Rosh Hashanah 5780

Isaac is mentally challenged.

This is not to make fun of him or try to insult him in any way. Isaac has something about him that makes him different. I don’t like calling anyone “on the spectrum” because if it’s a spectrum we’re all on it, and that phrase is therefore not descriptive at all. Yet the text points to a non-specific mental or social disability that makes him different from everyone else. So much so that when we studied this section of the Torah in our Saturday morning class in my first year here, I had taken to calling him, “Special Needs Isaac.” Something about Isaac does not feel like he is like the other characters in Genesis.

Today we are reading the Akeidah, the story of the binding of Isaac. It is a terrible story of Abraham being asked by God to take his son up to a mountain and sacrifice him. Abraham says yes, and goes up to the spot God shows him with Isaac. The he binds Isaac—giving the name to this section, since Akeidah means binding, and raises the knife to sacrifice him, only to be stopped by an angel who tells him that it was all a test. Abraham did not withhold his son from God, and therefore he will be blessed by becoming as numerous as the stars in the sky and the grains of sand on the beach.

The rabbis of the Talmud and the commentators throughout the centuries have struggled with many parts of this text. One of the things that gets their hackles up is the questions of how old Isaac is at this point. If he is younger than 13 it makes sense that he might be overpowered by his elderly father. But the rabbis do not like that math, and they want him to be older—sometimes as old as in his 30’s. But if he’s older, wouldn’t he fight back and not let his aged father tie him up? Something about it does not fit.

Looking back at Isaac’s life, he is never given a voice before or after the Akeidah. They speak about him a lot, but Isaac does not speak for himself. When God tells Abraham that he and Sarah will have a son, Abraham wonders how a man of a hundred and a woman of ninety could possibly have children together, and he laughs. Sarah has the same reaction later when the angels tell her that she will have a child. They both laugh—va’yitzchak for Abraham and vatitzchak for Sarah. For their laughter, they are told they will name their son Isaac, Yitzchak, which shares its root with the laughter they display. 

Even acknowledging that numbers in the Torah are not math, they laugh because they are an elderly couple. They have spent years living together, building a life together, building a faith together. They have done far too much for them to be young. Abraham’s laughter in Genesis 17 and Sarah’s in Genesis 18 are both about how old they are and how silly an idea it is that they could bear children. Isaac’s own name means laughter, and comes from the reaction these two have. So suffice it to say they are comically old for childbearing.

A study was done in Israel in 2006, looking at 132,000 families. Is showed that men who conceive in their 30s are 1.6 times as likely to have a child with a disability as men under 30. Men in their 40s have a sixfold increase in risk. Since then, 5.7 million families have been studied in Denmark, Sweden, here in California, and elsewhere. Nearly all of this research has shown an increased prevalence of mental disability among the children of older fathers.

Clearly the writers of the Torah were not aware of this study, but perhaps they knew the simple truth that older parents were more likely to produce children with disabilities. The Torah wants us to understand that Isaac is mentally different.

We often understand that for their laughter they beget laughter, but what if the laughter they beget is not a friendly laughter, but one of teasing, making fun, and mocking?

Once Isaac is born, he grows up and is weaned. It happens in one verse in the Torah, Genesis 21:8, which says exactly that: “The boy grew and was weaned.” At the weaning feast, a common custom of the ancient world, Sarah sees Ishmael with Isaac, and he is m’tzachek. The word m’tzachek can mean a few different things. It is surely there at least in part because m’tzachek shares its root with Yitzchak, Isaac’s own name. But it can be playing, making sport of, jesting, or toying with. It could be innocent—two brothers playing—or it could be sinister if Ishmael is picking on Isaac.

What further confuses the scene is that we do not know how old either brother is. We know Ishmael is 13 when he is circumcised, and Isaac is born around a year later. So the boys are probably about 14 years apart in age. But we have no idea how old Isaac was when he was weaned. Evidence suggests that societies at the time stopped nursing their babies between 2 and 5 years of age. So if we assume Isaac was weaned around three years old, and that Ishmael is around 18, perhaps Ishmael is playing a little rough for Sarah’s liking. We have likely seen much older siblings or cousins who play a little rough for the comfort of a new mother. It happens.

Or maybe Ishmael m’tzachek with Isaac is a kind of teasing that we would never tolerate today. Perhaps he is making fun of Isaac’s disability. || Until very recently, that was the way people with disabilities were treated—with teasing and a complete lack of understanding and compassion. It also explains why Sarah was infuriated enough to demand that Ishmael and his mother leave their home. She was defending her son, who would not have have been able to defend himself.

Abraham may not have shared her sentimentality over Isaac’s issues. Today’s reading of the Akeidah suggests that Isaac may also have needed defending from his own father. The Akeidah begins with a charge. God says to Abraham, “Take your son, your special son, the one you love, Isaac.” 

The midrash Bereshit Rabbah imagines a conversation between God and Abraham.

God says, “Take your son.”

Abraham responds, “I have two sons. Which one?”

“Your special son.”

“Both sons are special. They are unique in their own way.”

“The one you love.”

“I love both of my sons.”

“Isaac.”

No question when God uses his name. The conversation the midrash creates suggests that Abraham has love for Ishmael as well as Isaac, which is wonderful. It also might miss something. Perhaps Abraham needed to be convinced that he also loves Isaac. 

Imagine the conversation without Abraham’s interjections. Internally, Abraham might be think that God is finally accepting Ishmael as Abraham’s heir. At least until the last word. Take your son, your special son, the one you love, Isaac.

Perhaps at that moment Abraham thinks, “Isaac? I love that kid? But he’s so....different.” Men can have a hard time accepting a son who is different, so for God to tell him, “Abraham, I know you love your son, perhaps more than you realize, and it is time to accept him,” can be a very powerful moment. 

Years after the Akeidah, several chapters after today’s reading, Abraham tells his servant to get a wife for Isaac. He sends him on a journey where he meets Rebekah and invites her to his master Abraham’s home. She agrees, and goes to meet her husband to be, who is sitting alone in a field.

What is interesting is that Isaac needs someone else to get a wife for him. Abraham does not need an intermediary to marry Sarah. Jacob finds Rachel on his own, and though he is tricked into marrying Leah, he agrees to have children with her. Every other biblical character finds their own spouse. Only Isaac has an intermediary sent for him. Perhaps this is due to his lack of mental prowess for negotiating a bride price, or perhaps simply just his lack of ability to have a conversation with another person.

When Rebekah first sees him and he is sitting alone in that field, the rabbis of the Talmud credit Isaac with davening Ma’ariv, reciting the evening prayers, but this anachronistic commentary ignores the likelihood that this is just where he either preferred or was forced to spend his time. Many people with autism, for example, simply like to be away from other people. They find socializing difficult, and do not adhere to social norms. In ancient times, adults with mental challenges were often pushed to the side, told to go away if they could not handle being with the others. Whatever challenges Isaac had, being alone in the field makes sense for him as a character. He was likely out there a lot.

Looking at Isaac as mentally challenged, we might understand Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son, even when we do not agree with it. He was a man of the ancient world—powerful, wealthy, a leader in his community, successful in every way except one. Then he conceives a son with disabilities. Isaac could be a constant source of disappointment for Abraham. Though we no longer share Abraham’s feelings of shame over a son like that, we can acknowledge it likely existed in the ancient world for having a son viewed as less-than. A son who, at the time, did nothing but give people something to laugh at.

So in the Torah portion we read this morning, when Abraham is told by God, “Take your son up the mountain,” Abraham’s speedy acquiescence makes sense. But it still does not make it right.

So often we look at this pivotal moment in our Torah and we point out the fact that Isaac and Abraham never speak to each other again. What we neglect to mention is that they have never spoken to each other before this part of the story, either. Their relationship has always been strained, they have never been close. They just go through the motions. Maybe it gets worse after the Akeidah, but it is not a complete sea change.

Recognizing Isaac as mentally challenged, we may learn how we should behave when we have special needs people in our lives, our community, our family. Not like Abraham. He was the denying, angry father. Disappointed and feeling inadequate about the son he and his beloved Sarah produced, he goes through the motions of circumcising him, finding him a wife, setting him up with property and a good life. Sarah dies shortly after the Akeidah and does not even see him married, but even in his early life she was perhaps over protective of him. She shuns anyone who would treat him different, kicking Ishmael and his mother out of their home. Really, neither of these is an acceptable way of treating someone who is different from us.

The rabbis in tractate Berachot of the Talmud actually do teach us how to deal with them. They put Isaac in our prayers every day, three times a day. They credit him with inventing the evening service because of his practice of sitting alone in the field at the end of the day. They say his name along side his father Abraham and son Jacob. We talk about the generations that begin with seven amazing people, the avot and imahot, and we have never swayed from putting Isaac’s name right at the top.

They even point out things that could be seen as indicative of his mental difficulies and laud them as successes. They are excited that he is the only patriarch to have only one wife. They extoll him as the only patriarch to never set foot outside of the land of Canaan. We could easily point to these things as being related to his mental disabilities. Someone without strong social skills would naturally not venture away from their familiar surroundings, nor would they seek more companions when they prefer to be alone. Instead of blaming his condition as the reason he never strives for more, the rabbis compliment him, saying it is his strength of character that grants him the blessing of faithfulness to the land and to Rebekah.

Trying to learn from our longstanding acknowledgment of the blessing all people bring, I worked with a few different B’nai Mitzvah with challenges over the years. In Miami one boy held the Torah and recited Shema. As a severely Autistic young man, that was the most he could do, and it was a beautiful moment. Another Bar Mitzvah we worked with was very musical, and he actually made up the cantillation on the spot, even though he had practiced flawlessly. When he wasn’t singing, it took all of our focus to keep him on the bimah, as his tendency was also to wander off when he fancied.

Here at CBT I have worked with several students of different abilities, too. Hopefully nobody would even notice. Part of instituting our B’nai Mitzvah Revolution is allowing students who do not thrive in an academic arena can still show us what their strengths are. Not everyone can read Hebrew or even English out loud. Not everyone can deliver a D’var Torah. Yet everyone can be celebrated. Everyone can show us their Jewish passions and accomplishments. Everyone can become B’nai Mitzvah in their own style.

This is our responsibility as a community, as a people. When someone is different from us, we do not chastise them, bully them, or tease them for their differences. At the same time, we do not coddle them or keep others away from them because they are different. We learn to work with them. We support them. We learn from them. We take what we would see as a weakness, as less-than, and treat it as normal. Or better, we treat it as a blessing. We support and help strengthen the skills and abilities they do have, and give them the tools they need to be a success in our community.

May we look deep into our ancient texts and learn from the examples of our ancestors. May we continue to reach out to those who are different. May we truly live up to our reputation as a welcoming community by openly welcoming people of all abilities. May find the opportunity to let people with special needs know that they are just that: Special to us and to our community.