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My mother’s grandparents owned a two-family home in Jersey City, New Jersey. Sometime in the sixties, my great-grandmother, up in years and long widowed, sold the house for eight thousand dollars, a sum she used to support herself in the last years of her life. It was a perfectly reasonable decision at the time.
On the other hand, who knew that blue-collar Jersey City would someday become a hip, rejuvenated suburb filled with young, urban professionals. Suddenly Bubby’s apartment with a fire escape for the sukkah was a condo with a terrace in Avalon Coves. And, of course, was worth over a million dollars. If only she had known!
I can never help but think of this when I read about Abraham’s purchase of a burial cave for Sarah, who dies at the outset of this week’s reading, Chaye Sarah. Abraham is told that the land he wishes to purchase is owned by a man named Ephron the Hittite, with whom Abraham must negotiate. After a bit of back and forth, during which Ephron politely – but falsely – offers to give the cave to Abraham for nothing, a price is settled on – four hundred shekels. It’s hard to know whether or not this was a reasonable price at the time, but our sages make it clear that Ephron was greedy, overcharging Abraham. And he did so by disguising the units of money in which he wanted to be paid. Thus we read, in Braishit Rabbah 58:7 (5th century CE, Israel):
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My lord, heed me: Land worth four hundred shekels of silver” – Rabbi Ḥanina said: All the shekels that are stated in the Torah refer to sela’im; in the Prophets, litrin (25 shekels); and in the Writings, centenaria (100 shekels). Rabbi Yudan said: The exception is the shekels of Ephron, which were centenaria. (In other words, the four-hundred-shekel price demanded was actually forty thousand shekels). That is what is written: “A greedy man rushes after wealth, and he does not know that diminishment will befall him” (Proverbs 28:22). “A greedy man rushes after wealth” – this refers to Ephron, who cast a greedy eye upon the wealth of the righteous man [Abraham]. “And he does not know that diminishment will befall him” – as the Torah diminished the letter vav from him.
How do the sages deduce this? Because Ephron is spelled with a vav in every place it appears – except the passage in which he quotes the price. Moreover, if you remove the vav from Ephron’s name the gematria (numerical value) of the letters is 70 (ayin) plus 80 (pay) plus 200 (resh) plus final nun (fifty) – which equals four hundred.
The truth is that not only was Ephron diminished by his greed, but Abraham made a good deal. We still have Abraham’s original cave, called the Cave of Matriarchs and Patriarchs (Ma-arat ha-Machpelah) four thousand years later.
You might say it’s the Jewish version of Avalon Coves.
- Rabbi Scott Hoffman
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