In this week’s Parsha, the Torah tells us, “Vayavo Avraham lispod l’Sarah v’livkosa—And Avraham came to eulogize Sarah and to weep for her.” Immediately, we notice something unusual: in the word “V’livkosa—To cry,” the letter chaf is written small. Chazal explain that this hints to the fact that Avraham cried less than he normally would have. But why? What could have restrained his grief at such a moment?
Picture the scene. Avraham returns home after the Akeidah. Surely he wanted to share the extraordinary news with Sarah that Hashem promised a future, descendants, a nation of holiness. But instead he finds that Sarah has passed away. He asks what happened, and he is told that she heard Yitzchak was being sacrificed, and before hearing that he lived, her soul departed.
At that moment, Avraham realizes the danger. This is the Satan’s final attempt. If he can provoke even a subtle feeling of regret in Avraham—“Had I not gone... had I not done this...” —he could diminish the merit of the Akeidah. Therefore, Avraham guards his heart. He restrains his weeping not out of coldness, but out of measured wisdom to ensure that no trace of regret, even unintentionally, should arise. Hence the small chaf: his tears are measured, lest grief open the door to second-guessing the divine command he fulfilled with absolute devotion.
Rashi comments that Avraham “came” to mourn her. Where did he come from? Rashi says he came from Be’er Sheva. One Midrash says he came from the funeral of Terach. Another says he came from Har HaMoriah. So which is it?
Rav Hutner zt”l offered a beautiful explanation. He said that physically Avraham came from Be’er Sheva, and that is Rashi’s simple meaning. But when someone eulogizes a beloved soul, we often say in English, “Where are you coming from?” What perspective are you speaking from? What dimension of this person are you drawing upon?
Avraham came from two places in his heart.
First, he came from the “burial of Terach”—not in the literal sense, but symbolically. Sarah had stood at Avraham’s side as he rejected the idolatry of Terach’s world. She was his partner in burying the ideology of paganism. When Avraham spoke about Sarah’s greatness, he spoke from that place: “This is the woman who built a new world with me, who helped me uproot the falsehoods of our generation.”
Second, he came from Har HaMoriah, the mountain of the Akeidah. Sarah was not only Avraham’s partner in faith; she was the mother who instilled those values into Yitzchak so deeply that he willingly placed his neck on the altar purely because Hashem had said so. That is the ultimate eulogy. “This is the mother who raised a son capable of ascending Har HaMoriah with perfect faith.”
So yes, physically Avraham came from Be’er Sheva. But spiritually, emotionally, in the essence of his eulogy, he came from two profound places: from the ideological revolution they built together, and from the mountain where her son embodied the faith she nurtured.
