Leading God Out of Dark Alleyways

Rabbi Judah said, “The matter may be compared to the case of a king who had two sons, one an adult, the other a child. He said to the child, ‘walk with me,’ and to the adult, ‘Walk before me.’ So Abraham, who was strong, was told, Walk before me and be whole (Gen.17:1), while Noah, who was weak, was told.Walk with God.

(Gen.6:9). Rabbi Nehemiah said,” The matter can be compared to the case of a dear friend (ohev in Hebrew) of the king , who was walking in the mud of dark alleys. The king looked out and saw him sinking. He said to him, “Rather than sinking in the mud come and walk with me.” But the case of Abraham may be compared to the king who was walking in dark alleys. His friend looked out the window. Spying him, the king said, “Rather than giving light through the window, come down and shed light before me. “So the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Abraham, our father, “Rather than giving light for me from Mesopotamia and its surrounding land, come and give light for me in the Land of Israel.”  (Genesis Rabba 10:1, Theodore-Albeck ed.; Tanhuma Lekh Lekha 26, Buber, ed).

The midrashist finds the expressions walk with God and walk before me illustrative of the contrasting characters of Noah and Abraham. Rabbi Judah views these expressions in terms of physical or spiritual maturity. A young son is not yet strong or responsible enough to deal with life’s complications of his own. Such a child needs a helping hand, hence Noah walked with God. The older brother, on the other hand, of proven maturity, is encouraged by a wise father to go forward on his own to develop his strength and sense of responsibility, hence, Abraham is told,Go before me. Rabbbi Judah exploits the turn of phrases to demonstrate God’s paternal, educational behavior toward his children. The weak he keeps by his side; the strong he gives a ‘gentle’ push forward. [1]

In contrast to the paternal, educational approach of Rabbi Judah, Rabbi Nehemiah is audacious in his theological presumptions. The metaphor employed is that of an intimate friend (ohev) (While it is true that the figure of king/God is privileged, it seems that the term ohev (friend) is often used as a mere stock phrase for friend of the court, does not in this context lose its derivative meaning of loved one. In Scripture Abraham is called beloved of God (Isa.41:8; 2Chr.20:7)). Noah is stuck in the mud of the generation of the flood, and without God’s help, is doomed together with his generation. As pictured in Scripture, he is totally passive. He moves only at the command of God and builds an ark, selects such and such animals, enters the ark, leaves the ark only when told. And Noah did so; just as God commanded him, so he did (Gen.6:22, cf. also 7:5, 8:18)  (Commenting on Noah’s failure to leave the ark before God’s command, Rabbi Judah the son of Ilai said: “If I was there, I would have broken the Ark and would have gone out from there myself.” Midrash HaGadol, Gen. 38:16, Margulies, 2nd edition (Jerusalem: Shalem Books, 1967)).

Abraham, on the other hand, emerges from the Bible not only as a faithful follower of God, but as a fighter, a peace-maker, wily when necessary, and a fierce advocate of God’s justice. As the intimate friend in the parable sheds light before the king lost in the alleyways, so Abraham sheds light before God in the spiritual darkness of Mesopotamia. The tables are turned. God is portrayed as the dependent One; it is Abraham who comes to the rescue! The midrash suggests by way of the parable that it was Abraham’s actions that initiated the command Go forth. The applied teaching does not soften the message of the parable and leaves nothing to the imagination. “Rather than giving [refracted] light for me from Mesopotamia and surroundings, come and shed light for me in the land of Israel.”

To understand the light that Abraham sheds and why God is in need of Abraham to lead Him into the Land of Israel, we have to first turn back to Genesis 12:2,3 and 18:19.

I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great and you shall be a blessing, I will bless those who bless you and curse him that curses you; and all the families of the earth shall bless themselves by you.For I have singled him out, that he may instruct his children and his posterity to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is just and right, in order that the Lord may bring about for Abraham what He has promised him.

Abraham exemplifies the doing what is just and right. Nevertheless, his light cannot penetrate the darkness of a land of idolatry. Only in a new land where his seed can take root, can the light of Abraham begin to shine on all the families of the earth. The light of the parable alludes to the teaching of Isaiah: I will also make you a light unto the nations, that my salvation may reach the ends of the earth (51:4). This speculation is grounded on the fair assumption that the rabbis were acutely attuned to the musical score of Scripture and were alert to every musical phrase that would associate their innovative teaching with that found in the biblical text (The countless quotations in midrashic literature alone would attest to the fact, not to speak of a hermeneutic of Intertextuality that inform many rabbinic interpretations; cf. D. Boyarin, Intertextuality and the Reading of Midrash(Bloomington Indiana University Press, 1990); A. Singer, And God Sat Shiva: biblical tracings of a midrashic text, Toronto Journal of Theology, Fall 2002. In this article, I discuss conscious and unconscious links with unstated biblical verses in the formation of a midrashim). Rabbi Nehemiah may well have made the biblical connection of blessing, light and the acknowledgement of God’s deliverance among the nations (Ps.67) that intricately links Scripture with his teaching.

This Midrash stresses the indispensable role played by Abraham in God’s scheme of things. The measure of the Divine presence in the world is a function of human participation in His teaching. A parallel midrash boldly reiterates that without Abraham, God’s sovereignty is rudely impaired. “Until Abraham went out in the world the Holy One, blessed be He, was, in a manner of speaking, only king of the heavens (Gen.24:7), but after he went out in the world, God ruled over heaven and earth (ibid. 3) (Sifre 313, Finkelstein edition (New York: JTS, 1965)).

One further observation and tentative interpretation of the verse in Genesis upon which Rabbi Nehemiah based his teaching: Walk before me and be whole (Gen.17:1.) The simple meaning of the text indicates that if Abraham wishes to be whole, he must follow God’s command to walk before Him. Yet, as applied in the Midrashic context, it is God who asks Abraham to light a path before Him. It is God who seeks wholeness – another heretical sounding statement which is only a more powerful restatement of the representations of God losing his way in dark alleys or being confined to the heavens.

A common practice in rabbinic exegesis could, by the mere insertion of a silent letter, square the text with the implied interpretation of the midrash. The silent letter (aleph) , placed between the first and second letters of the word v’yeheh (and be you), transforms it into the word v’eheyeh (and I will be). Inasmuch as the subject of the sentence is God, the verse would now be rendered Walk before me and I [God] will be whole. Or more simply (if one doesn’t mind the shift from the first to the third person), a mere transposition of the letters v’yeheh to “yud hey vav hey” forms the word of God: Walk before me and God, will be whole (I suspect that the editor or redactor was somewhat uncomfortable leaving the audacious midrash without adding and alternative interpretation of the verse, Walk before me and be whole: “Rabbi Berachia [taught]: Rabbi Johanan said: ‘It is to be compared to a shepherd who stood and looked at his flock.’ And Resh Lakesh said: It is to be compared to a high officer who sends the elders before him. According to Rabbi Johanan, we are in need of God [as the flock is in need of the shepherd]. According to Resh Lakish, they go before Him to announce his coming as a way of honoring Him.” Cf. parallels and commentary in Bereshit Rabba, Theodore-Albeck ed., ad locum, 277).

There are other examples that speak of God’s incompleteness in this ‘best of all possible worlds’ that suggest that our diaphanous, but acceptable exercise in rabbinic exegesis may not be off the mark: Hand upon the throne of the Lord (Ex. 17:16). “Rabbi Levi in the name of Rabbi Hama, the son of Hanina said: ‘So long as the seed of Amalek is in the world, neither the Name nor his throne is complete.’”  (Pesikta Rabati, Parshat Z’chor, ch.12 p.51:1, Ish Shalom, Vienna, 5640).

Granted the dramatization and hyperbolic representation, the significance of our midrash is clear. Abraham, as an intimate friend of the King of Kings, is commanded to go forth and through the light of his character and deeds pave the way for God to manifest Himself in the world. Abraham is to be the human means to achieve the Divine end.

The interplay of Scripture and midrash completes our analysis. Genesis 12:1 emphasizes the initiative of the inscrutable God who commands the unquestioning obedience of Abraham. Our midrashic texts contend that his shedding of light precipitated God’s command Go forth from your land.Similarly, the plain meaning of the verse, Walk before Me and be whole (Gen.17:1) has God telling Abraham that He, God, will be whole if he, Abraham, walks before Him.

It would appear that a radical inversion of Scripture and an unmistakable usurpation of the Biblical text has taken place. However, understanding that one of the functions of Midrash is to fill in gaps, we see Scripture and our midrash as being complementary, two sides of the same cosmic coin. God is both transcendent and immanent; Abraham independent and obedient. The relationship between them is reciprocal and interdependent. Each must take responsibility, each must rely on the cooperation of the other. Continued creation requires the active participation of heaven and earth.

The text underscores a powerful existential tendency. The virtue of this tendency is a poignant humanity. God is not projected as a distant, transcendent concept or being. He is seen as a lone, vulnerable figure, deeply involved with his creation. God is in need of a human partner to realize His divine presence in the world.

The relationship between God and Abraham as human figures with personal virtues and vulnerabilities make them accessible models for human contemplation and emulation. God’s self-exposure of His ‘limitations and imperfections” open up channels of empathy for the Divine saga as well as for His creatures. Only the holy partnership of a God of human pathos, and an Abraham with a divine-like character can realize the dream of a transformed creation.