The Last Hineni: A Midrash
Gellman, Marc
THE LAST HINENI A midrash for the High Holidays MARC GELLMAN When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to look, God called to him out of the bush: "Moses! Moses!" He answered, "Here I...
...Here it is...
...Gen...
...Gen...
...Ex...
...4:13) Unlike the hineni of Abraham, Moses is not prepared to accept any task without question or qualm...
...27:18) Here Scripture comes to teach that hineni—open readiness to God or man—may be met by deception...
...Isaac's piety is not imperiled, only Jacob's...
...It can also be a response by man to a call from a fellow man...
...Rashi, following the Midrash Tanchuma, provides this commentary: Hineni—Here am I: Such is the response of the pious (has-sidim...
...Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him...
...To loose the fetters of wickedness, to undo the bands of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke...
...The task has not yet been set forth...
...A simple straightforward, ordinary request...
...So he [Jacob] went in to his father, and said, "My father" ; and he said, "Here I am...
...The last hineni is thus less a teaching than a hope, less a fact than a prayer...
...Is not this the fast that I have chosen...
...Isaac has heard nothing, yet is still prepared to complete the task...
...I am slow of speech and slow of tongue...
...Exodus 3:4 What is the meaning of hineni...
...Then shall your light break forth as the morning, and your healing shall spring forth speedily...
...Abraham's hineni at the end of the call to sacrifice his son was a response of joy that the God who merited his love could never have intended the completion of the horrible task...
...3:4) Here Scripture teaches that, though hineni is "the language of meekness and the language of readiness," hineni can be the language of doubt as,well...
...Come, I will send you to them...
...Isaac is the only one of the two who can say hineni because Isaac is the only one truly present...
...Isaac is not demeaned by this trickery, only Jacob...
...The day when God says hineni is the last day, the day of the Lord, the Messianic day...
...And this is not only the last instance of hineni in the Torah, it is also the last moment of time...
...When you see the naked that you cover him, and that you hide not yourself from your own flesh...
...In each man we can see all of man...
...22:7) Here Scripture comes to teach a new aspect of the meaning of hineni...
...His ambivalence is not in his readiness to do the task but in his lack of confidence in his own capacities to succeed...
...Then Abraham put forth his hand and took the knife to slay his son...
...Jacob, now Israel, has asked Joseph to go and inquire after the peace of his brothers and their flocks...
...And he said to him, "Here I am...
...God's comforting answer to Moses is the assurance that when we overcome doubt and speak hineni, we do not speak it into the void...
...Isaac receives with hineni the son whom he believes to be Esau, but who is in fact Jacob...
...Gen...
...It is the language of meekness and the language of readiness (lashon anava v'zemun...
...who are you, my son...
...Though Moses was terrified of God's presence, he was still able to express real fears and doubts about his adequacy for such a task in his hineni to God...
...He answered, "Here I am—Hineni...
...The father is answering hineni to an address by his son...
...The culmination of this divine/human relationship in the response of hineni awaits one of the last teachings of this word in all of Scripture—the teaching of Isaiah, chapter 58: Is such the fast that I have chosen...
...Gen...
...Moriah is the hineni between man and man...
...The angel of the Lord called to him from Heaven and said, "Abraham, Abraham," and he said, "Here am I." (Gen...
...And on that day, God will enfold the people in the peace of his hineni, the last hineni...
...And Isaac said to his father, Abraham, "My father," and he said, "Hereami, my son...
...He asks God, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and free the Israelites from Egypt...
...He answered, "Here am I." (Ex...
...Joseph shows his filial piety by answering, " hineni," but the task Joseph sets out to perform for his father is not the task he ends up completing...
...God's ultimate and messianic hineni is his response to the generations of man's hineni...
...Abraham's hineni at the beginning of the call to sacrifice his son was a response of readiness to do anything for the God he loved...
...Abraham answers to the call of his name by his God...
...After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, "Abraham," and he said, "HereamI—Hineni...
...Marc Gellman, a moment contributing editor, is rabbi of Temple Beth Torah in Dix Hills, New York...
...Will you call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord...
...Abraham's hineni to his son in the midst of the call was a response of humble awe before the faith of his son...
...The task Joseph accepted was not his father's but God's...
...His midrashim— for children and for adults—appear frequently in these pages...
...you will cry, and He will say: Here am I! Here Scripture teaches that hineni can be the response of God to the people...
...The day for a man to afflict his soul...
...37:13) Here Scripture teaches that the task we accept with hineni is often not the task we intend to accept...
...22:1) Here, in the first instance of hineni in the Tanach, we come to learn the first meaning of hineni...
...Readiness is the response because God has called...
...knowing, perhaps, that the answer must be silence...
...Is it not to deal your bread to the hungry, and that you bring the poor that are cast out to your house...
...He is sold into slavery, elevated to the court of the Egyptian Pharaoh, placed in charge of the granaries, and finally he becomes the salvation of his brothers and father...
...So after his own hineni he can ask, "Who are you, my son...
...Hineni need not only be Abraham's response—the response to God by man...
...The hineni of Mt...
...The response of Moses at the burning bush teaches us that when we say hineni, God responds as well...
...Here the roles are strangely reversed...
...Commentators point out that hineni is the response of a person of lower rank answering a person of higher rank who is about to issue a command...
...The only certainty lies in the fact that God has called, and Abraham has listened and responded...
...3:11) And he asks, "What if they do not believe me and do not listen to me . . . " (4:1) And then he says, "Please, O Lord, I have never been a man of words...
...Moses' hineni is honest agony...
...And Israel said to Joseph, "Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem...
...here God says hineni to mankind...
...Abraham is in awe of his son and acknowledges his humility before his son's courage and piety in a single word...
...Hineni comes at all stages of true callings...
...In all other places and at all other times in Torah, hineni is only the response of man—sometimes to God, sometimes to other men—but nowhere else is it God's response...
...Yet, this is the truth of the setting, for Isaac is on a higher level of faith than his father...
...Meekness is the response because God has called...
...4:10) And finally M?ses pleads, "Please, O Lord, make someone else your agent...
...Then shall you call, and the Lord will answer...
...and your righteousness shall go before you, the glory of the Lord shall be your reward...
...The rabbis were also more in awe of Isaac than of Abraham, reckoning the merit of Isaac as greater than that of any other patriarch and transforming a test of Abraham into "the binding of Isaac...
...When the Lord saw that he [Moses] had turned aside to look, God called to him out of the bush: "Moses...
...Abraham has heard the command to sacrifice Isaac from God directly...
...The hineni Joseph says to Israel is his last word to his father for 27 years...
...On the way up Mt...
...Moriah, seeing the knife, and the fire, and the wood for the burnt offering, Isaac addresses his father and Abraham responds, "I am here, my son" ("Hineni, b'ni...
...In Abraham's first hineni we can see all hinenis—all moments of human response to the divine call, all moments in which man listens, hears his name, and says, "God, I am only man, but I love you and I will do whatever you ask...
...Moses had been tending the flocks of his Midianite father-in-law, Jethro, when he came upon the burning bush where God called to him to go back to Egypt and lead the people out...
...His journey was not for his brothers, but for the generations...
...Abraham has passed the test of God, and his response to the saving intervention of the angel is a hineni of relief and exaltation...
...On the last day the people will cry out to the Lord...
...22:10-11) Here Scripture comes to teach that hineni not only signals the beginning of a task, but also its completion...
Vol. 7 • September 1982 • No. 8
