Parshas Lech Lecha

Bs”s

Parshas Lech Lecha 5777
by Mordechai Dolinsky

There is a tremendous and awesome, inspiring aspect of the parsha; Vayomer…el Avram lech lecha. Who is this Avram; what is special about him that he is worthy of the greatest gift and experience a human can experience–Vayomer Hashem el Avram. Not a single hint to any trait of something special. There are some nice things to say, like he was actually thrown into a burning furnace for the sake of Kiddush Hashem–but in the Chumash nothing. In a way he was the most important human in history. He made Klal Yisroel, the realization of the bearers of the Will of Hashem; Moshe Rabeinue, Maamad Har Sinai, is all an outcome. Hashem chose Avraham from a house of idol worshippers; a pure and honest heart. Lot, from this most glorious, inspirational house…what greatness he could have reached.

Rashi explains at the end of Parshas Noach that the pasuk gives an inaccurate impression that the father of Avraham passed on before he departed for Eretz Yisroel so that peopel should not think that Avraham was callous towards his father. What an important lesson–how much we must always be sensitive to project a Kiddush Hashem.

Have a wonderful Shabbos.