A.
This week’s parasha ends with the account of the âqeidath Yitzchaq, the final test of Avraham’s faith, discipline, and obedience administered by G-d, in which Avraham was instructed: קח נא את בנך את יחידך אשר אהבת את יצחק ולך לך אל ארץ המורי' והעלהו שם לעלה וגו' (“Take, please, your son, your only one whom you love, Yitzchaq, and go to the land of Moriya and raise him up there as a burnt offering....;” XXII, 2).
Avraham set out to comply with this heart-wrenching demand. As the account reaches its climax, we read: וישא אברהם את עיניו וירא והנה איל אחר נאחז בסבך בקרניו וילך אברהם ויקח את האיל ויעלהו לעלה תחת בנו (“And Avraham lifted his eyes and saw, and behold, there was a ram in back caught in the thicket by its horns; and Avraham went and took the ram and raised it up as a burnt offering instead of his son;” ibid., 13).
Rashi tells us of this ram: מוכן הי' לכך מששת ימי בראשות (“It had been ready for this since the six days of creation”). His source for this is apparently the Talmud: עשרה דברים נבראו בערב שבת בין השמשות וכו' רבי יאשי' אמר אף האיל של אברהם (“Ten things were created on the eve of the [first] sabbath at twilight.... Rabbi Yoshiya said, Even Avraham’s ram;” פסחים נ"ד.).
This leads us to ask: What did Rashi see that led him to make this comment?
B.
To begin to find an answer, we first turn elsewhere in the Torah, where we read: שור או כשב או עז כי יולד והי' שבעת ימים תחת אמו ומיום השמיני והלאה ירצה לקרבן אשה לד': ושור או שה אתו ואת בנו לא תשחטו ביום אחד: (“An ox or sheep or goat which is born and has been seven days with its mother, from the eighth day onward it will be suitable as a burnt offering to Ha-Shem. And an ox or sheep, you will not slaughter it and its son [otho v’eth bno] in one day;” Leviticus XXII, 27-28).
The various ramifications of this passage are discussed at some length in the Talmud. The issue which concerns us now turns on the implications of the phrase otho v’eth bno. The gmara tells us of a dispute amongst Tanna’im concerning the phrase’s application: "אותו ואת בנו" נוהג בנקבות ואינו נוהג בזכרים. וחנני' אומר נוהג כין בנקבות בין בזכרים (“’It and its son’ is in effect with female [animals] but not with males; and Chananya says, 'It is in effect whether with females or with males;'” חולין ע"ח:). In other words, the Chachamim hold that otho v’eth bno means that one may not slaughter the mother and her young on the same day, but that it does not similarly apply to the father animal, whilst Chanaya holds that it applies equally to males and females.
The gmara strives to illustrate the principle underlying this difference of opinion by reference to another dispute. In Leviticus XX, 9, we read: כי איש איש אשר יקלל את אביו ואת אמו מות יומת אביו ואמו קלל דמיו בו: (“For each man who curses his father and his mother shall surely be put to death; he has cursed his father and his mother, his blood is upon him”).
Here the issue is whether the miscreant has to have cursed both his parents to warrant the death sentence, or if cursing either one is bad enough: אין לי אלא אביו ואמו, אביו שלא אמו ואמו שלא אביו מניין? ת"ל "אביו ואמו קלל", אביו קלל, אמו קלל, דברי ר' יאשי'. ר' יונתן אומר, משמע שניהם כאחד, משמע אחד בפני עצמו עד שיפרוט לך הכתוב "יחדיו" (“All that I have is ‘his father and his mother,’ whence [do we learn that this applies to] his father without his mother, or his mother without his father? This is taught by ‘he cursed his father and his mother,’ his father he cursed [or] his mother he cursed; these are the words of Rabbi Yoshiya. Rabbi Yonathan says, 'Both have the same meaning as [either] one, meaning either one by itself, unless the Scripture details for you [the word] "together"’”).
In other words, Rabbi Yoshiya needs the second clause to tell him that the prohibition applies to either the father or the mother. Rabbi Yonathan, on the other hand, sees the first clause as distributive by itself, leaving the second clause available for another purpose (עיי' רש"י שם).
If we now analyze our verse according to their respective criteria, it is clear that Rabbi Yonathan would agree with Chananya, in that the first clause refers to either a cow or a ewe, therefore the word otho is available to be interpreted as referring also to a male of the species. Rabbi Yoshiya, on the other hand, would agree with the Chachamim, in that he views the first clause as referring to the joint slaughter of a cow and a ewe, and needs the word otho to tell him that either a cow or a ewe may not be slaughtered on the same day as its calf or kid (הלכה פסוקה היא שודאי אסור לשחוט את האם ואת בנה כאותו היום, ונוהג גם בזכרים מספק משום מחלוקת התנאים. עיי' רמב"ם הל' שחיטה פי"ב הי"א ושו"ע יו"ד סי' ט"ז סע' ב' ).
It would appear, therefore, that in the case of Avraham’s ram, created ex nihilo at twilight on the eve of the first Sabbath, Rabbi Yonathan would hold that otho v’eth bno might apply to the ram, whilst Rabbi Yoshiya would hold that it would have no application, since the ram had no mother and is, of course, a male.
So what?
C.
Near the beginning of next week’s parasha, Rashi comments on Genesis XXIII, 2, summarising the midrash: ונסמכה מיתת שרה לעקידת יצחק לפי שעל ידי בשורת העקידה שנזדמן בנה לשחיטה וכמעט שלא נשחט פרחה נשמתה ממנה ומתה (“And Sara’s death is placed near to the âqeidath Yitzchaq because it was due to the news of the âqeida, when her son was presented for slaughter and nearly slaughtered, that her soul took wing from her and she died”).
It is plain both from Rashi’s summary and the original wording of the midrash that Sara was vouchsafed a vision in Chevron of what was transpiring on Mount Moriya (the Temple Mount in Jerusalem) in real time, and died before any actual slaughter took place. The Maskil li-Shlomo picks up on the word בשורה, which ordinarily signifies “good news,” and sees in it a triumphant vindication: When Sara saw that she and her husband had succeeded in raising a son so perfect, so free of blemishes from the surrounding, debased culture that he was fit to be an ôla tmima la-Shem, a “perfect offering to Ha-Shem,” she knew that her mission here below was complete, and immediately returned her pure soul whence it had come. He finds confirmation of this in the poetic verb used to describe her death, for which he offers the alternate possible translation aufgeblüht, “blossomed” -- Sara’s soul “blossomed” forth at the news.
If all of this is true, then, it would also seem true that it runs afoul of our conclusion in the gmara, that otho v’eth bno means that the mother of the sacrifice cannot be “slaughtered” on the same day as the sacrifice. Whatever his other qualities, Yitzchaq was arguably rendered ineligible to be sacrificed on that day because he was predeceased by Sara.
"הליכות עולם לו" -- אל תקרי "הליכות" אלא "הלכות" (“’The ways of the world are His’ [Habakkuk III, 6] -- read not ‘ways’ [halichoth], but ‘laws’ [halachoth];” מגילה כ"ח:). As I have explained several times, halachoth are no less chuqqei teva, “laws of nature,” than gravity or conservation of energy, describing discrete physical and metaphysical phenomena. Since it was G-d Who commanded the sacrifice of Yitzchaq, and G-d Who took back Sara’s neshama at the instant He did, it was G-d Who rendered the sacrifice invalid at that moment.
As proof that such an outcome was planned from the very beginning, we have Avrahm’s ram, waiting in the wings since Creation, מוכן לכך מששת ימי בראשית...
D.
We are once again afforded a glimpse of the way in which Divine Providence anticipates every need, and runs the world. The contingency of Avraham’s final test was planned from the first, provision made that he would pass it, but it was never envisioned that the ôla tmima would actually be slaughtered and sacrificed, but instead constitute the next stage in the evolution of the ממלכת כהנים וגוי קדוש (Exodus XIX, 6), Israel.
Nor is it any accident that it is Rabbi Yoshiya who clarifies that Avraham’s ram was created for the purpose from the beginning, the same Rabbi Yoshiya who holds like the Chachamim, that otho v’eth bno applies only to the mother and her young, so that nothing could invalidate the substitute sacrifice.
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