Jewish Life #23.Lech Lecha; trust, hope and time

In this week’s parashah Lech Lecha, the faith and trust of Abraham is accentuated. According to the commentators, the choice of Abraham (and therefore Sarah) is based on both of these characterological qualities.[1] As human beings, we need to internalize these qualities too in dealing with the slow process of redemption. Let us learn from a commentary on Lech Lecha of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. 
 
Whatever the divine promise, it is not fulfilled immediately.[2]
 
Sacks: “Abraham’s journey, like that of Moses and the Israelites in a later generation, takes longer than they or we expect. There is no sudden transition from here to the promised land, from starting point to destination. Taking Genesis literally, the universe might be made in seven days, but anything in the human world that involves profound change, takes time. The biblical drama is set in the arena of time.
 
Faith is the ability to live with delay without losing trust in the promise; to experience disappointment without losing hope, to know that the road between the real and the ideal is long and yet be willing to undertake the journey.
 
That was Abraham’s and Sarah’s faith, and that of Moses and the prophets and those who came after them.”
 
To cope with all the possible roadblocks in our journey in life, we need faith and trust. Just like Abraham (and Sarah), our father (our mother). In clinical psychology these traits are referring to a sense of basic trust and tolerance, specific tolerance of frustration and tolerance of anxiety. These traits are core aspects for self-strength, not only psychological but social and biological as well. Faith and trust and also key to meaning and purpose; the unique contribution to which every person is called. 
 
Without faith and trust, every life journey is a (more than) unpleasant undertaking and there is a great risk that the final destination will not be reached. If faith and trust in a person are well anchored, a person's life journey can prove to be a joyful endeavor.
 
[1] In the next parashah the characterological quality of chesed is accentuated.  
[2] Sacks, J. (2009). Covenant & Conversation. Maggid (pp. 92-93). 


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