All the Families of the Earth Blessed Only for the Sake of Israel

Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 65:2

Curated by Arthur·Told by Maggid·

Rabbi Elazar said: What is the meaning of what is written, "And in you shall all the families of the earth be blessed" (Genesis 12:3)? Even the families that dwell upon the earth are blessed only for the sake of Israel. "All the nations of the earth" (Genesis 18:18): even the ships that come from Gaul to Spain are blessed only for the sake of Israel. The Holy One, blessed be He, said to Abraham: I have two good shoots (berikhot) to graft into you, Ruth the Moabite and Naamah the Ammonite.

Themes

IsraelAbrahamRedemption

Continue Reading

Mekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben YochaiOn the Strength of That Very Day Israel Left Egypt in Battle ArrayThe verse marks the moment of the going-out with a strange word. On the etzem of that day, it says, a term that elsewhere means a bone. The sages read it as theMekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben YochaiEvery Israelite Worthy of Miracles for His Own SakeThe duty to tell the story returns, and again the rabbis insist there is no escaping it. Whether a man has a son or sits alone, whether he is in company or by hMekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben YochaiWho Plunged First Into the Sea and Won the RewardWho dared to enter the sea before it had fully parted? The sages preserve two answers and refuse to flatten them. In Rabbi Meir's telling, the whole tribe of BeMekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben YochaiHad Israel Sung The Lord Reigns No Nation Would RuleA single tense becomes the hinge of history. At the sea Israel proclaimed, "The LORD will reign forever and ever," pointing the verb forward, to a kingship yet Mekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben YochaiThe LORD Is My Banner and God's Share in Israel's FortunesAfter the battle with Amalek, Moses built an altar and gave it a name that reads like a war cry: the LORD is my banner. But whose banner, and whose victory? TwoMekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben YochaiBorne on Eagles' Wings From Egypt to SinaiGod begins His proposal at Sinai not with hearsay but with eyewitness proof. "You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt." No witnesses, no written record, no