From Hostage to Pioneer of Faith: Strength, Faith & Legacy - Rabbi Lazer Brody

with Hashem's loving grace bizm. Today's podcast is entitled the first Hebrew hostage and it's all about our matriarch Sarah who together with her husband Abraham were the world's two first monotheists for her pure and complete belief in one God is what we call in Hebrew Amuna. So in that respect she and her husband Abraham they brought Amuna into the world. So why were Abraham and Sarah called Hebrews? Well, the Hebrew word for Hebrew is Eively, and that means a person that comes from the other side, the other side of the river. Now, they came from the east side of the Euphrates River and the rest of the world was on the west side. So, in fact, the midish tells us that as the first monotheist, this is a very befitting name because they were on one side of spirituality, the belief in one god, and the entire other world was on the other side. In fact, King Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, very first chapter, there's nothing new under the sun. So those of us today with Amuna, we're not exactly politically and socially correct, but very uncorrect. Uh this is not new because that is exactly uh the way Abraham and Sarah were. And we derive our strength to withstand all the social pressure and all the political pressure from Sarah and Abraham that they're our matriarch patriarch and we have their DNA. That's the biggest gift they gave us their DNA. So the Torah tells us that Sarah lived it till the age of 127 and that's in 23rd chapter of Genesis. Rashi, our foremost biblical commentator, he says that everything all those years were equally good. Wait a second. Time out on the field. Hold it, Rashi. That doesn't sound logical. This is to me that's the strangest passage that Rashi wrote in the whole Torah. Because few women in history, few people in history had a more difficult or more challenging or even more miserable life than our matriarch Sarah. Her life was a neverending saga of trials and tribulations. So, let's recount a few of them. Let's see what happened to to Sarah. Rashi says that her all years were were wonderful. They were all good, equally good. The whole 127 years that she was 100 years old as if she was 20 in beauty and she was 20 as if seven years old in innocence and she everything was beautiful. Everything her life was beautiful. She was beautiful. Well, right after she got married, she was 15 when she got married and Abraham was 25. And right after they they didn't even finish their honeymoon when King Nimrod who was a big he considered himself an idol and Abraham he upset uh Nimrod's policy that to everyone to bow down to him because Abraham didn't believe in anything other than Hashem. He was a montheist. So Nimrod took him barely fresh out of the wedding and threw him in a fiery furnace given the death penalty to burn. So, here's a young bride with a brand new husband and he gets thrown in capital punishment thrown into a fiery furnace. Well, she didn't know that Hashem was going to save him, but Hashem did because Hashem miraculously saved him. But, uh, Sarah, as a young bride, right after the wedding, she never expected to see her husband again. In fact, the same day she saw her father Haron burned to death. Haron figured, "Well, if Abraham came out of alive, I'm going to come out of life, too." Haron didn't have Abraham's amuna. He was hedging it. He'd said, he said, "Well, Abraham overcame Nimrod wall. I'm going to follow in his footsteps." But Haron didn't deserve it. So, he got thrown into the fire furnace. He was burnt crisp. That's the first test. Now, the second, Hashem commanded her husband to leave their home in Babylon, their Babylonian homeland, and that present day Iraq, and migrant to the land of Canaan, which is present day land of Israel. And that will be their promised land, the promised land, a good future there. And Hashem promised them a a good life and and wealth. And they'd inherit the land. But shortly after they got there, there was a famine. There was nothing to eat, nothing to drink. And they were forced to wander south to Egypt in search of sustenance. We're far from finished. So just imagine Hashem coming to an offering. Okay, if you leave New York and go to LA, you had a great new job and a new home and everything. You come there and nothing. and you left your home, you left everything behind and you're unemployed. This that this was faith, but she didn't break. No, we're not finished yet. So now they're down in Egypt. So Sarah became the world's first Hebrew hostage. She was a beautiful woman inside and out. And in Egypt, there was no beauty like hers. So the servants saw the Egyptian servants at the border. They said, "We got to take her to Pharaoh. She's fit to be a queen." So they abducted her from Abraham. They took her to the palace and Pharaoh covered her going wanted to be a queen. But Pharaoh didn't realize that he was playing with fire. This a rich uranium. This is our matriarch Sarah, the first believer, the first with Amunes. She and her husband. So, Hashem sent a very painful affliction to Pharaoh. And although Pharaoh tried, he couldn't do anything. He couldn't molest her. He couldn't he was he was totally neutralized. She neutralized him. And here she was, a young and innocent and holy woman, and she's hostage in Egypt until Pharaoh reali Pharaoh realized that if he didn't let her go, he'd pay with her life. Now, it's interesting to note that that was Passover night. But the fact that Pharaoh was afflicted, that wasn't enough. Hashem later on Passover night, that's when the Egyptians were afflicted with the worst plague, the 10th plague, the firstborn. So we could see this is uh what the midrash tan says that the acts of the fathers and the mothers are stepping stones to the kids. We see this repeating itself. Now let's go to the fourth her fourth trial and tribulation. Her brother Lot she had lost her father Haron. She had her mother died. She only had her brother and with Abraham they went to Lot came with them accompanied them to the land of Canaan. Now there was a war between the five kings of Sodom and Armor and the in the south of Israel in the Dead Sea and the four kings of the north Nimrod and his three allies in the Assyria Iraq area. So Lot became a captive became a prisoner of war and they took him to Syria. Now why did they capture Lot? They didn't need Lot so much. They wanted to capture Abraham but Lot and Abraham say Lot was Abraham's nephew. They looked exactly alike. So Nimrod paraded lot through the streets and said that he as he captured Abraham and people didn't know they didn't know the difference. They they thought that it was Abraham. So Abraham couldn't allow that to happen. That was a defamation of name. So Abraham took Eleazar and he declared war. This is the mid the mid says 318 but 318 is the numerical number of Eleazar that uh it could be Rashi says that Eleazar alone and they went up north to go to war. So here are the this Abraham the first Hebrew and his loyal slave Eleazar and they're taking on the four greatest superpowers of the time. This as if uh two men two a rabbi and his and his and his beetle they take on North Korea and Russia and Iran and Red China all at once. This is exactly what it was like. So here's Sarah at home and her husband's going to war up north again. She's left alone. She doesn't expect one chance in a zillion that she's ever going to see him again. And he runs off to war. Well, again, Hashem comes to his aid and he released Lot from captivity, brought him back to the land of Israel and against vast odds. So, she was again, she saw her husband even though she didn't expect to see her husband again. We're not finished. That life was not a bed of roses for our matriarch Sarah. So Abraham came home victorious, but that's not enough. It despite decades of marriage already, she hasn't had children. And so Abraham doesn't want to divorce her and Sarah knows he doesn't want to divorce her. But she really has to do something. So she takes her Egyptian concubine, Hagar, and she gives it to Abraham so that she should be strengthened from her concubine. So the concubine right away, not waiting right away. Boom. Nine months later, she gives birth to a son, the son Ishmael. Ishmo was the the son of the concubine Hagar. And uh since she got pregnant, right away she looked at her and she said to Sarah, "You you think you're so holy. Look at me right away. Hashem gave me gave me a child and you've been married tens of years, decades, and you haven't had anything." and she started feeling really insolent to Sarah. And this was a Sarah had uh tremendous abuse, verbal abuse and grief from her her maid servant. So now we we're not finished yet. Uh despite the immense grief, she has another that's not enough. She has a sixth trial and tribulation that uh Hashem tells Abraham to leave their home in Hevron and to go to Grar. Grar is a place in southwestern Israel and today it's an area between Ashcolon and Gaza and there was King Avi there. So again uh she they go down again. King Abby Milik covers her and they abduct her and she becomes a hostage for the second time. Not one second time in a strange king and our holy pure matriarch Sarah again she becomes a hostage. So again just like Pharaoh of your was punished really bad. You realize you put two and two together and you realize that this woman is not bringing a blessing into the palace. he better get rid of her. So he has to he sends her back to Abraham. He realized it's not Abraham's sister. It was his wife. So Avium says to why do you tell him it was your sister? He says because I see there's no fear of Hashem in this area in Philistine. There's no fear of Hashem and if I would say to your wife, I know you would have killed me. So Abraham to preserve himself. But now returns Sarah and she comes back. So after she's abducted and Sarah remains perfectly faithful all the time and all these tribulations. So at age 90, Abraham is 100. She finally becomes a mother after waiting for 75 years of marriage to the time she was 15 time she was 90 and she gives birth to Isaac. Okay. So it's not enough that she waited 75 years for Isaac. Hagar's son who was already 13 Ishmael very mischievous they were more grows up to be a crook but very mischievous and whenever somebody not looking he tries to kill he shoots he shoots arrows at at Isaac and she sees that the concubine is not doing anything and the concubine's son is trying to kill her own son so uh that's not enough we have an eighth trial that is equal to Abraham's 10th trial where Sarah after all these years and Isaac grows up and Isaac is going to be the pro the continuation of his father Abraham spreading monotheism in the world and Sarah hears that Hashem commanded Abraham to take Isaac to Mount Mariah and to sacrifice him on the altar. Well, the evil inclination, he came and he told this, the evil the angel that he came and told this to Sarah, she would see angels. She could converse with angels, but he didn't tell her that Hashem took him off the altar and told Abraham to go slaughter a lamb instead. They caught a a a kid goat that was caught in the in in the bushes instead. But he said, "Uh, your husband took your son to slaughter Mount Mara." She heard that and then she couldn't stand that anymore. And then her soul left her and that was the 127 years old when she left the world. And at the time Isaac was 37. This the time the Aada when he was bound on the altar as a sacrif as a sacrifice. So let's go back to our original question. We said how could Rashi say that all those years were good for Sarah? Well Sarah was a living example of amuna. We said that deeds of fathers and mothers are stepping stones for the children. So Sarah had to have this difficult life and despite her difficulties in life to maintain her amuna for this to come down to us in our DNA. Now you have to understand when you have difficulties in life and you're strengthened amuna and you hold on an amuna this goes in your DNA and you pass this on to your children and your grandchildren, your great-grandchildren, the end of generations. This is the greatest gift that a parent can give their offspring is a gift of amuna. So Sarah knew that everything Hashem does, it's everything comes from Hashem. She knew nothing else. There's no one but Hashem and she knew everything Hashem did from the best whether or not the challenge is easy, hard or prodigious. So there was no difference to Sarah. It's what calls this is the measure of equality. Sierra knew that every came from Hashem whether something was difficult or something was good for her it was all good because came from Hashem it's all good and that's she whether it was good or seemingly opposite for her it was all good this is what Rashi is telling us that all her years were good all the years were equally good no matter what Sarah went through in her life and this is why she is our matriarch our great-g grandandmother and she's also the great grandmother of the giants of Amuna King David and the giant amaish Gamu and Rebea where they said Gamula that's God's last name that's also the good and said everything does it's all for the best so these are Sarah's great grandchildren and it come down in the DNA and they come down to us so what we do if we don't have strong amuna is that we haven't activated the DNA that we receive from Abraham and Sarah. So that's our job to activate that amuna because we have it within us that have full belief in Hashem and we have a full belief in Hashem. No matter what's going on around us, we have a good life, a sweet life and with our strength of amuna, Hashem should bless everyone and sign and seal everyone for a wonderful new year 5786 and all your hearts wishes for the very best. Amen. God bless.