[Avodah] How a Jew Should Conduct Himself in Golus

Professor L. Levine via Avodah avodah at lists.aishdas.org
Sun Nov 13 11:55:37 PST 2016


The following is from RSRH's commentary on Bereishis 14:13


13 And the escapee came and brought the news to Avram the Ivri. [Avram]
was then dwelling in the groves of Mamre the Emori,brother of Eshkol and of Aner; they
were the masters in a covenant with Avram.


There are two types of bris: (a) a covenant between equals; (b) a
covenant between two unequal parties, where one accepts the other in
a bond of friendship, adding him to his faction, so that the other is
subordinate to him.

Our verse speaks of a covenant of the second type. Avraham did
not seek an alliance with Mamre and his kinsmen; rather, Aner, Eshkol
and Mamre, the natives, took the initiative and made a covenant with
Avraham, the stranger. They were the ba'alim of the bris. Not only Mamre,
in whose territory Avraham lived, but his kinsmen, too, recognized
Avraham's imposing personality and enlisted him as their ally.

Avraham's conduct should serve as a model for his descendants
throughout the generations, as long as they live as zerah Avraham in a land
not theirs, b'eretz lo lahem. A Jew should conduct himself as a Jew, loving
peace, and should not interfere with affairs that are not his. He should
develop and shape his own affairs, and attend to Israel's needs. The
result will be that the other peoples will seek to enlist him as an ally
- not vice versa. Every person of purity will recognize that true, complete
Judaism is the most perfect conception of humanity - not vice
versa. For the concept "Jew" is broader than the concept "man." A Jew
need only be a Jew, in the full and complete sense of the word. If he
behaves in this manner, then, although he will be only a shochan, he will

win the esteem of the other peoples, and they will enlist him in their
bris. Avraham did not purchase this alliance relationship at the cost of
abandoning his own calling.


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