CrashCourse3

Aish HaTorah:
Crash Course in Jewish History -- Part 5

THE PROMISED LAND

By Rabbi Ken Spiro

* * *

God gave Abraham and his family the Land of Israel as a laboratory where
his descendants are supposed to create the nation that’s the model for the
world.

The Jewish story begins in the Book of Genesis, Chapter 12, when God
first speaks to Abraham, and continues through to the end with the death
of Jacob and Joseph. This segment can best be described as the
development of the “family” of Israel, which in the Book of Exodus will
become a “nation.”

In the last installment of these series we examined the patterns set into
history when God sent Abraham on his journey.

Abraham had been born in Ur Kasdim in Mesopotamia (today’s Iraq) then
moved with his father to Haran (today’s northern Syria/southern Turkey)
and that is where he got the instruction to go to Canaan, the Promised
Land, which will become the Land of Israel.

God said to Abram: “Go from your land … to the land that I will show you.”
(Genesis 12:1)

This is a key statement and the promise is repeated several times. For
example:
On that day, God made a covenant with Abram, saying: “To your
descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt as far as the
great river the Euphrates. The land of the Kenites, Kenizites, Kadmonites;
the Chitties, Perizites, Refaim; the Emorites, Canaanites, Gigashites and
Yevusites.” (Genesis 15:18-21)

“And I will give to you and to your descendants after you, the land of your
temporary residence, all the land of Canaan as an eternal possession and I
will be a God to them.” (Genesis 17:8)

We say that Judaism is God, Torah and the Land of Israel. The Land of
Israel is not a pay off. God did not say to Abraham: Support me and if
monotheism spreads throughout the world, I will give you a good piece of
real estate for your own. God gave Abraham and his family the Land of
Israel as a laboratory where his descendants are supposed to create the
nation that’s the model for the world.

A SPIRITUALLY SENSITIVE PLACE

The Land of Israel is a special place; it’s the only place on the planet
earth
where the Jewish people can achieve their mission. A model nation cannot
come to be anywhere else. So, it is very important to understand the
Jewish relationship with the land.

And because it’s a special place, a spiritually sensitive place, a place of
tremendous potential, it’s also a place where one has to behave in a
special manner. The Jews were only given the land because of their
mission. If they abandon the mission, they lose the land. This is another
very important lesson in Jewish history which is repeated, and it is also
one of the most often repeated prophecies: “If you don’t keep Torah, the
Land will vomit you out.”

Throughout the early part of the Bible, God is constantly talking about
giving the Jewish people the Land of Israel and reaffirming that
commitment.

Indeed, the great 11th century Biblical commentator Rashi, asks a
question of the very first sentence in the Bible: Why does God begin with
the creation of the universe?

If the Bible is a book of theology for the Jews, why not begin with the
creation of the Jewish nation and go immediately to the story of Exodus.
That’s when the Jews become a nation, get the Torah, and go into the land.

And Rashi answers, quoting an ancient oral tradition that in the future, the
nations of the world will say “you are thieves” to the Jewish people. You
have stolen the land from the Canaanite tribes. So God begins the Bible
here at the creation of the universe to tell the world: “I am the Creator of
the
Universe. Everything is mine. I choose to give the Land of Israel to the
Jewish people.”

CLAIMS OF CONQUEST

Every other nation in the world bases its claim to its land on conquest. A
people came (for example, the English or the Spanish) conquered the
indigenous people (for example, the Indians) took the land, settled it, and
called it by a new name (for example, United States of America). “Might
makes right” is the historical claim of almost all nations in history.
However, the Jewish people base their claim on God’s promise. It is a
moral claim because God is God and God is by definition truth, and God is
by definition morality. God gave the Jewish people the Land of Israel.
Without that, the only claim the modern State of Israel can make is it is
stronger and was able to take the land from the Arabs.

This is a very important thing, and it is essential for the State of
Israel --
which is not a religious state and often far removed from Jewish values --
to
realize that the Bible gives the Jews a moral claim.

Indeed, the early founding fathers of the modern state, even if they were
not
religious, were deeply steeped in the realization of Biblical heritage of
the
Jewish people and their connection to the land. Ben Gurion had an
appreciation of the necessity of anchoring a modern, even secular Israeli
state in Judaism and Jewish tradition. (We’ll get more on Zionism later in
this series.)

ISHMAEL

After Abraham arrives in the Promised Land, he is faced with a dilemma.
His wife Sarah is barren, and she wants Abraham to have an offspring. So
she suggests that Abraham take a surrogate wife, Hagar, who joined
Abraham’s camp when he passed through Egypt. Hagar is the daughter of
the Pharaoh and she had elected to travel with Abraham as Sarah’s
maidservant. Great people have great servants. And so Abraham takes
Hagar as his second wife and from that relationship is going to come a
child by the name of Ishmael.

Ishmael will not want to carry on Abraham’s mission. Ishmael will go off
and found his own lineage; this is all recorded in the Bible, in the Book of
Genesis, Chapter 16.

In human history, we’re going to have two great monotheistic faiths, which
are going to appear later, after Judaism is already established for more
than 2,000 years: Christianity and Islam.

Islam is a religion which originated with the Arab peoples. The Arabs,
according to their own tradition and according to the Jewish tradition, are
the descendants of Ishmael. One of the great attributes of Arab culture is
hospitality. And the Bible tells us that Abraham was famous for hospitality.

It seems therefore that even though Ishmael does not carry on Abraham’s
mission he can’t help but be great. He’s blessed. By the way, the Bible
says specifically that Ishmael is going to be great and that he’s going to
be
at odds with the rest of the civilized world.

“You shall call his name Ishmael … And he will be a wild man; his hand
will be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall
live in the presence of all his brothers. (Genesis 16:11-12)

SUPERNATURAL BEGINNING

When it is clear that Ishmael will not carry on the mission, God tells
Abraham, who is then 99, that Sarah, who is 90, is going to become
pregnant.

And this is how Isaac is born, supernaturally.

As we noted earlier, this is what defines the Jewish people. The Jews never
should have been there. The Jews certainly shouldn’t have survived, yet
they did and still are here.

Before Sarah conceives God tells Abraham:
“Your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will name him Isaac. I will
establish My covenant with him as an eternal covenant to his descendants
after him. And as for Ishmael … I have bless him and I will make him
fruitful and will increase him exceedingly. He will become the father of
twelve princes and I will make him into a great nation. But I will
establish
My covenant with Isaac who Sarah will bear to you at this time next year.”
(Genesis 17:19-21)

So Isaac is the person who will carry on the mission of Abraham, the
mission of the Jews.

NEXT: ISAAC AND HIS SONS

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