Shabbos Parashas Vayeira - 5779

Shabbos Parashas Vayeira - 5779

Rabbi Hal Miller

And Avraham approached and said, "What if there should be fifty righteous people in the

midst of the city? Would You still destroy it rather than spare the place for the sake of

the fifty?" [Bereishis 18:24]

In a well-known sequence, Avraham negotiates with God over whether Sdom is to be

destroyed or spared. In the end, God agrees to spare the entire city if Avraham can

come up with only ten righteous folks, but since he cannot, Sdom is destroyed.

A generation ago, European Jewry was all but destroyed. Does this mean that there

were not ten righteous amongst that whole population? What was different that God was

ready to save Sdom, none of whom were Jews, and not Europe's Jewish population,

who were by definition more likely that Sdomites to be righteous?

Commentators explain many issues about the numbers involved, satellite cities and

distribution, number of righteous in the Ark that were not enough to save the whole of

Noach's generation, etc., implying that although many Jews were righteous in Europe,

perhaps the number was insufficient as compared to the number who were not. None of

those numbers really seems to be relevant to our question, as there clearly were very

large numbers of Torah-observant, Torah scholars, and such in Europe, far over the

ratios that Avraham and God were discussing.

Rashi notes the first words, "And Avraham approached", and looks for similar phrases

throughout Tanach. In each, he finds that the person who came forward did so in

preparation for some kind of battle, for conciliation, or for prayer, thus he finds that

Avraham here was doing all three of these. On these same examples, Rav Hirsch

understands these as people "who on their own account would have escaped the

misfortune, being caught up in a general calamity that befalls others." As Nechama

Leibowitz words it, "Avraham mustered all his inner resource, both his gentle and hard

qualities, love and fear, mildness and boldness, ready to do combat on behalf of Sdom.

Nechama then asks, "On whose behalf did Avraham intercede? To save the righteous,

or the wicked as well?" She cites Divrei David on Rashi: "It is only right that You do not

destroy the righteous with the wicked since that is justice and requires no prayer. My

prayer is that You deliver the whole place for the sake of the righteous. If my prayer is

of no avail, why should You kill the righteous since this is only justice?" She draws a

conclusion: "A few can turn the scales and save the place if the righteous are "in the midst

of the city", playing a prominent part in public life and exerting their influence in its many

fields of activity. But if they merely exist, living on their own and never venturing forth but

pursuing their pious conduct unseen and unknown, they will, perhaps, save themselves,

but will certainly not possess the spiritual merit capable of protecting the city." Perhaps from

this we can better understand last week's verse, "Noach was righteous in his generation"

that although Noach lived according to God's laws, he did not make enough effort to get

others to do so as well.

Noach tried to save the righteous. Avraham tried to save the wicked as well, not just by

this debate, but by bringing God out to the rest of the world.

There is no way for humans to comprehend nor explain why six million were summarily

killed in Europe, and in particular why the hundreds of thousands of Torah observant men,

women, and children were included. Would things have gone differently had Jews lived

among goyim instead of in shtetls? We have no way to know, although the story of Sdom

seems to indicate a possibility.

But there was a more important difference.

Our verse begins, "And Avraham approached". Rashi's comment tells us that this could

mean three different things, all of them righeous. Only in the case of Avraham do we

find all three in one person, and perhaps also in Moshe. The leader of an evil generation,

no matter how personally righteous, cannot along bring the generation back to God

without all three of these: conciliation, prayer, and preparation for battle. There was no

Avraham in Europe.

Of course, even Avraham was unable to save Sdom. Even Avraham needed a minyan of

good people to work with. Perhaps none of us are Avraham, but all of us could be one of

that count of ten.