Coming of Age

The Wisdom of the Tent in Toldot

“At forty, understanding (bina)” (Pirkei Avot 5:21)

Isaac was forty years old when he took as his wife Rebekah, daughter of Bethuel the Aramean of Paddan-aram, sister of Laban the Aramean. (Genesis 25:20)

When Esau was forty years old, he took as his wives Judith, daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath, daughter of Elon the Hittite. (Genesis 26:34)

I [Caleb] was forty years old when Moses, the servant of God, sent me from Kadesh-barnea to spy out the land, and I gave him a forthright report. (Joshua 14:7)

Ish-bosheth, son of Saul, was forty years old when he became king of Israel, and he reigned two years. (II Samuel 2:10)

Rabbi Akiva, at the age of forty, saw water dripping on a rock and said, "If something as soft as water can pierce hard rock, how much more so can words of Torah, which are as strong as iron, penetrate my heart!" (Avot de’Rebbe Natan 6:2)

“And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.” (Genesis 7:12)

“And he was there with the LORD for forty days and forty nights; he did not eat bread or drink water. And he wrote upon the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.” (Exodus 34:28)

“And your children will wander in the wilderness forty years and bear your unfaithfulness, until your corpses perish in the wilderness. By the number of the days that you scouted the land, forty days, a year for a day, you shall bear your iniquities forty years, and you shall know My displeasure.” (Numbers 14:33–34)

“The mikveh has a great secret in purification, for its measure is forty se’ah to remove impurity.” (Baal Shem Tov, Tzava’at Harivash, 96)

Forty is a special number—not just in Judaism, but cross-culturally. Muhammad is said to have been forty when he became a prophet. Buddha is said to have meditated under a Bodhi tree for forty days before achieving Enlightenment. The ancient Egyptians, according to Herodotus, required forty days to complete the mummification process, marking the transition from our world to the afterlife. Viewed through this lens, Isaac’s marrying at forty may seem unremarkable. However, upon closer examination, it is far more significant.

The Torah is replete with references to the ages of characters at birth, death, and moments of royal succession. However, only two characters have their age at marriage explicitly mentioned: Isaac and Esau. The Torah does not bother to tell us explicitly and directly how old Abraham was when he married Sarah, or how old Jacob was when he married Rachel and Leah (although we can infer it). Sure, these were important moments in their lives. But Abraham’s Lech L’cha moment occurs after he’s married. And Jacob is defined by two theological events: a pre-marital dream vision of angels ascending and descending a ladder, and a post-marital wrestling match with an angel who wounds him for life. Joseph was presumably thirty when he took a wife, but the Torah mentions this only in passing. Its main point is that Joseph was thirty when he stood before Pharaoh to interpret his dreams. Given the significance of forty in the Torah—forty days of flood, forty days for the floodwaters to subside, forty days atop Sinai receiving the Torah, followed by another forty days of fasting, forty years of wandering in the desert, etc.—the astonishing thing is the connection of Isaac’s archetypal trial period to his marriage to Rebecca. Simply put, his marriage to Rebecca symbolizes his attainment of wisdom.

Isaac is the one Biblical protagonist who becomes a man and finds his identity through his marriage. His first forty years are defined by the preceding verse: “This is the story of Isaac, son of Abraham. Abraham begot Isaac (Avraham holid et Yitzhak).” (Genesis 25:19) Isaac spends forty years being “begotten.” Some commentators suggest that holid be translated not as “gave birth to” but as “raised.” Isaac is raised, incubated by Abraham. Abraham is his ark, his provider, and protector from the evils of the world. But Abraham may also be the cause of Isaac’s arrested development.

Isaac does not have a separate identity, at least as far as we can tell. The main defining event of Isaac’s childhood and upbringing is the Akeida (Binding of Isaac). A Midrash suggests Isaac went blind from the event, which can be read metaphorically: he lost his orientation. Only at forty, through his marriage, does he recover it. Esau’s marriage at forty suggests how much Esau sought to emulate his father, turning his marital age into a minhag (custom). Esau is a part of, and a continuation of, Isaac’s Toledot (generations). “These are the generations (Toledot) of Isaac.” Isaac’s story is defined by two dimensions: his having been the son of Abraham and his having been the husband of Rebecca. Isaac is born twice, and must be born twice, to become the great av that he is.

When it comes to determining who should receive Isaac’s birthright and blessing, it is Rebecca who decides. Without Rebecca, Isaac would make the wrong judgment. Yet Isaac accepts Rebecca’s judgment. Once he discovers he’s been deceived by Jacob, he does not cancel the blessing but asserts that it is non-fungible. Is this truly the case, or is this Isaac’s way of submitting to his wife’s preference for Jacob because he now understands it? “And Isaac loved Esau because he had a taste for game, but Rebekah loved Jacob.” (Genesis 25:28) Rebecca receives a prophecy from God, but Isaac has the good sense to listen to his wife and thus learn of that prophecy. (The text never indicates that she shares the prophecy with him, and Ramban believes she keeps it a secret.) Thus, the Torah gives a new model for encountering the divine: marriage. Isaac is defined not as a prophet—although he does pray to God and receive blessing and assurance from God—but as a student. Isaac relates to God, first through his father, and then through his wife.

If Abraham, per the Midrashic portrayal, is defined by first principles (the discovery of a prime mover via rational deduction), Isaac is defined by second principles: his ability to rely on and trust others. Some people are talented by orders of magnitude, like Abraham and Rebecca. Others are fortunate to be surrounded by talent and humble enough to benefit from it. They, too, deserve credit. If Abraham gives us the argument for Judaism from philosophy, Isaac gives it to us from tradition. If Abraham’s discovery of God is firsthand, Isaac’s is secondhand. There are many ways to be right. Knowing when to follow is one of them.

The Midrashic tradition portrays Esau as exemplary in honoring his father: “Rabbi Shimon ben Gamliel said: All my days I served my father, yet I did not reach even one thousandth of the level of service that Esau provided to his father.” (Bereishit Rabbah 65:10) But it also describes Esau as a misogynist who hated his mother: “Esau yearned to murder his mother” (Midrash Tanchuma). Through this enlarged and fantastical rendering, Esau disqualifies himself in spite of his bond with Isaac, because he fails to love the being whom Isaac loves. Esau is an apparent traditionalist who emulates his father—except in one regard: his father’s regard for his wife, Rebecca. Esau seeks to split the Torah of the father from the Torah of the mother, rather than regarding their Torah as a shared one.

Rivka’s name means “binding,” conceptually rhyming with Isaac’s defining experience as a bound sacrifice. But she is also the binding that ties Isaac to his new self and enables him to become not just an inheritor but a transmitter of tradition. Esau unravels this binding, or at least ignores it. His virtues are classically masculine and martial but lack the counterbalancing softness of femininity. The rabbis fittingly associate Esau with Rome.

Isaac brings Rebecca into his tent (Genesis 24:67); and it is the tent that defines Jacob (Genesis 25:27). Jacob is yoshev ohalim, a tent-dweller. Israel is later blessed in reference to the tents of Jacob: “How goodly are your tents, O Jacob, your dwelling places, O Israel.” (Numbers 24:5) Before we are People of the Book, we are People of the Tent. Esau is a man of the Field. The Field is defined by animality; the Tent by domesticity. The Field is defined by violence; the Tent by reflection. The Field is defined by fight; the Tent by flight. Esau bites; Jacob deceives. But the Tent is also the place of positive binding and connection, of intimacy. The Tent is where Isaac and Rebecca conceive. The Tent is the place of synthesis.

“Abraham birthed Isaac.” Where is Sarah in this story? This incomplete account becomes the setup for a contest between twins: one who scorns maternity in favor of paternity and seeks to be born exclusively of his father, and one who balances both tendencies. Isaac doesn’t birth Esau and Jacob, but prays for and with his wife. His innovative turn comes from his recognition that Rebecca isn’t merely his path to wisdom, but, in some sense, its embodiment. This insight enables him to put his ego aside and acknowledge Jacob as his spiritual successor. It is not just two nations that compete in Rebecca’s womb, but two ideals in Isaac’s identity: one is the ideal of the hunter, and the other the ideal of the tent-dweller. The latter wins, not because it is the opposite of hunting, but because it integrates and transforms it:

“The hands were the hands of Esau, but the voice was the voice of Jacob.” (Genesis 27:22)

The hands were the hands of Rome, but the voice was the voice of Jerusalem.

Shabbat Shalom,

Zohar Atkins

Etz Hasadeh