11 Lectures (In process of uploading)
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Beit El – lecture 2
The Torah mentions many times that God swore to our fathers to give us a land flowing with milk and honey. We will see that this oath took place… in Beit El. In order to prove that, we will follow Abraham’s travels in the land. It appears that he reached Beit El, went down to Egypt, and then returned to the exact same place – to Beit El. We will try to understand why he returned? What is special about this place? And why was the promise of the land fulfilled precisely after Lot separated from Abraham?
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Beit El – lecture 3
An interesting technique that appears in the Torah: In a sequence of verses, the phrase “Eretz” (the Land) appears 7 times, whith the most important message emphasized in the center of this structure: The Land of Israel is differant than Egypt. This message sheds light on the separation of Abraham and Lot, and expressed symbolically in the place where they separated – between Beit El and the Ai. these names have much significance! We will also begin to analyze – what things happened in Beit El? And in the inheritance of which tribe is Beit El located?
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Beit El – lecture 4
To summarize what we learned about Beit El from Abraham: Beit El symbolizes the preference for the Land of Israel over the Land of Egypt. A preference that stands out compared to the opposite preference of Lot. This leads to a fascinating comparison between the story of Lot’s exodus from Sodom and the story of the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. Many parallel expressions between the two stories – lead to the idea that the reason for salvation in both cases is following in the path of Abraham, doing righteousness and justice.