Jews and the Civil Rights Movement

Ha'Emek Davar, Intro to Bereishit

This volume, Genesis, is referred to by both the prophets, Joshua and Samuel, as “Sefer HaYashar,” (Hebrew for “The Book of the Upright”).

Rabbi Yochanan explains that this is the book that deals with the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who are called upright, as we see that Balaam said, “Let my soul die the death of the upright“. We shall try to understand the reason why Balaam called our forefathers specifically “upright ones” and not “righteous ones” or “pious ones” or any other appellation. Moreover, we shall analyze the questions of why Balaam prayed for himself, wishing that his end would be as these upright ones, and why this volume was given the added name, The Book of the Upright.

All these questions can be answered and explained by elucidating upon the phrase in the Song of Ha’a’zi’nu, “The Rock, His Work is perfect…He is righteous and upright.” The word “upright” shows the “justness of the judgment” of His destruction of Jerusalem and the Second Temple during the time of a generation whose outlook was crooked and twisted.

It is explained that the people of that generation of the Second Temple were “righteous”, “pious”, and intensely involved in Torah study. However, they were not upright in their relationships with others, either in their actions, thoughts, or speech. Therefore, because of the unwarranted hatred each had for the other, one would falsely accuse another of heresy, simply because the other’s religious expression, and way of respecting and showing reverence to God, was not in accordance with one’s own way. The one whose way was different was thereby labeled a non-believer and considered cut off from authentic Judaism, even though that person fulfilled The Torah’s Commandments. This lack of tolerance and limited acceptance of individual religious expression eventually led to murder in the first degree and to all the evils in the world. Eventually, GOD felt that punishment — the destruction of the Holy Temple — was necessary.

From this punishment we can see the “righteousness of The Divine Judgment”, for The Holy One, The Almighty, is Upright and will not tolerate so-called “righteous” people such as these. However, The Ruler will sanction them only with the stipulation that they choose the upright way in their relationships with others. God does not want people to be devious, even if their acts are proclaimed “for the sake of Heaven,” since the essence of these acts is corrupt. This perverted manner destroys creation and uproots the tranquil settlement of the earth.

Now we understand the reason for the unique praise attributed to our patriarchs [and matriarchs]: not only were they righteous and pious and not only did they love God to their fullest abilities, but, in addition, they were upright. That is to say, they accustomed themselves to deal straightforwardly with other people, not only because it is honest to do so, but also because they realized that this positive way of relating to people bestows the continuity of existence on creation. Even idol worshippers, despite their low and despicable spiritual level, were treated with love and concern for their well-being by our patriarchs [and matriarchs].

This is exemplified by the great extent to which Abraham, our father, applied himself, through intensive prayers and appeals, to gain the preservation of wicked Sodom. Abraham beseeched God to spare Sodom even though he hated the people and their leaders to the fullest degree, because of the wickedness that saturated their very being. Nevertheless, he wanted them to continue to exist.

In the Midrash, this concept of Abraham’s compassion is touched upon when we learn that The Almighty said to Abraham, our father, “You love righteousness and hate evil; namely, you love to find the good within all My creatures, to make them right before Me, and you hate to attribute evil to them, to make them guilty.”

Thus Abraham was truly worthy of being called by God, “a [real] father to a multitude of nations”. For just as when a son does not follow a straight path, yet his father nevertheless desires his welfare and goodness, giving him what is best and most beneficial, so Abraham extended his loving-kindness [in a diverse and variety of ways] to give continuity to the world.

Another clear example of Abraham’s worthiness is exemplified in the grace that was poured forth by Abraham in his unique extension of tolerance toward Lot. We also see how compassionate, calm and serene Isaac, our father, was, when making no demands himself, he was appeased by his adversaries, Abimelech and his entourage, with a minimum of words of placation. He was mollified to a much greater extent than they had requested.

Jacob, our father, got very angry with Laban, for he knew that Laban wanted to kill him, to destroy him completely, and that Laban would have succeeded in killing him, had it not been for God’s intervention. Nevertheless, Jacob spoke gently to Laban and readily formed a peace agreement with him. Thus our sages say, “Better is the patriarchs’ reconciliatory approach of dealing with assertiveness than the humility of later generations.”

There is truly much to be learned from the peaceful manner in which the patriarchs approached life and accepted others, qualities so vitally necessary to sustain the world. This is the principal idea of this book, The Book of Creation. Therefore, it is also called The Book of The Upright because of the many episodes of the patriarchs’ deeds which illustrated their true love of humanity and their astounding tolerance.

What about Balaam? [What was Balaam’s rationale for calling the patriarchs specifically “the upright ones“? And why did he wish that his end would be as “the upright ones“?]

At the moment of his Divine Inspiration, he did not consider to wonder about his low level of piety, which was in contrast to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’s devotion to God. This was natural because Balaam was a prophet of the nations of the world, and since he believed in idols, the essence of his being came from a source of impurity.

But Balaam was upset about his bad conduct toward humankind. Though it was most natural for him, an idolater, to hate The Israelite Nation, because they, The Israelites, were the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and had their source of being in the foundation of sanctity which is diametrically opposed to his source of being, impurity, nevertheless, it was not proper for him to make the demand that an entire nation be uprooted. Such an act of destruction would not have been in accordance with the continued existence of the world and would have been the antithesis to humanitarianism. Concerning his recognition of the Jewish patriarchs’ level of tolerance, Balaam cried out, [I pray,] “Let my soul die the death of the upright and let my end be like his.”

That is to say, Balaam wanted his end to be like that of those who sustain creation and help it remain in existence because they are straight-forward, upright people. The Book of The Upright, The Book of Creation, and The Book of Genesis are one and the same. The founders of Judaism — Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, and Jacob and Rachel and Leah — are examples to all humanity. Their godly views reflect true tolerance for, and a real love of humanity since they desire all of creation to exist.