answer these questions today?
Synoptic Abstract
This Shabbat's portion takes us back to our Sunday School days. We all have been told the Biblical stories of the Creation: Adam and Eve; Cain and Abel; and the expulsion from the Garden of Eden. If you wish to brush up on your knowledge since your childhood days, please read on.
Let us begin "in the beginning" (Gen. 1:01). In Hebrew, these English words are rendered as one word – "Beresheit." This is the name of our parasha and the name of the first book of the Torah. In English, it is called Genesis. The word begins with the Hebrew letter Bait, which is the second letter of the Hebrew Aleph-Bait, or as we say in English, "alphabet." The Midrash (books of parables from the time of the Talmud, 2,500 years ago), asks why the Torah starts with this letter. The rabbis explain that before God was about to create the world, each of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet came before Him and asked that the world be created specifically with its letter. The letter Tat thought that it should be first, since it is the first letter in the word Torah. This scenario continued with each letter giving a short discourse on why it should be used as the first letter. Bait said it should be used because it is used to bless God with Beracoth (blessings).
The kabbalists delve into this letter more deeply. They say that the numerical equivalent of the letter Bait is two and write that this alludes to harmony and unity. When people live together and work together – as a team rather than as separate units – the world has meaning and life has value. The one major theme of Torah and of this D'var series will be to show that people must always think of others and not just of themselves. We will see time and time again, especially in the inter-family relationships of Genesis, "that a world in which everyone considers his own needs and has no sensitivity toward the needs of others is perverted," says rabbi Leib Scheinbaum. As rabbi David Shneur posits: "dissent and discord along with thinking selfishly lies at the root of all the world's ills." By reading this week's parasha, we can see how the first family was marred by inner strife between the world's first brothers, Cain and Abel. If there is one recurrent theme I notice when I study Torah it is that the world was built upon a foundation of God's altruism. He did not have to create the world. King David writes in Psalm 89:03: "the world is built upon chesed (kindness)." It will be by our following these ethical precepts that, hopefully, we will learn together. By doing ahavath chesed (acts of loving kindness) we will affect the world's continued growth.
"The blood of your brother cries out to Me from the ground" (Gen .4:10). As we know from our Passover seders, when we count the Ten Plagues the Hebrew word for blood is "dahm." In this verse from Genesis the Hebrew word is "dahmie," which is "bloods." The rabbis in Talmud Tractate Sanhedrin 37A say that Cain's crime was not limited to one person. He had shed Abel's blood and the blood of potential descendants. They derive from this the notion that "he who saves a life, saves the whole world," as well as the converse. The rabbis also posit that since Cain did not know how to kill, as he was the one who "invented" murder, he had to hit, stab, stone, and whip Abel many times until he caused a mortal wound. It was only after severing his jugular vein that Abel died. The sages say that every bleeding wound cried out in pain and for retribution. Rabbi Joel Sharin cites Psalm 9 to discuss this further.
"The avenger of blood (doresh dahmim) has remembered them. He has not forgotten the cry of the humble." For some Modern Jews who wish not believe in divine reward and punishment, we have the obligation to be our own doresh dahmim, as well as to be careful not to spill blood.
This concept applies to other forms of spilling blood as well as murder. We spill blood when we assassinate another's character with lashon ha ra (gossip). We spill blood when we destroy another's self esteem or dignity. A person does not have to be mortally wounded to suffer irreparable damage. As we will learn in future parashot, we can destroy lives with our mouths. We can run over another's feelings in our race to personal success. When we act cruelly toward others, and our children and grandchildren see our action, we are killing our own offspring. When the grandparent snubs others, are we surprised when we see her child and grandchild do the same? The Torah shows us this with Cain's great-grandson, Tuval Cain. Tuval's great-grandfather was the world's first murderer, and Tuval becomes the world's first arms dealer (Gen. 4:22). We must do our best to curb our own behaviors and be our own – as well as our neighbors' – doresh dahmim.
We can also learn about teshuvah (repentance) in this parasha. Cain was unable (no pun intended!) to bring Abel back to life. We are taught that Cain had a son and named him Chanoch, and that Cain "became a city builder and named the city after his son"(Gen. 4:17). Cain became remorseful over killing his brother and asked himself where the he got the burning passion to kill. The Midrash teaches that Cain learned the value of human life too late. But he did teshuvah by building cities and teaching human values to his descendants. Chanoch is a derivative of the Hebrew word for education, "chinuch." Cain realized that educating children about moral values was important to ensure that others would not repeat his mistake. Ironically, the Midrash tells us how Cain died. When his grandson, Lamech, was old and partially blind, Lamech's son Tuval took him hunting. They used Tuval's "sharpened implements of copper and iron." Being weak sighted, Lamech mistook Cain for a deer and killed him. Sins of fathers can be visited onto the sons.
Before we end this D'var Torah, let us see how the Zohar, the book of Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism) interprets parts of this parasha. Genesis 5:1-4 lists the generations of Adam, but omits Cain and Abel. We know traditionally that God created man on the sixth day (Gen. 1:27), but we read later in Gen. 2:5 that "there was no man to till the ground." The Zohar says that this is because only the second creation is called a "living creature" (Gen.2.07) because it is only he who receives a soul – breath of life – from God. There were, therefore, two creations of
The second is called Adam. Then God said "it is not good for man to be alone...and will make a helpmate for him." Then God made the animals and brought them all to Adam from which to choose a helpmate. "But the man did not find a suitable helpmate from among them" (Gen. 2:18). The Zohar says: "Alas for the stupidity and blindness of men who do not perceive the mysteries of the Torah and do not know that the beasts in the field are designated the unlearned first creation of man, who were soulless men-animals among soulful men."
Genesis 3:01 says: "the serpent (nachash) was more cunning than all the beasts of the field." The Zohar says that he was their leader, the first soulless man created by God. He was fruitful and multiplied creating more soulless and unlearned man-animals. The sages write that Nachash walked upright until he was later cursed by God and made to "crawl on his belly and eat dust" (Gen. 3:14). The Zohar says that Nachash was the ideal form of Satan.
God also said: "it is not good that man should be alone" (Gen. 2:18). The Zohar says that, just as there was a first and second man, there were two women. The first was called Lilith. She was formed out of the ground, as were the other beasts of the field. (Gen. 2:19). Eve was created from Adam's rib (Gen. 2:22) and became Adam's wife. Lilith became Nachash's wife.
Both Rashi and the sages of the Zohar agree that Nachash sexually desired Eve when he saw her naked and having relations with Adam. According to the Zohar, this is what Eve was talking about when she said: "The serpent (Nachash) seduced me" (Gen. 3:13). The sages say that both Adam and Nachash had sexual relations with Eve and that she conceived by both of them. Cain is the son of Nachash, and Abel is the son of Adam, but even Abel has "good wine mixed with bad." The Zohar states that Nachash injected his impure semen into Eve and she absorbed it, mixing the serpent's seed with Adam's. Therefore, neither Abel nor Cain was a pure son of Adam, and this is why neither is listed in the generations of Adam, and why the Torah tells us in Genesis 5:03 that Adam and Eve begot Seth "in his (Adam's) likeness and image."
The Midrash of Ben-Sira (written somewhere between 600 and 1000 C.E.) says that Adam also had sex with Lilith. He didn't like it, as Lilith always insisted on being on top. She asked of Adam: "Why must I lie beneath you? I also was made from dust and am your equal." Adam then tried to compel her by force. Lilith, in a rage, uttered the unspeakable four-lettered name of God, became winged, and flew away. God sent three angels to find her. They found Lilith at the
Lilith is mentioned in the Talmud in four Tractates: Eruvin 100B, Niddah 24B, Shabbat 151B, and Bava Batra 73A. The rabbis call her a wild-haired, nymphomaniac winged creature and the mother of demons. She is mentioned in Isaiah 34:14, but some translations use the name "night monster," based on the Hebrew word "lillah" for night. Rabbi Hanna forbids men to sleep alone for fear that Lilith will come at night and seduce them. Some stories show her to have demon children. Other tales show her to be barren and seeking out others' children to kill.
There are some sects of Judaism that hang an angelic amulet above the cribs of boys who are not yet circumcised to protect them from Lilith. A ring of charcoal is drawn on the baby's bedroom wall. Inside the ring is written: "Adam and Eve in. Out Lilith!" If a child is heard laughing in his sleep, the mother strikes the child's lips with one finger whereupon Lilith vanishes.
Because Lilith left the Garden of Eden before Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit and became mortal, some Midrashim say that Lilith is immortal. Some say she was the demoness who killed Job's sons. Others say she was the Queen of Sheba who visited King Solomon. Solomon suspected
The Zohar developed a theory that Adam was originally comprised of both male and female elements. Talmud Tractates Beracoth 61A and Eruvin 18B say: "Adam, who was the first man, had two full faces." Rabbi Samuel ben Nachman said that when God created Adam, "He created him as a hermaphrodite." The Midrash Leviticus Rabbah says: "When man was created, he was created with two body fronts, and God sawed him in two, so that two bodies resulted, one for the male and one for the female." From this the Kabbalists posit that every one of us has a heavenly soul mate to whom we were joined before birth. Our responsibility, if we are lucky, is to find our soul mate (beshert) and to rejoin with that person in marriage. This marriage therefore would be one of equals – with no one always on top so to speak.
While our tradition is full of sexist "old husbands' tales" about women that some sects in our religion cling to as a way of keeping women enslaved, we also find throughout our literature women shown in an equal and honored light. It is these traditions that we as Spiritual Jews need to hold onto and from which we should learn.
As Jews, we must continually ask ourselves where we are and remind ourselves that we are indeed our bothers' and sisters' keepers. While we might have thought that religious school was boring when we were kids, my hope is that you will find the study of Torah and the texts of Talmud, Midrash and other great books to be provocative and inspiring.
Shabbat Shalom:
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