Parshat Toldot: Not Yet

November 29, 2024

Genesis 25:21

וַיֶּעְתַּ֨ר יִצְחָ֤ק לַֽיהֹוָה֙ לְנֹ֣כַח אִשְׁתּ֔וֹ כִּ֥י עֲקָרָ֖ה הִ֑וא וַיֵּעָ֤תֶר לוֹ֙ יְהֹוָ֔ה וַתַּ֖הַר רִבְקָ֥ה אִשְׁתּֽוֹ׃

Isaac pleaded with the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was barren; and the Lord responded to his plea, and his wife Rebekah conceived.

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While this seems pretty straight forward, there is something this verse subtly ignores. Yes, after getting married, Isaac prayed for him and Rebecca to have a child. And yes, God answered his prayer. What the text leaves out is that there were twenty years that passed between Rebecca and Isaac’s marriage, and their having children. While it seems that there was little break between Isaac praying and God’s answering his prayer, in fact this was a prayer that Isaac prayed for twenty years.

This is an essential aspect of Jewish prayer. Just because God has not answered yet, doesn’t mean God won’t. It took almost four hundred years for the prayers and cries of the Israelites to be answered while they were slaves in Egypt. The Israeli national anthem captures this perfectly – Hatikvah, “the hope”. The lyrics express how for two thousand years we prayed for a return to the land of Israel – that prayer took even longer than the Israelites in Egypt.

Just because God hasn’t answered yet doesn’t mean all hope is lost. So, we pray for our deepest and most extraordinary hopes – from comfort for the bereaved, to a return to Israel, to world peace and an end to hate. Whether it’s 20 years, 400 years, 2000 years, we pray and never give up hope knowing that God’s answer to our heartfelt prayers is never “no” but rather “not yet.”