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It begins by telling us that “G-d blessed Abraham with EVERYTHING” ((24:1). And then that; “Abraham gave EVERYTHING he had to Isaac.” (25:5)

At first glance this makes no sense. Is this to be taken literally? G-d ‘owns’ the entire universe! Is that what G-d gave to Abraham? Everything?? And how could Abraham give it all (‘everything’) to Isaac?

Even more, it’s not clear why this wedding story is important enough to be written in the Torah or even why is Isaac himself so important? The Torah doesn’t tell us anything Biblical, miraculous or even instructive about him! Didn’t do miracles, give sermons or have followers. What was special about Isaac?
To understand this here are two stories.
The first comes from The Talmud (Sanhedren 91a).

Some 2,300 years ago Alexander the Great ruled the entire world and he allowed the Jews to remain in Israel.

But it wasn’t long before other nations demanded Israel for themselves.

The African delegation said “Israel is called the Land of Canaan (Num. 34) and Canaan was our relative! The land belongs to us!”

The Egyptians quoted Exodus 12:35 “The Jews took all our wealth when they left Egypt with Moses, we demand repayment!”

The Arabs said “The Torah calls Ishmael the “son of Abraham’ (Gen. 25:12)) We have as much a right to the land as they do.

Alexander requested that the Jews send Rabbis to refute their claims.

At first the Jews didn’t know whom to send until a simple, hunchbacked Jew called G’via ben P’sisa stepped forward and announced.

“Let me reply” he said. “If I don’t succeed then just say that I was an impetuous simpleton. But if I win, you can say that despite my ignorance the Torah was victorious.”

The Rabbis agreed, G’via presented himself in Alexander’s court and the rebuttal began.

He calmly listened as they repeated their claims and replied.

To the Africans he said. “You are relying on the wrong Torah sentence. In Genesis 9:27 your forefather, Canaan, is called a slave. According to Torah a slave is the total possession of his master. In other words, you belong to us and have no claim to anything, including the Holy Land!”

Alexander gave the Africans three days to reply and when they realized they couldn’t, they ran away in fear and shame.

Then G’via turned to the Egyptians. “You claim that we Jews must return what we took when we left Egypt? Well, it says in the Torah that millions of Jews; over 600,000 males alone, slaved for four hundred and twenty years in Egypt! If you reckon it out, I think you owe us much more than we took.”

Alexander also gave them three days to reply and they too disappeared.

Finally (and this is what is relevant to us) he said to the Arabs. “True your ancestor was a son of Abraham. But the Torah tells us (Gen. 25:5) “Abraham gave EVERYTHING to ISAAC!’ In other words, your relative Yishmael received nothing.”

They too had no reply and the land of Israel remained in the hands of the Jews.
The second story happened about one hundred and fifty years ago in Czarist Russia.
At that time Russia was under the Orthodox Church, everyone there including the King, was devoutly religious and anti-Jewish decrees were commonplace.

And occasionally anti-Semitism came from Jews themselves.

One apostate, let’s call him Stephen, came up with the idea that the government close down all the Jewish printing houses in Russia!

He claimed that the Jews have a book called the Talmud which is filled with anti-gentile rhetoric and must be destroyed. He openly challenged the Jews to come and defend themselves in an open debate.

The Czar called for three prominent Rabbis to answer these serious charges.

Rabbi Yitzchak of Velozhin represented the non-Chassidic Jews, Rabbi Halperin represented the Chassidic Jews and Rebbe Menachem Mendel (a.k.a. the Tzemach Tzedik) represented Chabad.

The apostate stood up, and addressed the Judges. “It is known that the Jewish book called the Talmud, which is the main source of Jewish knowledge, is filled with poisonous statements against our religion. For instance, let us look at what it says in Mesechtas Sofrim (Chap. 15)

“Tov Sh’Be’Acum Harog” The best of the gentiles should be murdered!”

“How can the court, indeed, how can any human being hear these words without disgust and revulsion filling his very bones!?” At this point he was screaming, his face was red with emotion his finger was raised dramatically on high his and voice was raised to a high pitch. “These books and the heretics that wrote them must be destroyed!!!” He looked about him and sat down.

The Tzemach Tzedik then turned to Rabbi of Velozhin and said “You answer!”

He cleared his throat, stood from his chair and replied.

“Your honor, this man” He pointed to the apostate, “is using the government court system to settle his own personal scores. He is obviously so filled with hatred against his own people that he has lost his reason.

“The Jews have always been the faithful servants of the Czar and never slandered his religion. As for the quoted Talmudic passage …. it says exactly the opposite of what our accuser says it does!

It says “‘Tov’ Sh’Be’Acum ‘KATOL'” (Katol means ‘kill’ in Aramaic)

Which means, “The best of the gentiles are the Catholics!” (Katol)’!!

The judge was astounded. He paused for a moment turned to the apostate who ordered that a Talmud be brought from the royal archives and there it was clearly written as the Rabbi said; ‘Katol’ not Harog. The case was dismissed.

When they were outside of the court building Rabbi Velozhin turned to the Tzemach Tzedek and said,

“I know the entire Talmud by heart and it doesn’t say ‘Katol’ it says ‘Harog’ like he said! That was a miracle!

‘You are right” The Rebbe answered “G-d must have arranged it that they had the one edition that is written differently!

“But” the Rabbi from Velozhin continued, “I never heard that answer that ‘Katol’ means Catholics! You put that answer into my mind!”

The Rebbe smiled and nodded.

“If so,” continued the Rabbi “why didn’t you say the answer yourself?

“Because I didn’t want to say that any idolatry was good.” The Tzemach Tzedik answered.
This answers our questions about the marriage of Isaac.
The greatness of Isaac is that he was the first to receive a “Jewish Soul’ by birth.

Abraham received his Jewish soul directly from G-d and the first one he passed it on to was Isaac. This opened the door for Isaac to give it to Yisroel and thereafter to all us Jewish people ‘Bnei Yisroel’.

That is true Jewish identity. As the Tanya explains in the second chapter, the Jewish soul is a portion of the Infinite Creator Himself, in a limited human body…. Something like it was in the Holy of Holies.

And, as in the Holy Temple, even a ‘limited’ revelation of G-d (In one ‘inner’ chamber alone) contains EVERYTHING.

That is what it means that G-d blessed Abraham with EVERYTHING, and that Abraham gave EVERYTHING to Isaac. Namely they received and passed on the Jewish soul.

But there is more. This Jewish soul has a purpose. It gives every Jew the inspiration and power to transform the world into truth; to reveal G-d everywhere constantly and purposefully.

That is the importance of Yitzchak (Isaac) and this wedding.

The name Yitzchak implies happiness (Tzchok) (Gen. 21:6).  Because this ability to reveal meaning in every aspect of creation is a joyous wedding; uniting G-d with the world.

And that is why the Torah tells us in such detail about Isaac’s wedding; it is the prototype of how Moshiach will unite G-d and the world.

That is the point of the above stories. G’via in our first story used this sentence (‘Abraham gave everything to Issac’) against the Arabs to prove that the physical LAND of Israel is ours. And the second story shows that all our enemies will miraculously cease to oppose us.

This will finally be accomplished by Moshiach who will bring the Jews back to Israel by rebuilding the Temple, making the world blessed and happy and transforming our enemies as we saw in the second story.

As we say in the wedding blessings “Speedily will be heard in the cities of Judah etc. the voice of the Groom and the voice of the Bride”. And as we say in Psalms (126:2) “Then our mouths will be filled with Laughter”

But it all depends on US to open our eyes and do all we can. And not much is lacking. We are standing on the merits of thousands of years of Jewish hopes, prayers and suffering. It could be that all that is lacking is just one more good deed, word or even thought to bring ……
Moshiach NOW!!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad, Israel

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