Sarah's akeida victory...and a look at malachim and free will
ילקוט בראשית - פרק כג - המשך רמז קב (ע' נמי בראשית רבה, פרשה נ"ו, סימן ד)
ויבא אברהם לספוד לשרה כששב אברהם מהר המוריה בשלום חרה אפו של סמאל שראה שלא עלתה בידו תאות לבו לבטל קרבנו של אברהם מה עשה הלך ואמר לשרה לא שמעת מה נעשה בעולם אמרה ליה לאו אמר לה לקח אברהם את יצחק בנך ושחטו והקריבו על עולת מוקדה התחילה בוכה ומיללת שלש בכיות כנגד שלש תקיעות שלש יללות כנגד שלש יבבות ופרחה נשמתה ומתה. ויבא אברהם מהיכן בא מהר המוריה בא:
And Avraham came to eulogize Sarah - When Avraham returned from Mount Moriah in peace Samael was upset as he saw that he was kept from his heart's desire: to prevent Avraham's offering. What did he do? He went and said to Sarah: "Have you not heard what has been going on in the world?" She said to him, "No." He said to her "Avraham took Yitzchak your son and slaughtered him and brought him as a burnt offering." She began to cry and she sobbed three cries relative to the three tekiyos and three sobs relative to the three yevavos and her soul flew up and she died.
Reading this midrash as a literal account of events surrounding the akeida will not only rob it of its true depth, but would actually present serious theological problems. Why, for instance, was Samael (who would seem to be synonymous with Satan) permitted to take personal revenge from Avraham through Sarah's death? And what exactly is Samael? Is he a kind of angel? Does he have free will? Why should he have any personal feelings towards Avraham and Sarah? Why did he want to prevent Avraham's offering?
Not that the only problems with this midrash are theological...
Why is specifically Avraham described as returning in peace? What about Yitzchak? Wasn't his life in greater peril than his father's (after all, wasn't Avraham the one holding the knife)?
What is the significance of Sarah's three cries and three sobs and for what purpose do they so obviously evoke the mitzvos of tekiyos found elsewhere in the Torah?
Why did Sarah's soul "fly up" upon her death - which, if we take matters at their face value, was the result of a misunderstanding?
Although we'll have more on this subject later on, let's say for now that Samael was in fact acting as God's loyal servant. In that context, we will have to assume that it was God's will that Samael should seek to prevent Avraham's offering and similarly that Sarah should be given such difficult (if inaccurate) news.
First, let's examine Avraham's return from Mt. Moriah. Since he was never really in the kind of physical danger that would require a solution that could be characterized as "peace", the midrash is most likely referring to some spiritual problem - the resolution to which is Avraham's sense of "peace" with God. Perhaps, despite having been brought so close to killing his son, the deep love he held for his Master had allowed him to avoid even a trace of resentment. Wouldn't offering a ram in place of Yitzchak demonstrate just that fullness of feeling for God's plan despite how inscrutable it might sometimes seem? Couldn't, therefore, a test of Avraham's complete loyalty be colorfully and powerfully described in terms of a conflict over whether or not to bring the replacement offering?
So that takes care of Avraham's struggle and victory. But what about Sarah? What role did she play in the story of a young man who was, after all, her son too? While it stands to reason that God expected something great from her as well, we don't see it actually discussed in midrashim.
Until now. I believe that this midrash is, in fact, primarily about Sarah and the way she reacted to the akeida.
It's not unreasonable to assume that her first thought on hearing of Yitzchak's "sacrifice" was to wonder how her passionately-held understanding of God's opposition to human sacrifice could possibly fit with what had just occurred. Then, at the height of her shock and numbing loss, Sarah's carefully developed self discipline then took over. "Who was responsible for this?" she might have asked herself. "It must have been Avraham. And I know that he would never have done such a thing without God's explicit instruction, so whatever happened, it was justified. I must therefore conclude that until now, I have been making a mistake: there must indeed be at least some circumstances which justify human sacrifice. If God wants it, than I must humbly follow."
But where do we actually see such a "conversation" in the words of the midrash? There's no end of possible scenarios one could arbitrarily impose onto a midrash, but shouldn't we first give it a chance to speak to us on its own terms?
Which brings us back to the business of shofar blasts. I can't help thinking that walking away from this midrash with the impression that Sarah's sobs literally sounded just like shofar isn't just shallow and meaningless, it's rude. Even if she really did have a bizarre voice, why bother preserving that lonely piece of information for the ages? Such an obvious literary reference to the various Torah mitzvos which employ the teruah call begs us to draw a comparison. But to what end?
The Torah requires the teruah sound on three separate instances: the shofar blowing of Rosh Hashana (Vayikra 23:21), the call for freedom on the fiftieth year of the Yovel cycle (Vayikra 25:10) and, throughout our nation's forty years in the wilderness, when we were to assemble or prepare to break camp and move on (Bamidbar 10:5). What they all share in common is that the sound is to inspire a change in behavior (economic behavior at Yovel, the need to give up our very homes when called to move on in the wilderness and, following a personal accounting, our social and religious behavior at Rosh Hashana - see Rabbi S.R. Hirsch's commentary to Vayikra 23:24).
Here's how I see it: as we saw above, Sarah, based purely on the information she'd been given, concluded that her life-long attitudes towards the sanctity of human life must somehow have been wrong. This would require she reassess everything. How better to express that process than through three tekiyos (which, according to Rabbi Hirsch tell us to break from the rhythms of our daily lives and begin the process of self-analysis). Sarah thought things through and concluded that, no matter how little she actually understood it, if this new idea was really God's will, then she would follow it wherever it might lead. And how better to express that than through three teruos (which, according to Rabbi Hirsch, represent our moving forward along the new moral path that our analysis has shown us).
Then Sarah died. But she didn't drop dead from shock (in which case "her soul flew up" would indeed seem strange), but gracefully and triumphantly ascended to Heaven having completed her earthly mission after passing her final test! Even if It was all based on Samael's dark lie, given what she knew, Sarah reacted exactly as she should.
Samael
Just what do we know about Samael?
The angel Samael, the evil one, is head of all the Satans. At every moment he would discuss Moshe's death, saying: "When will the end or moment of Moshe's death arrive so I may descend and take his soul from him?" And about him David wrote (Tehilim 37) "The evil one gazes at the righteous and seeks to kill him." (We can prove that this verse refers to these two individuals as) among all the Satans there is none more evil than Samael and among all the prophets there is none as righteous as Moshe, as it says "No prophet will ever arise in Israel like Moshe who knows God face to face." (Devarim Rabba, Zos Habracha)
In a similar vein, the gemara (Sotah 10b) recounts the fateful courtroom confrontation between Yehuda and his former daughter-in-law (Beraishis 38:25) in which Tamar courageously sought to protect Yehuda's dignity. Nevertheless, in a desperate final attempt to save her own life, she tried to show him some items of his that fell into her possession:
Rabbi Elazer said: once the identifying items were found, Samael came and pushed them away (from Yehuda). Gavriel came and brought them closer.
For Samael - who is the (heavenly) minister of Edom - came and pushed them away so that she (Tamar) should be burnt (for the adultery she was assumed to have committed), so that the King David, who would defeat Edom at the Melech Valley, would not (be born). (Rashi)
Rambam (More Nevuchim 2:30):
It should be clear to you how Samael is the Satan and this name too is (a description) indicative of the context (i.e, it is a description rather than a proper name).
This characterization of Samael as "the evil one" and of being eager to have Tamar burnt leaves us with a strong sense that he takes his job a bit too seriously and that he might not be an entirely loyal servant of God.
Is such a thing possible?
Acher (the nickname of the troubled sage, Elisha ben Avuya) destroyed saplings (a Talmudic expression hinting that Acher had abandoned Judaism)...What was it (that turned him away from Torah)? He saw that Matatron (a heavenly angel) was given permission to sit and record the Jewish people's merits. (Acher) said: "I have a tradition that there is no sitting...in heaven. Heaven forbid (one might conclude) that there are two powers" (i.e., that Matatron sat in rebellion against God). Sixty flaming staffs came out and hit Matatron..." (Chagiga 15a)
Sixty flaming staffs came out and hit - Heaven forbid that there could be a legal claim against (Matatron - who, it would seem, has no free will). Rather, this was (staged) to show Elisha that there is a Master over (Matatron). (Rabbainu Chananel)
At least as far as Matatron goes, Rabbainu Chananel clearly rejects the possibility of any personal interest, and thus personal liability. Rabbi E.E. Dessler, in Michtav M'Eliyahu (Vol II, page 214) quotes this Rabbainu Chananel but extends his position to include any reference ascribing free will to any angel.
Because the Satan and the nations of the world attack the Jews saying "What are these mitzvos (i.e., those mitzvos that the human mind would not naturally have adopted on its own)?" therefore (the Torah) writes (concerning those mitzvos) "chuka" - as though to say "I consider it a (Royal) decree and you have no permission to second guess it." (Rashi to Bamidbar 19:2)
This Rashi is similar to a Gemara in Yoma 67b, but with one crucial difference: the gemara ascribes the attack only to the Satan, and not the nations (Rashi, as he often does, based his words on a separate midrash that made his point more precisely). According to the Gemara's approach, one could say that the Satan, acting purely as God's agent, is simply "attacking" us to inspire us to rise to the Torah's defense.
However right now it is specifically Rashi's version with which we're concerned. Any criticism that the nations might level against certain mitzvos would most certainly be intrinsically hostile. In other words, they're not doing it to provoke the Jews to teshuva, but for personal reasons of some sort. Since Rashi's version of the account equates Satan's actions with those of the nations, we must assume that the Satan himself is driven by equally personal considerations.
Or, in other words, free will.
Thus, Rashi's position would seem distinct from that of Rabbainu Chananel/Rabbi Dessler. Which brings us to the Rambam, who, as is often the case, appears a bit more complicated.
In his More Nevuchim (2:6), Rambam explains that many natural forces and even physical bodies (like the spheres and planets) are what we would call angels - in that they are used by God to carry out His will. In the next chapter, he writes that these forces and bodies are self-conscious, aware of the purpose and effect of their actions and enjoy free will (see also Yesodai HaTorah 3:9), although of a kind more limited than ours.
However (as he writes in More Nevuchim 3:22), Rambam draws an important distinction between "regular" angels and Satan (here are his words):
ואחר כך הזכיר כי השטן הזה הוא משוטט בארץ ומתהלך בה, ואין בינו לבין העליונים יחס כלל, ואין לו שם שוטטות. הוא אמרו 'משוט בארץ ומהתהלך בה', אין התהלכותו ושוטטותו כי אם בארץ. ואחר כך אמר כי זה הישר התם נמסר ביד השטן הזה, ושכל מה שחל בו מן הפגעים ברכושו ובניו וגופו הייתה סבתו השטן
ומפי' אפודי "ר"ל שאין לשטן כח בענינים רוחניים כי אינם מקבלים הפסד והעדר...אבל (באמת) השטן בלתי מכוון"
Which I believe can be paraphrased thus:
In the process of explaining Job's suffering and struggle to understand it, Rambam notes that the Satan - the one directly responsible for what happened to Job, is described differently than the bnei Elokim (see, for instance, Job 1:6). Examining the text, Rambam seems to conclude that Satan's role (which is synonymous with that of both the angel of death and the evil inclination) exists only in the vacuum created by God choosing to "pull back" from certain lower worldly affairs.
Therefore, according to Rambam, the answer to Job's question ("why is God doing this to me if I don't deserve it?") is that it isn't strictly speaking God doing it at all. While of course God set limits beyond which the Satan may not go (see Job 1:12), He wasn't directly involved in the methods and tone and the Satan is free to choose his own .
So according to Rambam, the Satan may certainly not act in opposition to God Himself, but he is given the free will and precisely defined space to act creatively and forcefully using his own "personality." And thus, it would seem, he can at least appear to be acting on his own agenda.
