Last week, my worlds collided. I once trained as an opera singer, and though I have traded Gluck for gemara, I remain a fervent supporter of the arts. I have a weekly appointment that brings me within a block of the Metropolitan Opera House, at Lincoln Center, and I often stroll through the plaza, admiring the posters for new productions.
A few days ago, my usual route was blocked by hundreds of protesters drawn by the Met’s premiere of The Death of Klinghoffer. Klinghoffer is the work of John Adams, considered by many to be the greatest living American composer of opera, and librettist Alice Goodman, and it portrays the 1985 hijacking of a cruise ship by terrorists representing the Palestinian Liberation Front (PLF). During the hijacking, 69-year-old Leon Klinghoffer, a Jewish man who used a wheelchair, was murdered by the terrorists and thrown overboard.
Since its premiere in 1991, Klinghoffer has drawn criticism and charges of antisemitism, often at the hands of groups and individuals who have neither seen the opera nor read the libretto. Many object to what they see as the “humanization” of the Palestinian terrorists, which they interpret as a tacit acceptance of the Palestinians’ antisemitic statements and an implicit excuse of the murder. Dialogue over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is rarely cool and measured, but the hysteria over the Met’s new production has reached a level of drama that is, fittingly, truly operatic.
This week’s parashah, Vayera, relates the Biblical origin of this intractable war between Jews and Arabs. Sarah, in her old age, gives birth to Isaac, the long-awaited son that God promised to Abraham. Some time later, Sarah sees Ishmael, “the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing,” and Sarah demands that her husband, “banish this handmaiden and her son, that the son of this handmaiden will not inherit with my son, with Isaac’” (Gen. 21:9-10). God tells the distraught Abraham to do as Sarah says, assuring him that Ishmael, too, will be made a great nation. According to tradition, Isaac is the ancestor of the Jews, and Ishmael the progenitor of the Arabs–each people descended from Abraham, and each possessed of a tradition that the land of Canaan is their divine inheritance.
How are we to understand Sarah’s desire for Ishmael’s banishment? Why can the two brothers not inherit together? The key seems to be Ishmael “playing,” מצחק, and Ramban offers three possible interpretations of the word: idolatry, illicit sexual relations, and murder. Ramban teaches that Isaac and Ishmael had an argument about their inheritance, and that Ishmael claimed that, as elder son, he was entitled to a double portion. Then, Ramban continues, Ishmael took Isaac into a field and “played at” shooting arrows at Isaac, putting his brother in real danger.
Given this interpretation, Sarah’s concern is understandable and her alarm justified. In Ibn Ezra’s reading, however, we learn that מצחק refers merely to the normal “playing” of children, and that Sarah became jealous because Ishmael was physically larger than Isaac. If so, why such a harsh reaction?
I see a possible explanation in Sarah’s words. “Banish this handmaiden and her son,” Sarah says to Abraham– not, for instance, “Banish Hagar and Ishmael.” Sarah refuses to use the name of a woman who bathed and dressed her, who walked endless desert miles at her side, who bore for her a baby to ease the sting of barrenness. And Ishmael? Legally, he was Sarah’s own son, with Hagar a Biblical surrogate mother. Sarah must have rejoiced at Ishmael’s first words and chased after him as he toddled around the camp, wiped food from his chin and answered his questions about God. Did he call her “Auntie”? “Mother”?
With the birth of Isaac, Sarah’s priorities have been upended and reordered. Like any mother, Sarah wants to give her son the world, and Ishmael is suddenly an enemy, laying claim to that portion of the world that Sarah has the power to give. Perhaps, when Ishmael is “playing” with Isaac, the situation before her is as ambiguous as the Biblical language, but Sarah, bewildered and afraid, does not allow Ishmael the chance to explain his actions. She blinds herself to Ishmael as a human being and acts, reflexively, to negate the threat to Isaac, her fragile hope for the future.
Sarah teaches us that it is dangerous to engage with the humanity of our enemies. To do so would be to examine what role we play in our strife; it could even weaken our resolve. Would Sarah have been able to choke out the words, “Banish our son, Ishmael, and his mother, Hagar,” or would tears have cut her off as their faces flashed before her eyes? To insulate herself from the pain of condemning her intimates, Sarah dehumanizes the boy and his mother.
It may be that this is why those protesting Klinghoffer object to “humanizing” the very human Palestinian terrorists: if a terrorist is human, we have a responsibility to him. Even if the opera condemns his acts, it gives voice to him as a man, even if he is monstrous in action. Some who believe in the future of the Jewish state see ourselves as the protectors of a fragile dream, and some protesters reacted as reflexively to the opera as Sarah did to Ishmael’s play, preemptively condemning out of fear the perceived threat to what we hold so dear. To “other” and fear the adversary is a natural response, but we must learn to curb the reflex. We must see our enemies’ humanity and allow it a voice, for only a human adversary can exhibit the virtues of forgiveness, mercy, and love.
Meggie O’Dell is a third-year rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, where she is also pursuing a master’s degree in Jewish sacred music through the H.L. Miller Cantorial School. She is a 2014 alumna of T’ruah’s Rabbinical/Cantorial Student Fellowship in Human Rights Leadership.