Hold That Thought
Last week I published an article about the three main ways Abraham’s odd visitors in Genesis 18 have been understood: there’s the Christian idea of the Trinity, the ancient idea of the Divine Council, or a proto-appearance of the Angel of the LORD. Thing is, there’s an entirely different way to read this story. One that completely side steps the questions about how Abraham can meet God in three persons.
It comes to us from the rabbinic tradition, and I only came across it when doing some reading to preach on this tale. It’s honestly pretty fascinating and I think it has some really neat implications for the ways we imagine the divine in our lives, all around us.
It comes from the Talmud, specifically Shabbat 127a, where Rav Yehuda passes along a teaching from his own teacher, Rav.
The story in Genesis opens like this:
The LORD appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. (Gen 18:1)
But this interpretation reads that verse not as a summary of the story that’s about to happen, but simply as the first scene of the tale.
One day, Abraham and God were sitting in the shade chatting.
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