Extreme Moderation (Season 8 Episode 2)
Chochmat Nashim
15/12/2024
And we walked, the two of us together — my father and his littlest daughter — winding our way back from the Western Wall where we had just welcomed Shabbat. “Take a look at this,” he said out of nowhere, pointing to the open chumash (pentateuch) in his hand: “Vayashkem” — “vayashkem”; “Vayikra… malach” — “vayikra malach…,” showing me the many parallels between Genesis 21’s banishment of Ishmael and Genesis 22’s binding of Isaac. In each story, Abraham wakes up early (21:14, 22:3); in each he submits to God’s command to sacrifice, literally or figuratively, a beloved son (17:18, 21:10-11, 22:2 with Rashi); in each case God, through the proxy of an angel, ultimately spares the child from death (21:16-19, 22:11-12); in each, God promises that the son will become a great nation (21:18, 22:17-18.)
I have no idea why my father mentioned these stories that late-summer night. Perhaps he had begun, uncharacteristically early, to review the Torah portion which he leined every year in shul on Rosh Hashanah, which also happened to be his birthday. “What do you think it means?” he asked. I did not offer any brilliant insights, nor, to the best of my recollection, did he. But I remembered his question — the first time in my memory that someone asked me for my thoughts about a Torah story, rather than offering their own. And so every Rosh Hashanah, as I would listen to my father publicly read those stories in that beautiful, haunting melody, and wonder about the parallels and their significance, I would wander through the text, contemplating why we read them on that day. In retrospect, I realize that it was my father’s question that handed me a candle to explore dark, unclear passages, and illuminate them, find meaning, and make them my own. At times, I would explore accompanied by companions, upon whose shoulders I stood. Just as often, however, I’d head off to meander on my own, lantern in hand, and encounter others along the way with whom I could compare notes.
