by Rabbi Avi Billet
At a time in his life when Avraham perhaps should have faded into the sunset, after the death and burial of his wife Sarah, he does two things that the Torah notes. The first is take responsibility for finding a wife for Yitzchak – which he does through the agency of his unnamed servant (who just about everyone identifies as Eliezer (based on 15:2). The second, after Yitzchak’s marriage, is to take Keturah as a wife.
Last week, I shared the opinion of Seforno that the sons of Keturah might not have actually been Avraham’s sons, but were her children that he helped raise. All this, over 40 years after the birth of Yitzchak, his own ben zekunim (son of his old age), should be a marvel either way, whether he fathered them AND raised them or even if Keturah brought them into the marriage and he had a hand in raising them.
With the exception of Midian, there isn’t a clear history in the Bible of any of Avraham’s descendants (Yishmael or the other sons of Keturah) having enmity against the Bnei Yisrael. It could very well be that Avraham taught them well the value of family (Yishmaelim bring Yosef down to Egypt, though that is a complicated story. Otherwise Yishmaelim are referenced in Tehillim 83 as a group who God had destroyed, though no context is given as to when that happened).
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote an essay “On Judaism and Islam” [https://www.rabbisacks.org/covenant-conversation/chayei-sarah/on-judaism-and-islam/] in which he derives a message of hope for the future with truly-peace-loving practitioners of Islam, based on the premise that Yishmael is the ancestor of Arabs and therefore of Islam.
More than looking at the children of Avraham, whether natural or adopted, let us focus on the first component of Avraham’s last hurrah in the Torah, his marriage.
Chazal have pointed out that Keturah was a new name for the woman who had previously been Avraham’s wife (or concubine, however one prefers to view their relationship), namely Hagar. She is called Keturah, which is related to the word Ketoret (the special spice blend of the Mikdash) because her deeds in this marriage were similar to the Ketoret, in that they uplifted and were pleasant.
Her name is reminiscent of the verse in Moshe’s blessing to the Tribe of Levi before his death (Devarim 33:10), "They shall teach Your ordinances to Jacob, and Your Torah to Israel; they shall place incense before You, and burnt offerings upon Your altar - יוֹר֤וּ מִשְׁפָּטֶ֨יךָ֙ לְיַֽעֲקֹ֔ב וְתוֹרָֽתְךָ֖ לְיִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל יָשִׂ֤ימוּ קְטוֹרָה֙ בְּאַפֶּ֔ךָ וְכָלִ֖יל עַל־מִזְבְּחֶֽךָ," a phrase which is followed by “May the Lord bless his army and favorably accept the work of his hands” - בָּרֵ֤ךְ ה֙' חֵיל֔וֹ וּפֹ֥עַל יָדָ֖יו תִּרְצֶ֑ה
Our Sages explain that when Hagar/Keturah was reintroduced to Avraham’s home, she who had been an outcast, despondent, destitute, felt the plight of the wayfarers who passed through Avraham’s tent, and she had a complete turnaround in her own life, focusing now on being a baalas chesed.
Avraham is the first person that the Torah mentions as having become widowed, who later married again. While we don’t know enough about his personality and his personal life, nor what triggered his remarriage, I think it is safe to make a few assumptions:
• He mourned his wife, and wasn’t interested in marrying again until after Yitzchak was settled
• After seeing Yitzchak’s ability to love his new wife, Avraham considered that he too had more love to give
• He did not simply want to enjoy his retirement, but he wanted to continue to feel relevant and important, and knew that taking on new responsibilities was good for him
• It is possible that he did not want to be alone
The Torah tells us in the context of Adam in the Garden of Eden that God said לא טוב היות האדם לבדו. It is not good for the human to be alone. Since in that space the only human was Adam, some render it to mean “it is not good for man to be alone.”
This is one reason why community is such a valuable commodity. The fact is that there are some people who are alone, and having neighbors, friends, people who check in, or simply the ability to come to shul or to a local gathering place is “good.”
Sometimes tragedy (widowhood) or circumstance (divorce) puts people in a position of being alone, and the verse also references that such a situation can be defined as לא טוב. This is not to say that people are unable or incapable of making the best of their circumstances. Some people manage well alone. Some people have a hard time of it. Some people put on a good face in public. Some people are open about their struggles. Some people never want to marry again. Some people desperately want to marry again. Some people entertain the possibility that marriage may happen again for them. [The truth is that some people who are in a bad marriage may also feel alone – this too is לא טוב.]
The hope for everyone is that what the Torah defines as לא טוב can somehow be overcome through a person not feeling alone. Sometimes community creates such possibilities through activities, through regular shul-going, through getting involved to whatever degree possible, and through staying “on the map” of visibility.
Yes, it is also on others to make whatever gestures of invitation and openness and helpfulness to do our part to see to it that those who are alone are not alone. And hopefully, no matter what circumstance one finds oneself in, one does not feel alone.
What Avraham demonstrated was what worked for him. He waited 3 years after the death of Sarah to put his house in order, to make sure Yitzchak was settled with a wife, before looking out for Avraham’s own loneliness to be addressed.
And if indeed Hagar was Keturah, her loneliness being filled by Avraham gave her the opportunity to take upon herself the ways of his household and transform herself into a model baalas chesed.
I just finished re-reading “All For the Boss,” a wonderful book of Yaakov Yosef Herman, an influential balabus in the Lower East Side in the early 1900s (he and his wife moved to Palestine in 1939) who, like Avraham and Sarah, “cornered the market” on Hachnasas Orchim. His wife, his partner in hosting and feeding myriads of guests through their years in NYC and in Jerusalem, passed away around 9 years after they arrived in the Holy Land, shortly after the establishment of the State of Israel. He learned to cook, and continued to host in the manner he had before. And a few years later he married again, and his new wife stepped into the role of hostess for their many orchim, rising to the occasion herself based on her new reality of not being alone, and finding a situation that became very טוב.
While many in the Torah had passed at much riper old ages than Avraham, he is the first to be described as dying בְּשֵׂיבָ֥ה טוֹבָ֖ה זָקֵ֣ן וְשָׂבֵ֑עַ, at a good old age, old and satisfied, and maybe the word “good” is included there, because he chose to not fall prey to the circumstance of life being לא טוב and he made the effort to find the טוב he needed in his life, such that it was most noteworthy at the time of his death.
May those who are alone be blessed to find טוב in friends, in family, in community, and if and when the opportunity arises, in and with a new spouse.
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