Vayeira 20:13 · unit 1

Parashas Vayeira · Passuk 20:13

The Complete Passuk

וַיְהִ֞י כַּאֲשֶׁ֧ר הִתְע֣וּ אֹתִ֗י אֱלֹהִים֮ מִבֵּ֣ית אָבִי֒ וָאֹמַ֣ר לָ֔הּ זֶ֣ה חַסְדֵּ֔ךְ אֲשֶׁ֥ר תַּעֲשִׂ֖י עִמָּדִ֑י אֶ֤ל כׇּל־הַמָּקוֹם֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר נָב֣וֹא שָׁ֔מָּה אִמְרִי־לִ֖י אָחִ֥י הוּא׃

And it came to pass, when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, that I said to her, “This is your kindness that you shall do with me: at every place to which we come, say of me, ‘He is my brother.’”

Chabad / Judaica Press

Source Citation

Torah Temimah points to Yerushalmi Megillah 1:9.

TT lemma: התעו אותי אלהים.

Sefaria — Yerushalmi Megillah

Core Text of Chazal

Core Text
הִתְעוּ אֹתִי אֱלֹהִים. כָּל הַשֵּׁמוֹת הָאֲמוּרִים בְּאַבְרָהָם קֹדֶשׁ, וְאַף זֶה כַּאֲשֶׁר הִתְעוּ אֹתִי אֱלֹהִים; וְהָכִי קָאָמַר, אִלּוּלֵי אֱלֹהִים כְּבָר הִתְעוּ אוֹתִי.

English: “God caused me to wander.” All the Names mentioned in connection with Avraham are sacred, and this one as well—“when God caused me to wander.” And this is what he meant: were it not for God, they would already have led me astray.

On the daf / in context: The apparent difficulty of a divine Name governing a verb of “leading astray” is resolved by reading the clause as “were it not for God I would already have been led astray.”

Type of Learning

Derash on the verse (Yerushalmi) — not a formal named middah of the 13. The sanctity of the Name is preserved by a slight syntactic re-reading.

What Is Learned

Every divine Name connected with Avraham is sacred; the phrase means that without God’s protection he would already have been led astray.