Four Points on Vayera

1. Definitely some room for comparing the Sodomites at Lot's door with the story of Migdal Bavel. All the city's men - a unified group - gather to do something bad. Though, by merit of their numbers and unity, they would be able to succeed, a Divine force intervenes by removing a basic human skill.

Also, once again, cities/organized human communities get a bad rap in the Bible.

Essential to this is the mob's line to Lot, הָאֶחָד בָּא-לָגוּר וַיִּשְׁפֹּט שָׁפוֹט "this one comes to sojourn here a while, and he thinks he can play the judge" . . . . something is going on here, as in Babel, that regards questions of authority and community.


2. Every time I read the parsha anew, I'm surprised by the צחק wordplay. Yeah - I expect it in the Sarah and Avraham stories, and its always interesting that they name their son with it . . . but then I'm totally *shocked* to see it appear again in the Sodom episode. Lot tries to warn his sons-in-law about the approaching destruction, but he is in their eyes כִמְצַחֵק, as a jester.

What's the deal!!!

3. Check out my dvar torah on Akeidat Yishmael, at The Drisha Parsha Blog

4. Finally, finally, finally!: I think I know why God scolded Sarah for laughing: He didn't - God scolded Avraham.

In 17:15-17 God tells Avraham that he'll have a child in his old age. Avraham, as we know, laughs in amazement. And, as we know, no immediate negative reaction from God to this laughter. Laughing is a legit reaction to hearing something fantastical for the first time.

Now, let's say you're Avraham and you bear the righteous faith that what God said is actually going to happen. What sort of things do you do? Well, you probably tell Sarah that she's destined have more kids. You probably tell her that you'd like to try to conceive a child together. You would certainly sleep with Sarah or perhaps sleep with her more often than you previously did. But either way, Sarah would understand that a child is a distinct possibility!

So when a few months later, a few fellows come in and say that Sarah will soon be with child, the fact that Sarah laughs is damning - it means this is the first time she heard of the promise! Avraham hasn't been doing any of the aforementioned things! Hasn't told her himself, or slept with her, or said, "hey, let's try to have a child."

It should not surprise us if God would ask Avraham something like - "What the heck, Avraham?! Why is she laughing?! How could you not believe in my promise to you?!". In fact, this is exactly what God does in 18:13-14

וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה, אֶל-אַבְרָהָם: לָמָּה זֶּה צָחֲקָה שָׂרָה לֵאמֹר, הַאַף אֻמְנָם אֵלֵד--וַאֲנִי זָקַנְתִּי . . . הֲיִפָּלֵא מֵיְהוָה, דָּבָר.

And God said to Avraham, "Why is Sarah laughing? Why is she saying 'Oh, is it really possible I'll give birth so old!!'" You really think anything is too hard for Me to do?!

Note, the "rebuke" is handed out to Avraham - not to Sarah - for it is Sarah's laughter which shows Avraham has not trusted in God's promise.

Economic Mass E-mail

You may or may not have received the following mass e-mail, just in time for the upcoming elections. It *sounds* like an interesting critique, but something is just straight wrong about it. Can you solve its hidden riddle?:

HOW A STIMULUS PACKAGE WORKS.

It is a hot day in the small Kansas town of Pumphandle and streets are deserted. Times are tough, everybody is in debt, and living on credit.

A salesman drives into town, stops at the only motel, and lays a $100 bill on the desk to pay for a one night's stay... on the condition that the room is decent. He's handed a key so he can check it out.

As soon as the salesman heads upstairs, the motel owner grabs the hundred bucks and runs next door to pay his debt to the butcher.

The butcher takes the $100 and hustles down the street to pay off what he owes to the pig farmer.

The pig farmer takes the $100 and heads off to settle his bill with the Co-op.

The guy at the Co-op takes the $100 and runs to pay what he owes to the local hooker, who's had to offer her "services" on credit.

The hooker dashes to the motel and pays off her room rentals.

The motel owner puts the $100 back on the counter.

The salesman comes back down and states that the room is unsatisfactory. He takes his $100 bill and leaves.

No one produced anything. No one earned anything... However, the whole town is now out of debt and looks to the future with unbridled optimism.

And that, dear friends, is how a "stimulus package" works.

Here's why this critique ain't a good one:

Let's say there are just two people in a town - say, a motel owner and a hooker. Let's suppose that at one point the motel owner borrowed 100 bucks from the hooker, and that at another point the hooker borrowed 100 bucks from the motel owner. Does either party owe either party? Of course not! They're even!

The example in the email was the exact same, but instead of 2 parties, there were 5. A owes B, B owes C, C owes D, D owes E, and E owes A. In other words, nobody owes anybody. Before the salesman came nobody owed anybody, while the salesman was in town nobody owed anybody, and after he left nobody owed anybody.

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Anyhoo, it seems to me that Sciences are granted by the public a sort of Obedience to Mystery. I, Ben the Non-Mathematician, may not understand the upper levels of crazy Mathland, but I'm willing to submit to it, willing to understand that there *are* mathematicians who have been trained in the technical language of their art and do indeed make substantive progress. There's a conception of initiates and non-initiates, and a tangible (if not fragile) trust by the non-initiates towards those who work in the field.

Economics, it seems, has failed to garner such respect. The main cause, I believe, is because economics deals with something everyone has and considers themselves expert of - money. We use it and we know it and we treat ourselves as semi-initiates, expecting common sense to guide us to truth and treating technical economic language with mistrust and disgust.

In the public eye, the most celebrated economist in the world will never be able to stand up to the Warren Buffet and Bill Gates - "hey, they are the ones who are actually making the economy work." No biologist ever felt threatened by a particularly prolific rabbit - "hey man, you study life, but this rabbit here has reproduced life like a 1000 times"; nor do authors feel threatened by men who lead dramatic lives - "hey man, you write interesting stories, but I met a guy who once had a really interesting life"; but economists, due to nature of our interests (money, utility, labor, etc.) are always assumed to be speaking overly fancy things about that which everyone and anyone already "knows".