[Picture: Sara and Rebecca – women of poise, daring and grit... The original image is a free image for use at CC BY 2.0 level, uploaded by CharlesFred to flickr]

[For articles on the “Sabbath of hayei Sara" in Hebrew, click here]

Updated on November 18, 2022

Rabbi Dr. Yossi Feintuch was born in Afula and holds a Ph.D. in American history from Emory University in Atlanta. He taught American history at Ben-Gurion University.

Author of the book US Policy on Jerusalem.

He is the rabbi of Congregation Shalom Bayit in Bend, Oregon.

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This weekly portion – hayei Sara – informs us of the death of the first Hebrew Matriarch in Hebron. Abraham, however, returned to Beersheba from the site where he attempted to sacrifice Isaac; Hebron and Beersheba have quite a distance between them. Hence, the logical conclusion is that once Sara had heard of Abraham’s intent to sacrifice their son Isaac on an altar she decided to split from him and move to Hebron. Sara likely had some logistical accommodation there; she and Abraham sojourned before in that area (i.e., at the Terebinths of Mamre, where Mamre himself was in a close alliance with Abraham).  Nonetheless, the incredible turmoil and tumult in her life might have likely contributed to her exasperation leading to her expiration soon thereafter.

[Picture: the biblical Be'er Sheva... The image was created and uploaded to Wikipedia by gugganij. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license]

What goes around comes around; what Sara did to Abraham by ordering him to expel his beloved Ishmael from their household, Abraham did to her by seeking earnestly to also ‘’expel’’ Isaac, their beloved son, from their life. A father who banishes one son from his home would not hesitate much before doing the same to another son, if not to other sons, even as later on Abraham ‘’sent away’’ without any wasted emotions, the sons of his concubines that he had begotten ‘’eastward, unto the east country’’ (Gen. 25:6).

What Sara did was bold and iconoclastic even by today's standards, sending a non-ambiguous message to Abraham that what he did to her could not be repaired or explained away. Sara chose to separate from her hubby of many years.

Abraham who hurried to Hebron to bury his estranged wife determines for all future generations of Hebrews that eulogizing the dead is a required funerary rite, even as he required a separate burial site for Sara shunning an internment in a Hittite cemetery. Ephron comes off in a bad light as he exploits Abraham’s stressful circumstances and insists on selling him for an exorbitant price the desired sepulchre of Machpelah together with its adjoining field that Abraham had no interest in buying; in retrospect it would become the first hard-core realty asset that Abraham purchases in Canaan, though being a mere semi nomad.

[In the photo: Abraham purchases the Cave of the Patriarchs ... (illustration from the 1728 Figures de la Bible). The image is in the public domain]

Eliezer, whom Abraham sent to Aram Naharaim to find a bride for Isaac, had to rely on the generosity of Rebecca. Abraham’s servant -- commonly identified as Eliezer -- arrives with an entourage of ten thirsty camels at Aram Naharaim, the residence town of his master’s extended family.  He sets his eyes on Rebecca for a desirable match with Isaac.

The overwhelming reason for choosing her as a potential bride from among all the other maidens who came to the spring to draw water to bring home at the time of evening, was not solely her natural kindness and alacrity in offering him water to drink from her own jug, the slave that he was at a foreign town with no privileges at the town’s well. Rebecca also quantified the amount of water she offered him, just enough to break his thirst, but not beyond that point to avoid an adverse affect on his health. (Indeed, drinking at once a lot of cold water, by one who is hot and thirsty, might put extra pressure on such a person’s heart, affect adversely his breathing, trigger off abdominal pain and cramping, and would delay a return to a normative state; presumably Rebecca knew the gist of these facts.)

After taking care of the servant’s immediate need to quench his thirst, Rebecca went on to generously embrace the arduous and time-consuming task of filling the troughs with water that she had drawn for the ten camels in Eliezer’s convoy; in this case she drew water, jug after jug, until the camels stopped drinking altogether.  Rebecca is introducing in this episode a new standard of conduct whereby humans would have a priority in access to water in comparison to domesticated animals, especially when they drink from the same source.

[In the photo: Rebecca and Eliezer - painting about 1652 by Bartolome Esteban Morillo. The image is in the public domain]

Moreover, Rebecca extends a hearty invite – without consulting first her father or brother -- to Eliezer and his own crew of underlings to enjoy home hospitality at her father’s house; an invite that included specifically a reference to camels’ feed. Clearly, Rebecca relates to the camels not as an afterthought, even as she acknowledges their needs as God’s handiwork worthy of compassion.

And indeed, upon reaching Rebecca’s family house Eliezer first unharnessed the camels, and he then fed them from the house bran that was provided to him; only afterwards food was brought for him too.

This order is in reverse to God’s directive to Noah about the food that he would store in the ark that would “serve for you and for them”. While on the ark the humans received their food before the animals; at Rebecca’s house the camels received their food even before the humans. This dissonance is understandable when we recall that in order to maintain an advantageous stature for the humans over the animals in the ark – both eating exclusively the same plant-based food – humans enjoyed first access to food. In the post-flood epoch, when humans were allowed to choose to eat animal meat, their elevated status was reflected in that divine privilege.

[Picture: While on the ark the humans received their food before the animals; at Rebecca’s house the camels received their food even before the humans...  SOURCE: free bible images]

Hence, humans were not to stretch out and extend their higher-than-the-animal standing than what it already was; gradation in stature is important but it too should be limited up to a point. Therefore, domesticated animals, the Torah says, should be fed before their owners themselves eat.

Being thirsty is much more difficult than being hungry and humans have a lesser ability than animals to withstand thirst. What happened at the well of Aram Naharaim and later at Rebecca’s house becomes the bedrock for the Bible’s evolving hospitality protocol for humans and animals.

Sara and Rebecca are trail blazing figures who are true to their inner core demonstrating daring and grit.

[For articles on the “Sabbath of hayei Sara" in Hebrew, click here]

מצאת טעות בכתבה? הבחנת בהפרה של זכויות יוצרים? נתקלת בדבר מה שאיננו ראוי? אנא, דווח לנו!