Avraham Taught Discovering Greatness Even When You Feel Burn-Out [Chayei Sarah]

Okay friends, the story begins paras the para of where we discuss ironically the death of Sara even though the name of the para is the life of Sara and what we're going to unpack in the next half hour or so is discovering greatness. Arainu had discovered greatness. Abrahamu had showed us the path in the Torah for us to discover our own greatness, our own resilience. The Torah describes in this para Aram's advance in age. I'm going to read the Hebrew and I'll translate it word by word because there is the loose translation and there is the more exact translation. It says Abraham Abraham was old and came in his days which is usually understood to mean he advanced in his days. He's getting old. He's aging. And this is mentioned right after um he had buried Sara which was not an easy task because he had to bargain for the entire land of Kron and it was a whole uh situation. He finally was able to bar uh to to purchase the land and bury her in the in the cave the known cave. And then the Torah describes him advancing in age. And that's mentioned right before he tasks his servant Delazar with the responsibility of finding his son Yitak a wife. And he tells him, "Go to the land of my parents. Don't take a land don't take a woman from the Canananites or from any nation." And he actually had, we know this from Rashi, an earlier Rashi, that he had a very specific lady in mind. It happened to have been a cousin of a niece of his and that was Rifka. Okay. Commentaries raise an important question here which is we know that real estate in the Torah is expensive. The Torah is precise in the language that it uses. It's precise in the amount of times it's going to say things. And if something is mentioned more than once, there should be a good reason for it. And this phrase, Abraham was old and advanced in days. That's the loose translation, was already stated in last week's para. Last week's para describes the three angels coming to visit Abraham. And they're there to inform him. One of them is there to inform him that him and Rifkar are going him and Sar, sorry, are going to have a child. They're going to have a baby, a baby boy. And Sara laughed. Sarah was skeptical. But why was she skeptical? Because the Torah says Aram and Sara were old and advanced in days. Same phrase just mentioned in the plural. We've already described that they're already over the hill. Why mention it again in this portion? Which by the way interesting to note like what changed this was about 40 years prior because at this point is about to get married is 40 years old when it was mentioned the first time they were old and they didn't have any children and the angel is prophesizing that they're going to have a child. So that's 40 years prior that they're getting old. So, some commentaries want to say that they started getting old in last week's para and now they're really old. Right now, they're really over the hill. Um, here's the thing that that is a suggested answer among some commentaries. It makes you wonder why Rashi doesn't say anything. makes you wonder why Rashi who is the authoritative commentary when it comes to the literal interpretation rather than homalytic interpretation or other ways of interpreting Torah why he doesn't mention why it's mentioned twice he doesn't even ask the question let alone answer the question to him it wasn't a question to Rashi it wasn't saying it twice to Rashi if you were to learn the Torah from the lenses of Rashi we're reading two completely different statements that happen to look the same, but they're different. And here's how you would look at the portion through the lenses of Rashi. Now, I'll tell you why this is important. By the way, let me just put some something in brackets here. Rashi is the authoritative interpretation when it comes to the literal meaning of the text rather than the halletic or midashic meaning. Rashi is also the authoritative interpretation when it comes to spiritual lessons derived from the Torah. It's ironic. You would think that other commentaries that discuss the cabalistic interpretation are more authoritative when it comes to spiritual lesson. But embedded within Rashi, there's a tradition, an age-old tradition. Rabbi Horowitz known as theakades from the 1500s mentions this. He says that there's an age-old tradition that embedded within Rashi in what Rashi says and what Rashi does not say are life lessons. Rashi doesn't say anything here which means there's lenses being lent to us and how to view this statement and it's different than how we viewed the previous statement. In the previous statement in last week's portion when it said Abraham and Sara had advanced were old and had advanced in age, we were really describing their age. We're saying, "Hey, these are old people. These people are over the hill. The fact that they're going to have a child is very significant. What we're saying in this week's portion, Abraham was old and he advanced in aged is something completely different and it's going to be a life lesson from any for anybody listening to this. You ready for the lesson? There are times in our life where we feel burnt out. where we feel like we just want to relax. We just want to take it easy. We're done with the uphill battle. We're done with swimming against the tide. And for different people, by the way, this challenge is going to mean different things. For some people, it's as simple as, "I'm tired. I'm old. I'm just not in the mood. and I'm burnt out. For some people, it might be a little bit more serious. There might be real trauma. And there is this notion of let's ask ourselves why we're burnt out or let's honor that feeling or thought. That's not what Abraham did. If you translate the text literally, you'd read it like this. And I mean really literally like not so you could make contextual grammatical sense, but just like literally raw raw text, raw translation. Abraham was old. He came into his days. Despite Abraham being old and he was not only aged chronologically, he had real life experiences, difficult life experiences, having to go against the tide of his entire family and community and adopting a faith in God. the various ten tests that that had come with such as being thrown into the furnace. Um the tests of him having to follow God to the land of Cananan, then leave the land of Cananan, going into Egypt, having his wife abducted twice, once by Pyro, once by Avi, bringing his son to the altar, the various wars that he had fought. And now where we are at this portion, he had just buried his wife. Aram is old. He's old chronologically. He's old in terms of experience. This stuff wears on you. And nevertheless, he comes into his days. He leaned into his days. His days were relevant. His life still had meaning and purpose. It still mattered. This text is mentioned right before he charges his servant Eleazar with the mission of getting his son a wife despite being tired. We must move on. That's a that's a rough statement. We must move forward. For some reason, moving forward is less uh I don't know triggering than moving on. And I get that. I don't mean move on like nothing that happened to you matters and just you're a robot. But there is this capacity to lean into the days. I'm going to read to you an excerpt from the midrash. The midrash says and this is the midrash on our Torah portion. It's known as the midrash rabba. The misra is one of the most um early commentaries on on the Torah. And basically every every book of the five books of Moses as well as the migillas and other books have its own midrash called the midash raba. So there's boracious rabba, there's shimos raba, etc. And here's what it says. I'll read it and translate it. Some people are old, but they're not with it. They're not in their days. Their life doesn't seem to matter anymore. And then you have some people that are with their days. They're with it. They're on top of things. Their life matters in a but they're not old. Give them some time, you know. um Aalan. But over here in the case of Abraham, Zaka connected Yam's age and his days matched up. But Yim connected Zikna. His age matched his days, his days matched his age. He was able to lean in, lean into his days. despite everything he had gone through, he had some sort of ability to lean in and realize his life has purpose. And here's the reason why, and we were speaking about this earlier, Abraham realized something that life is not about checklists and tasks. Because when life is about checklists and tasks, when our relationships, whether it be a relationship with God and our responsibility toward God, fulfilling the mitzvah, whether it be our relationships toward our spouses, when it's a checklist, you get burnt out. When it's an identity, you don't get burnt out. You lean in. You keep on going. You don't keep on going because you lied to yourself and you told yourself the pain isn't real, the suffering isn't real, the challenges aren't real. Ignore it, put the blind spots on and keep marching forward. That's not why you keep on going. You keep on going because you have something very important to do. I had a counseling uh mentor who shared with me fascinating perspective. He he said it this way. He said, "I'd spoke I had spoken with many many Holocaust survivors and he says, "I've never been able to get a Holocaust survivor to explain to me how he or she had survived, but they're always able to explain why he or she had survived." Because how is a checklist that's very technical and how are you supposed to know how you're going to survive or even how you did survive? But why? Why you survive? What's the motivation? That's an identity. Um, I'll give you another example of a post-biblical character from the Talmud or from the Mishna that exemplifies this idea in a similar way and that is Rabaka. We celebrate the um we celebrate Rabaka on Laga Omar, the 33rd day of the omare which is an interesting thing. What are we celebrating? Rabaka was the epitome of love your fellow. Like that's what he believed in. That's what he taught. He used to preach Torah. This is a fundamental principle in the Torah. He had 24,000 students that couldn't get along and they were dropping like flies. They kept dying because there was a plague and the plague was due to their um lack of respect towards one another. And on Logba Omar they stopped dying. Rabi moves to the south of Israel from the north to the south and he rebuilds with five students and we celebrate the fact that they had stopped dying and commentaries wonder um he had 24,000 students. They kept dying. We celebrate that they stopped dying. Well, you know why they stopped dying? It's not going to sound very good, but there were no more students left. Of course they stop dying. So why is logba such a celebration? You're not going to have like a deficit of death. Like what what is there's nobody left. So the way commentaries explain is what we're really celebrating is not the fact that they stopped dying is what he did after they had stopped dying which was somehow picked himself up and rebuilt not with 24,000 students and the prestige that comes with but with five students one of which were Rabbi Shiman Barai. Judaism was literally filtered through these five people rather than 24,000 because he had the courage somehow like Aramino despite how old he was to lean into his days and to pick himself up and somehow rebuild. He was able to do it somehow. Now for somebody who is going through a very excruciating circumstance. Um this could be meaningful and this could be challenging if somebody has some sort of severe trauma. If somebody has some sort of severe relationship issue, if somebody has gone through what Abraino or Rabika had gone through and is listening to this and saying, "Well, whoa." Okay. If somebody's listening to this right now and they haven't gone through what Abraham had gone through, the trials and tribulations that Rabi Aka had gone through. Is this a meaningful message? The answer is yes. Because this message exists also on a very micro level. And actually, I would encourage us to to think about this on a micro level, not just on a macro level. With Aramino was macro. Despite everything he'd gone through, he'd leaned into his days. Rabaka, this was macro. This was big. Losing 24,000 students, yet leaning into his days, rebuilding. This also exists on a micro level. And I think it's important to to look at it that way. There are small I shouldn't say small there are I guess small areas in our life where leaning into that moment could be meaningful and and even maybe maybe even life-changing maybe I'll give you an example I'll share with you a story Rabbi Yseph the father-in-law of the lab the previous He had gone through a lot also. He was on death row for sharing the flame of Judaism in back in commun communist um New York. Sorry. Back in communist Russia. Did I say New York? Was that a Freudian slip? Oh man, they're going to cancel me. Um he got he he was on death row for keeping the flame of Judaism alive and he had underground yeshiva's underground Torah centers underground shools and schools and educational centers and mikvah and he was not giving up any information as to the whereabouts of these spaces and they had um ordered that he's going to have capital punishment. Miracle of Miracles, they said some for some reason they changed it. You're not going to have capital punishment. You're going to be exiled to Siberia. Then Miracle of Miracles, they said, "You're not going to be exiled to Siberia. Just get out of here. Get out of our country. Just leave." So now he's on his way out. And it's moments before a horse and buggy is going to come pick him up and take him to the train so they can move. I believe he went to Poland and then I don't know the exact history and then came to America. So he's being escorted by his son-in-law who then wasn't the father-in-law has gone through a lot. He's about to escape a country and rebuild. And moments before the horse and buggy comes, he has all his luggage and he has all of his belongings. He opens up a volume of Talmud and begins to study as if he had just walked into a library or study hall and has a good couple hours to learn. It was like one of those intense moments of focus. and he's learning not just like okay let me just look like really diligently focused and his son-in-law Rabbi Maherson at the time says to him how how do you do this how are you so focused you're literally escaping a country you have an important trip coming up you're about to board a train the horse and buggies coming to take you and you have like 3 minutes or whatever it was how are you so focused He was leaning into his days like Abraham. Those couple of moments weren't going to escape him. They were meaningful. He was willing to lean in. He had told him the power in his answer. He told him the power of of utilizing every single moment and how the famed rabbi of previous generation going back about 800 or 900 years ago known as the Ashba, Rabbi Schlommo ben Ader was a uh a community rabbi and one of his big focuses were were um drafting respons to important questions which would create precedent for a lot of hakic resolutions. So that was pretty busy. You know he had to be well researched for that. He would also give three lessons a day in Talmud study at the yeshiva that he had to prepare for. He was also a physician and would treat patients and he'd also make time to exercise daily. So he had a lot going on. He said to him though every moment was sacred and the previous was saying that he had learned from the rajbah that every moment is sacred. You lean in that's on a very micro level. He had three minutes or however long it was four, five, six minutes but he leaned into it rather than saying I'm tired. Let me just scroll on the phone. It's very difficult. I I'll give you another example. a little bit of a different uh uh twist. So, I I have a mentor in the counseling field who leads trainings all over the world. He's on an airplane at least once a week, sometimes twice a week, and he finds himself in London about to lead a presentation. And this guy had gone through a very difficult life, suffered all sorts of abuse as a child, and really leaned into his days, really built himself up to be not just a proficient therapist who heals people, but somebody who's empowered many, many other therapists to heal people. Um, and against all odds, he had a lot going on. And and I'll spare with you spare you from all the details for now. But one of the abusive figures in his life was his father. Abusive to him, abusive to his wife or his mother. One of his safe um role models that he would look up to was his uncle. And his uncle apparently was not doing well. And on this trip, he's about to present in London at a conference in the evening. And this guy's from America. He's from Atlanta. Uh sorry, from Texas. He founds out he finds out 10 minutes before the um before the presentation that his uncle had died and it put him in like this shock. And now he's thinking, he says, he's thinking, how am I going to cancel this, I can't speak. I can't speak at this event. Literally moments before he's about to present to hundreds of people of professionals, his uncle died and he's just not in a space to talk about, you know, he just I mean, he could go on autopilot, but that's just not what he does. So he calls one of his colleagues. Sorry, this was a morning presentation and for his colleague it was early early morning like 3:00 in the morning back in America. No answer obviously he was desperate. He called him that time in the morning. He doesn't know what to do. He calls one of his local mentors and says I'm about to present in 8 minutes. My uncle just died. An uncle whom I was very close with. an uncle who was a a space of of of safety for me, one of the few role models I had in my life and he had just died and I'm in pain. How am I going to present? And what he was hoping for from the his mentor was, okay, here's how you're going to get out of it. instead he says, "Oh dear, now you're really going to have to shine." And he goes, "Huh?" Says, "Yeah, now you're really going to have to shine." And it it that one comment shifted his whole perspective. I can do this. And he describes how he gets up on stage And you know, he he he shares with the entire room, "Is it okay if I be real with you guys for a moment and tell you what I'm going through?" And he said it was one of the best training sessions that he had ever led where he really shined because he threw himself in there. Baba Yamim, he came into his days, he leaned in rather than ran away. and was able to shine and inspire many many people. This is what Abrau teaches us to lean in and we lean in when it's not just a task but it's a calling. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.