Keturah

November 13, 2009
Rabbi Seymour Rossel

     This week's portion is called Chayei Sarah, literally, "The Life of Sarah," but it includes very little about Sarah herself. It tells of her death. It tells of the death of Abraham. And it relates stories about how Abraham prepared for the future of the Hebrews. Sarah was 127 years old at the time of her death, so we calculate that she died three years before Isaac was married. And this is confirmed by the simple statement in Scripture that, in taking Rebecca as his wife, Isaac "found comfort after his mother's death" (Gen. 24:67).

     Finding this wife for Isaac was one of the tasks that Abraham set for himself at the end of his life. Another was the purchase of a piece of land in Hebron that would serve as a family sepulcher. This was the field and cave called Machpeilah in which, eventually, all of the patriarchs and matriarchs except Rachel would be buried. Abraham insisted on paying full price for this property and insisted on buying it in perpetuity, as an eternal possession. So Machpeilah became a symbol for the Jewish people of Abraham's faith in the God's promise that the land of Canaan would one day belong to the Children of Abraham forever.

     At the very end of the portion, Abraham's life is summarized in one of the elaborate genealogical lists of the Torah, this one describing the family tree of Abraham. Before this family tree, we were aware of Abraham's child by Sarah's Egyptian maid, Hagar. This was Ishmael. The arrangement between Sarah and Hagar was originally supposed to be something like a modern surrogate motherhood. Hagar's status was raised from handmaiden to second wife, and the child when born was placed on Sarah's knees to symbolize that it was ritually the child of the first wife. But neither Hagar nor Sarah was ever comfortable with the results. Hagar once ran away and later was chased out of the household by Sarah who now had a child of her own and wanted to remove any threat that Ishmael might pose to her beloved Isaac.

     Abraham remained aloof from the conflict between his two wives. God promised that both Isaac and Ishmael would be the father of many nations. As with the command to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham did not question God. But, surely, as many commentators, men and women alike, point out, Abraham's taking Isaac away from Sarah to sacrifice him on the mountain must have hastened Sarah's death. And there is no evidence that Abraham returned to Sarah's tent before she died.

     Now, in the family tree at the end of the portion, we learn that Abraham had a third wife whose name was Keturah. And Keturah gave Abraham six sons. A few commentators and some of the ancient rabbis conjectured that Keturah was just another name for Hagar. But this does not easily fit the facts. If Hagar had given seven sons to Abraham, surely the Torah would have listed it this way in the family tree. Instead, there is a separate listing for the children of Ishmael and that listing follows the list of the six sons of Keturah and their children. It is highly unlikely that the mysterious Keturah came along at the very end of Abraham's life and suddenly presented him with six children. This family tree seems to summarize the children and grandchildren of Keturah who were already in existence when Abraham himself died at the age of 175. And we know from previous stories that Abraham was amazed at God's promise of Isaac because he believed he was too old to father a child at that time.

     What Scripture is telling us is that, all along, while the well-known strife between Sarah and Hagar over the futures of Ishmael and Isaac was taking place, Abraham was occupied with raising six other sons that belonged to his second concubine, or his other wife, Keturah. Now, at the very end of his life, all God's promises come true within a few verses.

     God promised that Abraham would be "exceedingly numerous," "the father of a multitude of nations," "exceedingly fertile"; the family lists show how this all came to pass. God told Abraham, "You shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a ripe old age." The family list says just that: Abraham died "at a good ripe age, old and contented" and "he was gathered to his kin."

     God had also promised that Isaac alone was to be Abraham's true heir. The family list states that Isaac is the sole beneficiary of his father's estate and Abraham gives gifts to all the sons of Keturah while he is still living and sends each of them away from Isaac.

     God also promised Hagar that her offspring would "greatly increase" and her son Ishmael would be made "fertile and exceedingly numerous," "the father of twelve chieftains," "a great nation." In this family list, the twelve chieftains of the Ishmaelite clans are listed by name.

     There is some history to be learned from the sons of Keturah and the names of the Ishmaelites. The name Keturah comes from ketoret, the word for "spices," and the names of her children and grandchildren are known from other ancient sources as the names of clans and tribes and places that stretched from Northern Arabia up to the Euphrates river in Mesopotamia. These clans and places along with the Ishmaelite confederation formed the backbone of the major trade of the ancient Near East, the spice trade. These clans and tribes would later be given the name Arab, but that title was unknown for some hundreds of years to come, so we can see that the list itself, which includes the confederation of clans called Midianites, is quite antique and probably dates back to around the time of Abraham, just as it appears in the Torah.

     If there is any lesson here it is that people are always a lot more complex than we give them credit for. Who would have imagined that the few stories we have of Abraham, Sarah, and Hagar were just the surface of a life that had more "spice" in it on an everyday basis? Abraham is not just the simple chieftain of a bunch of Hebrews with one Hebrew son and one Ishmaelite son, he is the father of a multitude of nations. Scripture is saying that we are related through Abraham to all the nations of the ancient Near East, all the wandering tribes, all the merchants who carried the spice trade up and down the Fertile Crescent, moving frankincense, myrrh, salt, and many other aromatic resins and gums. This is the closing message of the life of Abraham and one worthy for us to remember. Our life as a nation is always enclosed in and surrounded by and dependent on the life of all the nations around us. And let us say: Amen.