Pieces In Perspective

Chayei Sarah: A life well lived, the view from above

"It's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years". A tired social media cliche often misattributed to Abraham Lincoln. But if there was anyone who lived up to that axiom, then it was Sarah. What is the secret of a wholesome and deeply meaningful life? What does it mean to have lived?

The commentators pick up on the unusual manner in which the Torah records Sarah's death:

'And the life of Sarah was one hundred years and twenty years and seven years; [these were] the years of the life of Sarah.'

In addressing the repetition of 'the life of Sarah', Rashi explains that we are being taught that 'all of [Sarah's years] were equally good'. Hers was the ultimate fulfilled time in this world. Our Midrash further addresses Sarah’s achievement with a verse from Tehillim: 'God knows the years of the complete (Tamim)’. And adds, 'Just as they are complete, so are their years complete.'

The Maharal of Prague envisions the word Tamim 'complete' as representing an attribute of total consistency. An existence that 'lasts forever'. A fitting parable is the phenomenon of refined metal or precious stones that can withstand the tests of time.

Whilst Sarah's story is undoubtedly awe-inspiring, an initial reading makes drawing personal resonance a challenging task. All of us experience ups and downs. The possibility of a life unencumbered by religious inconsistency does not resonate with most of our lived experiences. Like the visor in Rebbe Nachman's allegorical tale of 'The Lost Princess', we find ourselves aimlessly wandering in the spiritual desert. One's soul meanders aimlessly for what can last for years. In this era of shifting zeitgeists and transformative ideas, the person I was ten years ago fails to form part of a neat trajectory in line with the person I am today. A linear growth narrative appears mythic and elusive. An oddity encountered only in fairy tales or retroactive biographical projections.

Rav Yosher Ber Soloveitchik establishes a vision of Sarah that offers a meaningful application of her achievements to our lives. He does so by reading the last words of our Parsha's first verse as 'the lives of Sarah' in the plural form. "In the realm of the unfolding spirit, it is possible to see youth and old age [...] as simultaneous experiences." Genuinely great people, Rav Yosher Ber maintains, are often also "great children"; they "are rich and multi-talented" due to their fusion of all age's strengths. Thus, "the idealism of youth quite often shines through the eyes of a grey beard". Sarah, then, was a woman both advanced in years yet vibrant in youth. She successfully retained the positive qualities found at every stage of life.

This perspective can help us understand a Midrash that praises Sarah as a perfect calf or 'Eglah Temima'. Whereas the noticeable comparison here is to an unblemished sacrificial offering, there is a more subtle reading. The Hebrew expression for a calf, 'Eglah', shares an etymological root with the word for a circle, 'Egel'. Somehow, the Midrash envisions Sarah's life as a flawless cyclical event. But what does this tell us?

In the laws of besieging a city, God forbade the Children of Israel from cutting down a fruit tree. In the words of the verse in Devarim:

Is the Tree of the field a man ('Ki Adam Eitz Hasadeh') to go into the siege before you? {Devarim 20:19}

The mystical commentaries switch the pivotal four words from a question into a statement: 'man is a tree of the field'. The Tree now symbolises our human condition. How so? A tree trunk is an outward expression of multiple concentric inner circles; the multitude of rings, varied in shade and girth, express the vicissitudes of its journey. Some tell of triumphs, whilst others tell of tribulations. But ultimately, each has been built off the other to form a magnificent totality:

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Just as the external trunk points to years of manifold experiences, Sarah's spiritual perimeter incorporated the entirety of her existence.

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This explanation suggests that Sarah's perfection was an integrated persona rather than a linear journey. Still, our newfound insight needs accompanying instruction to help us achieve a comparable sense of wholeness. 

Thankfully, help is at hand. We observed how the Midrash portrayed the life of Sarah through the prism of the verse, 'God knows the years of the complete'. In biblical terminology, knowledge or 'Yediyah' always implies the existence of a connection - as in the marital union of the first human couple with Adam depicted as 'knowing' Chava. But 'Yediyah' also indicates the ability to affect or impact what is known. That is why a child who definitionally lacks 'daas' is precluded by his nature from making halachic decisions such as marriage or financial transactions. But what does it actually mean for God to 'know' and affect one's years?

During the daily prayer of 'Baruch She'amar,' we acclaim God as 'Oseh Maseh Bereishis', literally 'the one who makes the first act of creation'. An expression explained by the Vilna Gaon as referring to God's creative jurisdiction over time. Because humans experience time as linear, we do not see it as a unified entity. Our hopelessly narrow and myopic perspective is limited to a singular point on the graph of our life. Even without considering metaphysics, the theory of 'block time' suggests that all that has ever been, or will be, is co-occurring. Everything we encounter, and thus the way we understand ourselves, is founded on a meagrely thin slice of reality.

Nevertheless, one way of conducting life in tune with our soul's panoramic essence is by connecting to God. If we, so to speak, allow Him to 'know' our years, we can elevate our lives onto the plane of an interconnected whole. By achieving this union with God, we start to engage with our ups and downs as part of a grander picture.

For this reason, Jewish law adjudicates the obscure and the mundane – down to the minutiae of our daily lives. Our dedication to this sublime mode of living invests divine infinitude within even the darkest and dullest periods which would otherwise feel bereft of meaning. "Ritual is the poetry of deed, the choreography of faith," wrote Rabbi Sacks. Like the poet who creatively weaves connections into seemingly disconnected words, we can allow God to uncover the underlying grandeur of our lives. Then, and only then, will we have lived. And our lives will have counted far beyond the frontiers of human estimation. 

Good Shabbos, and Keep Wondering