Once in rabbinic school, I took a course in parshanut, rabbinic commentary, offered by Rabbi Steven Franklin. For me, it was a very difficult class and it seemed we stayed on some texts forever. One of those stories was the story of Abraham, the father of three major religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. How I used to swell with pride in a public school history or social studies class when they would teach us that Abraham was the first “monotheist,” the first person to believe in one G-d. How smart that Abraham was.

And of course, I knew the story of Abraham smashing the idols. So did my husband. We each tell the story of telling the story to college friends who were amazed. You see, that story isn’t in the Bible. It is in the midrash, a rabbinic interpretation to help us understand the text. If you want to read that midrash it is in Genesis Rabbah 38. (Also called Bereshit Rabbah 38)

We studied that text with Rabbi Franklin. And we studied Abraham and Isaac going up the mountain. Did Abraham really sacrifice Isaac? Did Isaac return with Abraham? Is this, as some Christians believe a pre-cursor to Jesus being sacrificed on the cross?

We studied all kinds of things to answer the question, “What’s bothering Rashi,” a medieval Jewish commentator.

We spent time learning about the three messengers that appeared and visited Abraham and Sarah in their tent. Were they messengers, men, angels, G-d? Whatever, it seems angels only have one unique, discrete mission. Only one job. Then, they go on their way.

In this story, the first angel was to comfort Abraham after his circumcision. We learn from this the importance of visiting the sick. We also learn the importance of welcoming guests, whomever they are.

The second angel was to tell Sarah that she would have a child. And Sarah laughed. How could that be possible since she was withered and her husband so old? We’ll come back to that second angel. We did in class, too.

And the third angel went on his way to warn Sodom and Gomorrah. And we spent a long time on the Hebrew verb, pakad. Seems G-d paked et Sarah. G-d took note of Sarah. G-d remembered Sarah.

And G-d took note (pakad) of Sarah. The sense that verse carries is that G-d remembered Sarah. The rabbis teach in Tractate Rosh Hashanah 32b, Biblical verses that mention pakad are equivalent to verse that mention divine remembrances. (Ramban on Genesis 21:1) We looked at every instance of pakad in the Bible. It was a good exercise in learning how to do cross-textual references and analysis. Some days the work brought me to tears, even though Sarah herself laughed.

But here is what I gleaned.

Maybe Sarah was the precursor to Mary, an archetype of Mary. An annunciation of an upcoming birth to a barren woman (not a young woman at all!). Maybe, as one midrash suggested, it was G-d who impregnated Sarah, since in the Biblical text itself, G-d reminds Sarah that nothing is impossible for G-d. And three angels, like the three wise men.

Many of these midrashim we studied were later ones, designed to be put side by side with the story of Mary. Many are contained and notated in the 10th century work Aggadat Bereshit available now in English with lots of notes. https://www.amazon.com/Aggadat-Bereshit-Translated-Introduction-Perspectives/dp/9004121730

The texts were confusing. Troubling. Difficult. But worth it.

Maybe they were not meant to be anti-Christian polemics. Maybe they were meant to bring people together, not to challenge them or divide them. Maybe they weren’t prooftexts at all. Maybe they were elevating Sarah to a higher level.

After all, she was considered one of the seven women prophets of Judaism. G-d spoke to her directly, one of the ways G-d took note of Sarah. We know also from midrash that she was the “Eshet Chayil”, the righteous woman of Proverbs and that is how Abraham eulogized her after her death at 100 and 20 and 7. Again from the midrash we learn that she was as beautiful at 20 as she was at 7 and as righteous at 100 as she was at 20. She was a good role model for women everywhere, in every age—including Mary.

What if these stories of Sarah just enabled the cross-pollination of cultures that gave birth (sorry, couldn’t resist) to Christianity and Islam.

Cross-pollination, different from assimilation, has always been very real in the Fertile Crescent. There is a Ladino song, “Avraham Avinu” that talks about Abraham being the light of Israel. A star appears to signal his birth.

Here is the first verse and the chorus:

Kuando el rey Nimrod
al campo salia mirava en el cielo y en la estrelleria vido una luz santa en la juderia que havia de naser Avraham Avinu.
When King Nimrod went out to the countryside
He was looking at heaven and at the stars
He saw a holy light in the Jewish quarter
[A sign] that Abraham, our father, was about to be born.
chorus:
(Avraham Avinu,
Padre querido
Padre bendicho,
luz de Yisrael) (x2).
chorus: (Abraham Avinu [our Father], beloved father
Blessed father, light of Israel) (x2).

Three Messengers, (the wise men?) an unexpected birth (or two) and a star that appears in the sky. Sound familiar?

Then I read one of my favorite Chanukah stories, The Trees of the Dancing Goats by Patricia Polacco.

Trisha, the author, loves the eight days of Chanukah on her family farm in Michigan, with her parents and grandparents. It’s idyllic especially when her mother has time off from teaching school. Her grandmother makes latkes, potato pancakes and her grandfather carves wonderful, whimsical wooden animals for each night of Chanukah as gifts for Trisha and her brother. But one year, all the neighbors get sick. Really sick with scarlet fever. Except Trisha’s family. They hatch a plan to make sure that each family can still celebrate Christmas. They bring in trees, decorate them with one of the wooden animals and secretly deliver them with baskets of fresh food, chickens and latkes. On the last night of Chanukah there is a knock on the door. Trisha’s best friend reappears with her family.

You will have to read the book to understand the miracle of light and friendship. The book was a hit with Hebrew School. While it is billed as a children’s story, it was a hit with our adult Friday night bunch. I choke up every time, reading the last page. It seems especially poignant this year. This is a year where my congregation is actively trying to live out the ideal expressed in Leviticus and echoed by Jesus, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” That’s precisely what Trisha’s family and Trisha’s neighbors did in response.

However you celebrate this darkest season of the year this weekend, remember to love your neighbors. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night. Yes, I can say that, as a Jew, to all my Christian friends, and anyone else who celebrates December miracles.