{"id":36671,"date":"2018-08-02T00:25:36","date_gmt":"2018-08-01T21:25:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=36671"},"modified":"2022-02-22T17:23:14","modified_gmt":"2022-02-22T15:23:14","slug":"abraham-believer-or-skeptic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/abraham-believer-or-skeptic\/","title":{"rendered":"Abraham: Believer or Skeptic?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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“How Shall I Know that I am to Possess It?”<\/span><\/p>\n

When the Lord promised Abraham that his children would multiply like the stars of the heavens, Abraham\u2019s response was to: “put his trust in the Lord” (Genesis 15: 6).<\/span><\/p>\n

When the Lord promised Abraham the inheritance of the Land of Israel, Abraham asked: \u201cO Lord GOD, how shall I know that I am to inherit \u00a0it?” (15: 8).<\/span><\/p>\n

The first reaction is the reaction of a believer. The second reaction is that of a skeptic. Our sages determined, however, that although Abraham\u2019s doubts stemmed from worthy and pure motives, not from lack of trust in God, but out of fear that his children would not be worthy of the promise, doubt is, nevertheless, a defect in faith.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are those who say that the \u201cCovenant Between the Pieces\u201d (the name typically given for the covenant described in verses 7-21) comes as a result of Abraham\u2019s doubts. The covenant is the Divine commitment to fulfill the promise. \u00a0However, it also included a decree, the price of casting doubt: “your offspring shall be strangers in a land not their own, and they shall be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years” (15:13).<\/span><\/p>\n

The flaw in his faith that he and his children will inherit the Land was engraved in the consciousness of the people of Israel from the moment the promise was given, and the punishment of this flaw was decreed for generations in \u201cCovenant Between the Pieces.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Forty years of wandering in the desert were decreed against the generation of those who came out of Egypt because the spies lacked faith, and cast a curse on the entire nation. This was also the case in the days of the return to Zion after the destruction of the First Temple and subsequent exile, as well as in the modern era of Zionism. Until the decrees that “oppressed them” (verse 13) forced those sent into exile to flee from the places in which they had found refuge, the Jewish masses did not believe the vision of a reborn Land of Israel and were not in a hurry to make aliyah.<\/span><\/p>\n

What is the price that will be paid for doubt and the uncertainty in the fulfillment of the age-old divine promise that Abraham\u2019s sons will inherit the Land of Israel? Or, how will we finally correct this flaw, and instead of asking “how shall I know” (Genesis 15:8), we will respond to the promise that we will inherit the Land of Israel with the words \u201che put his trust in the Lord” (Genesis 15: 6).<\/span><\/p>\n

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