midrash session 7

[cellio]

More midrash from Sefer Aggadah and my attempts to translate.

(1)"On the third day Avraham lifted his eyes and he saw" -- (2) and why on the third day and not on the first day and not on the second day? (3) So that there would not be nations of the world saying: (4) He was frightened and he went and he slaughtered his son.

The grammar seems a little awkward in (3); I want this to say "so that the nations of the world would not say", but, as with building IKEA furniture, I have some parts left over if I do that.

Also in (3), the word for "nation" is not "'am" as I expected but "um". Are they just synonyms, or is there some nuance?

In (4), I'm not sure of the grammar where I have "he was frightened". The root is hei-mem-mem, so the final vav is possessive, yes? But there's no prefix, so I can't get "in his fright" -- and anyway, it seems like a verb.

New paragraph: (5) "And he saw the place from afar" -- (6) how was it seen from afar? (7) It teaches that from the beginning the place was low down (shallow), as soon as the Holy One blessed be he spoke to place his Shekhina (in-dwelling presence) upon it and to make it holy, he said: (8) there is not the path of the king [...? something about:] in a high place uplifted and beautiful and all will see,

Let me pause here for a moment. The gist of this is that God was going to descend into this place, but is a low place, where no one will see, a suitable place for God's own spirit?

Line 5: (9) Immediately the Holy One blessed be he beckoned to gather the low place, as he (verbed... not sure) to the one place to make a place for the Shekhina. [In other words, he gathered up all the surrounding land to make a mound.] (10) He said to him Avraham to Yitzchak: do you see what I see? (11) He said to him: I see a pretty and praiseworthy mountain and a cloud connected (?) upon it. (12) He said to his boys (the servants): do you see ? (k'lum) (13) They said to him: we do not see these things. (14) He said to them: the nation resembles the donkey! (15) What the donkey sees and his eye does not know, as with them: (16) (a proof text that I can only get the gist of and don't have the citation for).

In (13) I'm not sure why it's "ein" and not "lo" (with an alef). My translation is probably not technically correct.

In (14), it says "'am", not "ha-'am", so that would be "a nation", but the next word looks like a participle and has a "ha-" prefix. I think literally this is closer to "a nation, the resemblers of the donkey!". But that doesn't flow so well.

New paragraph: (17) "And Avraham took wood of the offering and he put [it] upon Yitzchak his son" -- (18) as soon as (?) he bore his cross on his shoulder.

Yeah, really. Yitzchak had his cross to bear. There was a citation here to Midrash Rabbah B'reishit (which was written around 425CE), so we looked that up to see if anyone had more to say about this. We didn't find anything of note.

Comments

[magid.livejournal.com]

(8) It is not the way of a king to dwell in a valley, but in a high place, an uplifted (place), a pretty (place), visible to all. (9) Immediately, the Holy One Blessed be He hinted [or at least, I take it to be the same root as remez] to the area surrounding the valley, that they should gather into one place to make a place for the Shechina.

[cellio]

Thank you.

It is the same root as remez; I recognized it and asked.

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

I would translate (3) as "so that the nations of the world would not be saying." Also in (3), "umot" is a plural of "am" that is still used today (as in האומות המאוחדות (ha Umot ha Me'uchadot) -- the United Nations).

I would translate (8) as magid does above.

In (13), "Ain anu ro'im" is equivalent to "anu lo ro'im," though "ain anu ro'im" strikes me as an older grammatical construct.

[cellio]

(3): nice. Thank you.

"Umot": is it normal for 'ayins to casually turn into alefs like that?

Thanks for the info on (13).

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

I glossed too much in my explanation of "Umot." It's the plural of "umah," (aleph-vav-mem-heh), which is a synonym of "am" (ayin-mem).

That's what I get for trying to be all thinky too early in the morning.

[cellio]

Thanks. The rabbi told me it was another word with the same basic meaning (hence my question of whether there's a nuanced difference). But he didn't try to connect them grammatically and I read your comment as doing so. So thanks for the clarification.

That's what I get for trying to be all thinky too early in the morning.

Yeah, having too much blood in the caffeine stream can be a bummer.

[zevabe.livejournal.com]

I'd translate the difficult comment to his servants as follows:
12: Do you see anything (literally: do you see nothing?)
13: we do not see anything but deserts.

In 15, "mah" sometimes means "just as", usually in conjection with "af". So this will be, "Just as the donkey sees and doesn't understand, so too you."

16: Stay here with the donkey. It is another verse in the Akeidah story. (Gen 22:5 specifically). The idea that some nations, or perhaps even all non-Jewish nations are similar to a donkey appears also in Bava Kamma, with regard to causing a miscarriage in a non-Jew.

[cellio]

Thanks for all the information. I especially didn't know that about "mah". (Now that you mention it, the rabbi also brought deserts into the discussion where I had read things.)

(16): oh, of course. Duh.

[richardf8]

עם הדומה לחמור - I'm thinking that "עם" is in construct with "הדומה" - The nation of the likeness to the donkey. In rabbinic Hebrew, I think that ל can be a genitive prefix to, so the nation of the Donkey's Likeness may also be a reasonable rendering.

[cellio]

Thanks.