Shiur #16: The History of the Resting of the Shekhina(Part VI) - Mount Moriya and the Akeida (Part II)
Mikdash
Yeshivat Har
Etzion
Shiur #16: The History
of the Resting of the Shekhina
(Part
VI)
Mount Moriya and the
Akeida (Part II)
Rav Yitzchak
Levi
In the first part of this lecture, I dealt with the Akeida as an
allusion to the Mikdash that would eventually be built on Mount Moriya,
and with the connections between the story of the Akeida and the stories
of the revelation to Yaakov at Bet-El and the revelation to David at the
threshing floor of Aravna the Yevusi. This part of the lecture will deal with
the various meanings of the Akeida for future generations.[1]
I.
THE SELECTION OF THE SACRIFICE AND THE SELECTION OF THE PLACE OF THE
SACRIFICE
R. Mordechai Breuer in
his book Pirkei Mo'adot (pp. 332-33) notes that the root
resh-alef-heh appears twice in the account of the Akeida in the
sense of "choosing" (bet-chet-resh):[2]
And Avraham said, "God
will choose (yir'eh) Himself the lamb for a burnt-offering, my
son
" And Avraham called the name of that place Ad-onai-Yir'eh. (Bereishit
22:8, 14)
In verse 8, Avraham tells Yitzchak that God will choose an appropriate
sacrifice. In verse 14, Avraham calls the place "Ad-onai-Yir'eh," which should
be understood in the sense of "God will choose;" in other words, this place will
be chosen by God, and not by man.
These two acts of choosing appear once again in Parashat Re'eh,
where the Torah presents the Divine command to the people of Israel as the
absolute opposite of idol worship:
You shall utterly
destroy all the places in which the nations whom you are to dispossess served
their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every leafy
tree. And you shall overthrow their altars, and break their pillars, and burn
their ashera trees with fire. And you shall hew down the carvings of
their gods, and destroy the name of them out of that
place.
This you shall not do
the Lord your God. But the place which the Lord your God shall choose out of all
your tribes to put His name there, there shall you seek Him, at His dwelling,
and there shall you come. (Devarim 12:2-5)
As opposed to the idol worshippers, who choose where they will
serve their gods "upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every
leafy tree" Israel is commanded to seek out God's dwelling place and to serve
God in the place that God chooses to put His name. These verses
parallel the story of the Akeida with respect to the selection of the
place of Divine worship.
The parallel with respect to the choice of sacrifice appears at the end
of the chapter in Devarim:
Take heed to yourself
that you be not ensnared into following them after they are destroyed from
before you and that you inquire not after their gods, saying, "How did these
nations serve their gods? Even so, will I do likewise." You shall not do so to
the Lord your God; for every abomination to the Lord, which He hates, have they
done to their gods, for even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in
the fire to their gods. Every matter which I command you, observe to do
it: you shall not add thereto, nor diminish from it. (ibid. 12:30-31
13:1)
Here, too, the Torah contrasts the people of Israel and the nations of
the world; the idol worshippers choose their sacrifices on their own, and end up
burning their sons and daughters in fire, but God determines which sacrifices
the people of Israel are to bring.[3]
This is an expression of the conceptual principle that R. Yehuda Halevi stresses
in various places in his Kuzari (see, for example, book II, 46): the only
way to draw close to God is through the mitzvot, and not through
independent means; the particular way by which one can draw close to God is an
integral part of His service.
We see, then, that
Avraham teaches Israel through the story of the Akeida in the sense of
"the deeds of the fathers are an omen for the children," the fundamental
principle that the choice of the sacrifice and the choice of the place of
sacrifice are in the hands of God. These two points clearly distinguish between
Israel and the nations of the world a distinction whose practical significance
will be revealed in Parashat Re'eh.
II. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SEEING AND FEAR
We have seen that with
respect to God - the word re'iya is used in the sense of choosing.
I wish now to note the relationship in the story of the Akeida
between human seeing (re'iya) and fear (yir'a). The term
"seeing" appears twice in the Akeida story in connection with Avraham.
The first time is in v. 4, when Avraham sees the place:
On the third day
Avraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off.
The second time is in v. 13, when Avraham sees the
sacrifice:
And Avraham lifted up
his eyes, and saw, and behold behind him a
ram caught in the thicket by his horns. And Avraham went and took the ram, and
offered him up for a burnt-offering in place of his son.
These two acts of seeing parallel in their substance the two acts of
choosing mentioned earlier, which are also formulated as acts of seeing
(although there it is God who sees): the selection of the place and the
selection of the sacrifice. We see, then, that while it is God who chooses the
place and the sacrifice, He makes it possible for man to see to reveal on his
own the choice made by God.
Fear is not directly attributed to Avraham in direct fashion, but rather
in the context of God's knowledge, "for now I know that you are a God-fearing
man." The juxtaposition of verses 12 and 13 "for now I know that you are a
God-fearing man
And Avraham lifted up his eyes, and saw, and behold behind him
a ram" may teach us that there are times that fear leads to enhanced and
more profound sight. Standing before God and fearing Him allows man to see
the world in a truer light, and in our case, to see that the ram is the
sacrifice to be brought in Yitzchak's stead. We find a similar connection in
other places; for example, in Tehillim 128 we read:
Happy is one who fears
the Lord, who walks in His ways
Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears
the Lord. The Lord shall bless you out of Zion, and you shall see the good of
Jerusalem all the days of your life. And you shall see your children's children,
and peace be upon Israel.
The fear of God makes it possible for man to see the good of Jerusalem
and to see descendants "your children's children."[4]
Similarly, in Tehillim 34:12-13:
Come, children, hearken
to me: I will teach you the fear of the Lord. Who is the man that desires life,
and loves many days, that he may see good?
Fear is what makes it possible to see good.
The reverse is also true: seeing can also lead to fear. We find
this model in connection with Mount Moriya in the story of David in the
threshing floor of Aravna the Yevusi.[5]
Like Avraham in his day, David also lifted up his eyes "and saw the angel of
the Lord standing between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword in his
hand stretched out over Jerusalem." And in the wake of this, "David and the
elders, clothed in sackcloth, fell upon their faces" (I Divrei Ha-yamim
21:17), and in the continuation: "When David saw that the Lord had answered
him in the threshing-floor of Aravna the Yevusi, then he sacrificed there
But
David could not go before it to inquire of God; for he was terrified because of
the sword of the angel of the Lord" (ibid. vv. 28-30). That is to say, seeing
the sword of the angel of the Lord causes David to become terrified of
God.
A similar situation the seeing of God leading to fear is found at the
parting of the sea (Shemot 14:31):
And Israel saw
the great hand that the Lord wrought upon Egypt, and the people feared
the Lord, and believed in the Lord, and in his servant
Moshe.
In any event, we see that with respect to Mount Moriya the two sides of
the connection between fear and seeing find expression in Avraham and in David.
On the one hand, fear leads to more profound seeing; on the other hand, seeing
the face of God (or the sword of the angel) leads to fear.
III. THE
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE AKEIDA AS THE FIRST SACRIFICE ON MOUNT
MORIYA
One of the basic
questions that arise when we read about the Akeida concerns the
relationship between the original command to Avraham and what actually happens
at the end. The end of the story teaches us that God does not desire human
sacrifice, and the Torah presents here, for the fist time, the sacrifice of an
animal as a substitution for the sacrifice of a human being.[6]
In light of this clear and unequivocal conclusion, the question must be asked:
How are we to understand the enormous gap between the original command to offer
Yitzchak as a sacrifice and the conclusion of the story?[7]
I wish to propose an
answer connected to our understanding of the test being conducted specifically
at Mount Moriya. The absolute command was meant to clarify that the first
sacrifice offered at this place (on the first altar constructed there, according
to the plain sense of Scripture)[8]
must be at the level of human sacrifice. How so?
At the Akeida,
twofold devotion was demanded of Avraham, for the command stands in absolute
contradiction to both the Divine promise made to him, "for in Yitzchak shall
your seed be called" (Bereishit 21:12), and to the moral world in which
Avraham lived and believed in "the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment"
(ibid. 18:19). The command to sacrifice his son was meant to reveal Avraham's
devotion, the likes of which did not previously exist in the world. Accordingly
the command was formulated in absolute terms to teach that the noblest essence
of a sacrifice is man's total readiness to give up his life (or that of his son)
in order to fulfill the Divine command a supreme level of both love and fear.
The moment that Avraham reveals this devotion, the angel calls out to him, and
Avraham offers the ram in Yitzchak's place.[9]
IV. THE
AKEIDA AND THE WORSHIP OF MOLEKH
The worship of Molekh
took place in the kingdom of Yehuda during the days of Achaz, Menashe, and
Yehoyakim. The Torah (Vayikra 18:21; 20:1-5) relates to the severity of
such action and asserts that it is punishable by karet (excision).
According to Yirmiyahu, this sin is the primary reason for the destruction of
the city of Jerusalem (Yirmiyahu 19).[10]I
Indeed, in certain senses this transgression includes elements of the three main
sins that led to the destruction of the city and the Temple (Yoma
9b).
1. Idolatry:
The gemara in Sanhedrin 64a records a dispute over whether the
worship of Molekh is real idolatry or a type of
sorcery.
2. Forbidden
sexual relations: The prohibition of serving Molekh is included in the section
dealing with prohibited sexual relations (Vayikra 18:21) because burning
a child retroactively profanes the father's relationship with the mother.[11]
3. Bloodshed:
Chazal (Sanhedrin 64b) and the Rishonim disagree over
whether the worshippers of Molekh actually burned the children, or perhaps they
only passed them over fire or between two fires. The Ramban in his commentary to
the Torah (Vayikra, ibid.) adduces strong proof that we are dealing here
with actual burning.
What, then, is the
difference between burning children in honor of Molekh and the command at the
Akeida to offer Yitzchak as a burnt-offering? It stands to reason that
there are several differences.
First of all, we must
consider the way the Akeida incident concluded, which, as stated above,
is clear: God has no desire for human sacrifices, and such sacrifices were never
permitted by the Torah for any purpose whatsoever.
Second, at the
Akeida, a command was issued by God, whereas the worshippers of Molekh
did what they did of their own free will.
Third, there is a
fundamental difference between the two actions with respect to the understanding
that lies behind them. An idolatrous offering is based on the assumption that
God is cruel and that in order to appease Him, one must pay the dearest price of
all, one's own child. The Torah's understanding of sacrifices is altogether
different; it relates to supreme intimacy with God, whether for the purpose of
atonement for sin or for the purpose of praise and thanksgiving. According to
the Torah, a sacrifice elevates the world to its source, connecting between the
material and the spiritual. Thus, its objective is altogether different from
that of an idolatrous offering: love, rather than fear; communion, rather than
dread; unmediated intimacy, rather than alienation.
In this context,
Chazal (Taanit 4a) have an interesting interpretation of the verse
in Yirmiyahu 19:5:
And it is written:
"Which I did not command, and I did not speak, and did not come into My heart"
(Yirmiyahu 19:5). "Which I did not command" this is the son of Mesha
the king of Moav, as it is said: "And he took his firstborn son, who would reign
after him, and he offered him as a burnt-offering" (II Melakhim 3:27).
"And I did not speak" this is Yiftach. "And did not come into My heart" this
is Yitzchak the son of Avraham.
Rashi explains (ad loc.):
So that you not say that
the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded Yiftach, Mesha, and Avraham. For I never
commanded Mesha to burn his son in fire
"And it did not come into My heart"
this is Yitzchak the son of Avraham. That is to say, even though I commanded
him, it never came into My heart that he should [actually] slaughter his son,
but rather to test him
Chazal emphasize that from the very outset God had never intended
for Avraham to slaughter Yitzchak (and it is therefore necessary to search for
the reasons of the categorical formulation of the original command, as we did
above).
V. THE
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE AKEIDA AND THE REVELATION OF THE PLACE IN THE TIME
OF DAVID
The name given by
Avraham to the place, Ad-onai-yir'eh which, as stated, means "God will choose"
alludes to the expression, "the place which the Lord your God shall choose"
mentioned throughout the book of Devarim. It indicates that the chosen
place was still unknown, and that, despite the revelation at the
Akeida, it remained hidden. In fact, from the time of the
Akeida and on we do not find any explicit mention of Mount Moriya; it is
revealed anew at the threshing floor of Aravna the Yevusi only after the census
and the plague in the days of David. The unique qualities of the place, which
were revealed to Avraham at the Akeida, become revealed again, in a clear
and chosen matter, only in the days of David and Shlomo. This is how the Keli
Yakar formulates the matter (ad loc.):
He therefore called the
name of the place "Ad-onai-yir'eh," referring to the future, because the Holy
One, blessed be He, did not reveal this holy place to any creature; even to
Avraham, it is stated: "Upon one of the mountains which I will tell you of." And
we do not find that He said anything to him, except for what Avraham felt when
he saw a cloud hovering over the mountain. But nevertheless there is no mention
whatsoever that this is the mountain upon which God yearned to rest, because God
hid it
He therefore called it "Ad-onai-Yir'eh," similar to "God will choose
(yir'eh) Himself the lamb." Thus, he said that the time will come
when God will see and choose this place, and at that time it will be said for
all generations: "This day in the mount where the Lord is seen." "This day"
and not before, because until the day that it was chosen, the Holy One, blessed
be He, did not reveal it.
The author of the Shem Mi-Shmuel adds (Parashat Re'eh,
5675, s.v. ve-hineh ketiv le-shikhno):
It seems that the
finding corresponds to the seeking, and since nobody stirred himself in the
matter except for him [David], it was therefore impossible that they would find
the place
According to our approach, it was because they didn't seek that they
did not find.
In truth, there is
something very strange here. Surely the place of the Akeida is explicitly
mentioned in the Torah, and there it is stated explicitly: "Ad-onai-yir'eh; as
it is said to this day, 'In the mount where the Lord is seen.'" And Rashi
explains: "The Lord will choose and select for Himself this place to make His
Shekhina reside in it and for sacrifices to be offered there. On this
mountain, the Holy One, blessed be He, shows Himself to His people." If so, this
place was known to them. And it is difficult to say that they knew only the
mountain but not the specific place. We are forced, then, to say that this was
from God, that the place should only become revealed in accordance with the
seeking. And therefore, even though it had been made explicit, they did not
comprehend it.
An example of this is
found in the holy Zohar [which states] that the time of the end is
explicitly stated in the Torah, and in the future all will see that it is
explicitly stated in the Torah, but now it is concealed, and nobody knows it.
The same was true about Zion and Jerusalem.
In other words, the unique essence of the place, which had become
revealed in the days of Avraham, became hidden again so that its revelation
would result from seeking the place and this did not occur until the time of
David (see below).
VI. WHY WAS THE
PLACE OF THE MIKDASH CONCEALED FROM THE TIME OF THE AKEIDA UNTIL
THE DAYS OF DAVID?
The commentators suggest
many answers to this question. Here I will present what appear to me to be the
four main answers.
1. The Rambam
(Moreh Nevukhim III, 45) writes with respect to Mount
Moriya:
The fact that this place
is not stated explicitly when mentioned in the Torah, and not designated, but
only hinted at by means of the words, "Which the Lord will choose, etc.," is
due, in my opinion, to three wise considerations. First, lest nations should
hold fast to the place and fight for it with great violence, knowing as they do
that this place is the final purpose of the Law on earth. Second, lest those who
then owned the place ravage and devastate it to the limit of their power. Third,
and it is the strongest, lest every tribe should demand that this place be
within its allotted portion and should seek to conquer it, which would lead to
conflict and sedition, such as happened with regard to the priesthood. Therefore
the command was given that the chosen Temple should only be built after the
elevation of a king, so that only one would be qualified to give demands and
quarrels would cease.
The first two reasons are connected
to the nations of the world and are based on the same argument: Were the nations
of the world to know about the place, they would try to prevent it from falling
into Israel's hands,[12]
whether through war or through its physical destruction.
The third and main reason is
connected to the people of Israel, and here the Rambam directs us to a
baraita in Sanhedrin (20b):
Three mitzvot
were given to Israel when they entered the Land of Israel: to appoint a king, to
destroy the seed of Amalek, and to build the
Mikdash.
In the continuation, the baraita concludes that this order is
indispensable; the appointment of a king precedes the destruction of Amalek, and
the destruction of Amalek precedes the construction of the Mikdash. This
is also the Rambam's ruling (Hilkhot Melakhim 1:1-2). According to what
the Rambam writes in Moreh Nevukhim, the reason that the appointment of
the king must precede the building of the Mikdash is the desire to
prevent conflict and to instill the fundamental principle that the place belongs
to all of Israel, and its conquest should not be a tribal
matter.
Owing to the fact that its purpose is to serve as the place for the
resting of the Shekhina, Mount Moriya must be reached through a
unified effort. For this reason, establishing the monarchy one of whose
functions is the prevention of conflict and the formation of a unified regime
precedes the building of the Mikdash. There is an essential connection
between Jerusalem in general and the Mikdash in particular and the unity
of Israel. The unity of the entire people of Israel, as emphasized by the
Rambam, is a condition for reaching the place, and in order to reach the place
through unity, the place had to be hidden.[13]
The Rambam implies that the people of Israel did not know where the
Mikdash would be built, even though it is possible to understand from
Scripture that it would be built on the site of the Akeida. As Rabbenu
Bachya says:
And therefore Scripture
hid and concealed this place, and did not publicize it. Needless to say the
[other] nations [did not know its location], but even Israel did not know it.
For even though everyone knew the virtues of Mount Moriya, they did not know
that this was the place that God would choose. (Commentary to Devarim
12:5)
It is interesting that Radak sees the establishment of the monarchy as a
condition for the building of the Mikdash in a slightly different
manner:
"And the king and his
men went." And in Divrei Ha-yamim (I Divrei Ha-yamim 11:4): "And
David and all of Israel went." For all of Israel were now his men. Once he ruled
as king over all of Israel, he went to Jerusalem to capture the fortress of
Zion. For they had a tradition that Zion would be the beginning of the kingdom
of Israel, and it would only be captured by him who ruled as king over all of
Israel. And until now there was no established monarchy in Israel, because
Shaul's kingdom did not stand. (Radak, II Shmuel
5:6)
Radak relates to a different question: Why was Jerusalem not captured
from the time of Yehoshua to the time of David? He answers that there was a
tradition in Israel that this place would only be captured by a king who ruled
over all of Israel. Whereas the Rambam emphasized the connection between the
monarchy and unity as a condition for reaching the Mikdash on Mount
Moriya, the Radak says that kingship over all of Israel is a condition for
the very conquest of the city.
The common denominator
between them is that reaching Jerusalem or the Mikdash on Mount Moriya
was conditional on monarchy and unity. This condition is connected to the
understanding that these places are themselves places of kingship: Jerusalem is
the capital of the kingdom of Israel, and the Mikdash is the site of
God's kingship.[14]
This connection allows us to link together the explanations of the Rambam and
Radak, even though each one relates to a different place.
2. The Sifri
on Parashat Re'eh suggests a different answer to our question. On the
verse, "But to the place which the Lord your God shall choose out of all your
tribes to put His name there, there shall you seek Him, at His dwelling, and
there you shall come" (Devarim 12:5), the Sifri states as follows
(Sifri Devarim 62):
"But to the place which
the Lord your God shall choose out of all your tribes" seek on the basis of a
prophet. You might say that you should wait until a prophet tells you? Therefore
the verse states: "There shall you seek Him, at His dwelling, and there you
shall come:" seek and find, and afterwards a prophet will tell you. And
similarly, you find regarding David. As it is said: "Remember to David's favor
all his afflictions, how he swore to the Lord, and vowed to the mighty God of
Yaakov: 'Surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house
I will not give
sleep to my eyes
until I find out a place for the Lord, a habitation for the
mighty one of Yaakov'" (Tehillim 132:1-5).
The midrash tries to explain the unusual commandment to seek out
the place. We do not find many mitzvot in the Torah that obligate
seeking, but here, with respect to the place that God will choose, the Torah
commands us to seek out God's dwelling place.[15]
The location of Jerusalem and the Mikdash - which are defined as the
place that God will choose to rest His name are unknown to Israel. The
place exists, but Israel does not know where it is, and it falls upon them
to seek it out, to search for it and find it. The meaning of this demand which
was fulfilled in perfect manner by King David, as the Sifri attests based
on Tehillim 132 is that God desires to rest His Shekhina in that
place on condition that the people of Israel want this closeness and are
prepared to invest effort in searching for and finding it. The place itself
gives expression to the greatest closeness between God and the people of Israel,
and therefore, God tells us, as it were: "If you wish to be close to Me, seek
out My place and find it."[16]
A similar idea is found in Rashi (Bereishit 12:2, s.v. el
ha-aretz):
He did not reveal to him
at once which land it was in order that he should hold it in high esteem and in
order to reward him for complying with each and every command. Similar is "Take
your son your only son whom you love even Yitzchak;" and "Upon one of the
mountains which I will tell you of."
In other words, the failure to provide the precise location of the place
where Avraham was to bring his son Yitzchak was meant to endear the place in
Avraham's eyes and give him reward for compliance with each element of the
instructions.
We have seen, then, two similar understandings according to which the
Torah did not provide the precise location of the place (the place of the
Akeida or the place that God will choose) in order to create a more
meaningful connection to it: the Sifri emphasizes the obligation of human
seeking, whereas Rashi notes the endearment of the place and the reward that it
will provide reward for each and every command.
3. Abravanel in
his commentary to Devarim 12:4 writes:
There must be only one
sanctified place just as there is only one God who dwells therein, and there
must not be many places like the places of the [other] nations
And furthermore,
the place must be chosen by God, and by way of a prophet, and not in accordance
with the desire of the worshippers as they please. This is: "which the Lord your
God shall choose out of all your tribes."
Abravanel emphasizes two points here: 1) The place that God will choose
must be a single place, and not like the places of idol worship, which are many.
2) Since the place will be chosen by God, there is no need to specify its
location. This explanation is, in a certain sense, the opposite of the
Sifri's explanation. Whereas according to the Sifrei the
concealment was meant to create yearning and seeking on the part of man based on
the idea that man must be an active partner in revealing the Divine choice,
Abravanel argues that the Torah refrained from specifying the place precisely
because the place will be chosen exclusively by God, and man has no part
whatsoever in its selection.
4.
R. Charlop (Ma'ayanei Ha-Yeshua, chap. 32) suggests a
fourth understanding:
Just like the place
which God chose, the place of the Mikdash, is elevated in and of itself,
so too all of Eretz Yisrael has the sanctity of the Holy of Holies, the
place that had been concealed and where idols could not be worshipped
For this
reason, the sanctity of Jerusalem and the Mikdash was not clarified until
King David arrived, so that all of Eretz Yisrael could have the quality
of the sanctity of Jerusalem and the site of the Mikdash. That is to say,
the sanctity of Jerusalem should spread throughout all of Eretz Yisrael,
as they said: "In the future Jerusalem will spread until Damascus" (see
Yalkut Zekharya, 575), and that the entire land should draw from the
sanctity of the Holy of Holies in Jerusalem. This is what they said about the
verse, "The land upon which you lie, I shall give it to you and to your seed"
(Bereishit 28:17): This teaches that the Holy One, blessed be He, folded
all of Eretz Yisrael under him, alluding to him that it will be easy for
his descendants to conquer (Chullin 91b). The conquest of Eretz
Yisrael will have the sanctity of the chosen place. And all this precisely
because the place had not yet been chosen and its sanctity had not yet been
clarified, and therefore the uncertainty about each and every place in Eretz
Yisrael; perhaps it is the chosen place, and this itself brought in of the
sanctity of the place that was revealed only to God.
And the Holy One,
blessed be He, promised His people Israel that when the time comes to choose the
place and clarify its special sanctity, then if they only search and seek the
place, they will truly find it, "there shall you seek Him, at His dwelling, and
there shall you come" (Devarim 12:5). Even though the choice will be
Israel's, this choice is God's choice, "the place that the Lord shall choose."
For at that time there will be revealed the Divine unity of Israel with God, and
the light of God's choice will permeate the choice of Israel, they being a
single choice, as it were.
According to R. Charlop, the concealment of the place of the
Mikdash was meant to allow the revelation of Eretz Yisrael at the
level of the sanctity of Jerusalem and the Mikdash. In this sense, the
sanctity of all of Eretz Yisrael stems from the sanctity of the site of
the Mikdash, and when this level will become revealed, the redemption
will come.
SUMMARY
In the two parts of this lecture, we have seen that the Akeida
alludes to the future location of the Mikdash in various
ways.
I noted the similarities and the differences between the Akeida,
on the one hand, and the revelation to Yaakov at Bet-El and the revelation to
David in the threshing floor of Aravna the Yevusi, on the other, with respect to
the revelation, the offerings, and the self-sacrifice evident in each of these
events.
I discussed the idea of God's choosing the offering and the place of
sacrifice, and we saw that the altar of the Akeida the first altar to
be built on the mountain is also the first expression found in the Torah of
God's choice of the place.
I examined the relationship between fearing and seeing, and we saw that
the command to offer Yitzchak as a burnt-offering demands preparedness for
absolute self-sacrifice.
I continued with a comparison of the Akeida to the worship of
Molekh, and tried to understand the difference between
them.
In conclusion, I tried to answer the question of why the place remained
hidden from the time of the Akeida until the days of David. The general
conclusion is that the matter was intentionally concealed, and this can be
understood in a variety of ways: in order to prevent conflict between the tribes
or destruction of the place by the nations of the world; desire to reach the
place out of internal unity; reaching the place through one who is king over all
of Israel; the need for Israel to search for and seek out the place; the
exclusivity of the Divine choice; and the revelation of the sanctity of Eretz
Yisrael at the level of the sanctity of Jerusalem and the Mikdash.
All of these factors emphasize one aspect of the matter; they are not
contradictory, but rather they complement each other. From all of these
explanations, Jerusalem and the Mikdash stand out as the place of the
unity of the people of Israel, as the place of kingship, and as a place that
must be sought after.
(Translated by David
Strauss)
[1] Sections 1-4 of this
lecture already appeared as the second part of this lecture in my lectures on
biblical Jerusalem, 5765, lecture 9. They appear here with slight modifications.
Sections 5-6 are based on lecture
[2] I expanded on this use
and on the proofs for it in my lecture: "Mount Moriya Its Identification and
Its Name" (lectures on biblical Jerusalem, 5765, lecture 8). I will cite here
only one of the proofs brought by R. Kook the reverse parallelism in
Devarim 12:13-14: "Take heed to yourself that you offer not your burnt
offerings in every place that you see (tir'eh), but only in the
place which the Lord shall choose (yivchar) in one of your tribes;
there you shall offer your burnt-offerings."
[3] Later in the lecture I
will relate to the diametric opposition between the Akeida and the
burning of sons and daughters before Molekh.
[4] In his commentary to
this psalm, R. Y. Shaviv (Yesod ha-Ma'aleh, [Jerusalem, 5764], pp.
137-144) notes the connection between fear and the blessing of children and
grandchildren, and he shows how this blessing was fulfilled in Yosef, who saw
great-grandchildren through Efrayim: "The children also of Makhir the son of
Menashe were born on Yosef's knees" (Bereishit 50:23). Similarly, Iyov
also feared God and saw children and children's children four generations. The
same idea emerges from Tehillim 103:17: "But the steadfast love is from
everlasting to everlasting upon those who fear Him, and His righteousness to
children's children."
[5] This story (I Divrei
Ha-yamim 21) contains the root resh-alef-heh in various senses
multiple times.
[6] There is a well-known
disagreement among the Rishonim regarding the reasons for the sacrifices.
The Ramban (in his commentary to Vayikra 1:9, a section of which was
cited in the previous lecture) disagrees with the position of the Rambam,
according to which the sacrifices were meant to refine the reality of idol
worship. Ramban advocates the view that the limbs of the sacrificed animal come
in place of the limbs of the person bringing the sacrifice. That is to say, God
is "satisfied" with the offering of an animal sacrifice but fundamentally
there would be room for human sacrifice in the wake of sin. Also well-known is
the comment of the Rashbam (Bereishit 22:1) that the story of the
Akeida immediately follows the story of the covenant with Avimelekh
because the Akeida was Avraham's punishment for what he gave up in this
covenant.
[7] Chazal and the
Rishonim suggest various resolutions of this contradiction, including
diverse understandings of the essence of the trial and even the argument that
the conclusion is foreshadowed already in the command to raise Yitzchak up as an
offering, but not to actually sacrifice him.
[8] As may be recalled from
previous lectures, the Rambam (Hilkhot Bet ha-Bechira 2:1-2) brings the
rabbinic tradition (Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer, chap. 31) that Adam, Kayin
and Hevel, and Noach all offered sacrifices on Mount
Moriya.
[9] Of course, I do not
claim to have encompassed the full meaning of the Akeida in this
framework. I have related to only one aspect of the story, that which relates to
the fact that it took place on Mount Moriya.
[10] See also II
Melakhim 3:26, where great indignation is stirred up against Israel in
the wake of the offering of the son of the king of Moav as a burnt-offering on
the wall.
[11] Of course, this is not
really a case of forbidden sexual relations, but it does involve a profanation
and perversion of the sexual relationship.
[12] It should be remembered
that the Rambam lived in the twelfth century, and that during his lifetime
Jerusalem fell under two different rules: first the Crusaders, and later
Muslims.
[13] The connections between
Jerusalem and the Mikdash, on the one hand, and the unity of Israel, on
the other, are very broad. Each one deserves a separate lecture. In lecture no.
[14] I dealt with this
assertion, which is supported by many proofs, in my lectures on biblical
Jerusalem in 5765.
[15] The gemara
(Rosh Ha-shana 30a) derives a similar obligation from the verse in
Yirmiyahu (30:17): "'This is Zion, which no one seeks out' this implies
that it requires seeking."
Moreover, one of the
names of Jerusalem is Derusha ("Sought out"): "And they shall call them, The
holy people, The redeemed of the Lord: and you shall be called, Derusha
(Sought out), a city not forsaken." (Yeshayahu 62:12). As the Radak (ad
loc.) explains: "Derusha the opposite of what they used to call her:
'This is Zion, which no one seeks out.'" The Metzudat David, on the other
hand, writes: "Derusha God inquires of her welfare, and does not
forsake it."
[16] I wish to expand upon
the relationship between the obligation to seek out a place and its
sanctity.
Regarding Mount Sinai,
the Torah states: "When the horn sounds long, they shall come up to the
mountain" (Shemot 19:13). That is to say, at the end of the revelation,
the sanctity of the place will disappear. The same was true regarding the
Mishkan: we do not find advanced selection with respect to any of the
stations of the Mishkan. The sanctity of the site of the Mishkan
at each of its stations depended on Divine revelation, and from the moment that
the revelation ended and the people of Israel advanced to the next station, the
sanctity of the site disappeared.
In contrast, the
sanctity of Mount Moriya does not depend on revelation, but rather on God's
selection of the place at the time of creation. This place, which God chose for
Himself, is the place where the Mikdash was to be built. This assertion
accords with the position of the Rambam and other Rishonim that the
original sanctification of Jerusalem and the Mikdash was for its time and
for the future. That is to say, the sanctity of the place continues even when
the Mikdash is not actually standing upon it. This sharpens what we
learned in the Sifri: The site of the Mikdash is not accidental;
it was destined and selected for that purpose from the very beginning, but God
did not reveal its location in order to allow the people of Israel to fully
participate in seeking it out and finding it.