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TORAH

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Shabbat Lech Lecha:
Genesis 12:1-17:27;
Isaiah 40:27-41:16.

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24

got to know us and experi-
arrive this
ence the rich diversity of
week at
our culture and the bless-
"our" story in the
ing of freedom and liberty
Torah. For 11 chap-
— that they-would be our
ters, we've read the
friends.
increasingly disap-
What Torah tells us is
pointing story of
"that Abram sets off
Rabbi
"humanity" — and
because he believes in the
Joseph Klein
for 11 chapters, we've Special to the promise. He does not know
watched humanity
Jewish News where he is going, how
long it will take to get there
grow further and fur-
ther away from God, until finally, or what he will find when he
here in Chapter 12, we come to
does get there. It wasn't what he
this man Avram (Abram) who is believed that made him the
chosen to save us.
father of this chosen people; it
And the Lord had said to
was what he and they did.
Nothing has changed since
Abram, "Lech Lecha," "Get your-
self going out from your country Abram became Abraham. We
and from your family and from
make our mark on the world
your father's house to a land that around us because of what we
I will show you."
do: how we conduct ourselves in
It is a rather dramatic opening the world and how we manage
statement of this story that leads our relationships with other peo-
ple.
directly — to us! God identifies
What we know is that we are a
Abram by commanding him to
leave kin and country to go to an caring and compassionate people;
we believe that we are command-
unknown land, to father a new
nation.
ed to conduct ourselves rightly in
The traditional Midrash chal-
this world. We believe that we are
lenges itself by asking: 'Why was
in covenant with God, the source
of all creation, the fountainhead of
Abram the one chosen by God?'
all goodness. We know and we
Torah tells us nothing of how
believe that there are rules of right
Abram (for his part) came to
conduct and proper behavior, rules
know that "God" is the true God,
which define our covenant with
or why (on God's. part) Abram
was the proper person for God to God and through which we
choose. We don't know what
express that covenant with both
God and our people Israel. Instead
Abram believed before or after
God's command; what we know
of becoming anxious about not
only is that Abram gathered him- knowing what to believe as the
self, his wife and nephew and
world changes around us, we
acted — leaving the familiar for
ought to look within for what
the promise of a better future. As we've always known to be true. 0
Abram must have struggled to
Joseph Klein is rabbi of Temple
determine what is true or what
Emanu-El in Oak Park.
to believe, so we in our day also
struggle.
Conversations
The world has changed for all
In
what ways does Abram's leav-
of us, and so much of what we
ing
Harm parallel the emigra-
believed to be true no longer is.
tion
of our grandparents from
We believed that we were safe
Eastern
Europe? Whenever the
from terrorism in America. We
direction
of our lives makes a
believed that if people came to
radical
change,
from where
America (or any Western, demo-
does
our
courage
come?
cratic country) and lived here,

e finally

November 10 2005

in?