Was Rivka Really 3 Years Old? Parashat Chayei Sarah

0:04I was reading the Parsha this week, and it said something about Rivka being three years old when she was married to Yitzchak, and Yitzchak was 37, right? Now, is that... Well, you know, I'm curious because I have a daughter, and is that the same three of today, or is it different? Very good question. Okay. So the question is... Torah says that Yitzchak Avinu, when Eliezer, Eved Avraham, met her, and then after the whole life-threatening negotiation that he had with her family, because they tried to kill him, Lavan tried to kill him, but the Midrash says that in the last minute before he ate the food, a malach, an angel came and switched the food.

1:13switched the food and gave it to Rivkah's father. And that's why when the next, the following day, after that initial meeting between Lavan and Eliezer and Rivkah's whole family, it doesn't mention the father's name anymore. And the reason why is because he died, Betuel died. So anyway, Lavan was a rasha, who was Rivkah's brother, who saw that Eliezer, the servant of Avraham, came with a lot of money, gave her some gold and all types of beautiful things, and he figured, let me just get the gold and kill the guy. But HaKadosh Baruch Hu protects the tzaddikim, which by the way, as a side note, from this particular parasha, where it says that Eliezer was the head of Avraham's house, Onkelos, Agur over there, comments saying, from there we learned that Eliezer, and the Gemara also confirms,

2:23From there we learned that Eliezer was not just head of the house as far as running the store, the shop, and the finances, but rather Eliezer Eved Avraham was the Talmid of Avraham to the highest extent, meaning everything that Avraham, all the Shiurei Torah that Avraham Avinu was doing, he was listening, he was writing notes, he was recording, he was doing everything to the point where he became a Talmid Chacham, to the extent that any time Avraham couldn't give a shiur, Eliezer would give the shiur. Eliezer became a Yud Tamid Chacham, K'Rov Rabbi. so he was a big tzaddik. Anyway, he found, after seeing the blessing and getting the sign that he asked for Hashem to give him, he found Rivka and brought her back to Yitzchak. And it says that Rivka, the Chazal said Rivka was three years old, and Yitzchak waited three years before he consummated the marriage. So in essence, she was six when they consummated the marriage. But still, if we look at today's world, a 40-year-old with a six-year-old is a crime. It's pedophilia. It's disgusting. It's horrible. It's horrendous, and so on and so forth. And you're right, it is. So what's the pshat? What's the meaning over here?

3:49people during those times were very different than they are today. Physically, where at the age of three years old already, Avishag was similar to a full-grown woman, like a teenager, a late teenager. And when she was six years old, obviously already somewhat equivalent, let's say, to a twenty-year-old. What's the, what's the source? How do we confirm that? now if you have a three-year-old, like I do, in my house, and you tell your three-year-old, "Do me a favor, give me a cup of water, a cup, give me a cup of water." The three-year-old is going to be very excited to give it to you, because they're excited to do anything. It's one of the best things you could, you know, that, uh, that for them to do is to run errands. They love to do stuff, clean this. They don't actually clean or do anything, but they make pretend like they do. you know, "Oh, give me water, oh, great," yeah, yeah. And they run to go get it. You know, they kind of show up and it's like, you know, the cup, there's water, but it took a little bit, why? Because the rest of it is spilled all over the place. It's what, "Up!" Why? Because they're three years old, that's what happens with three-year-olds. I don't know. But over here it's only a cup, why? Because if you give more than the cup, it's too much, it's heavy. We see the gifkah

5:02was able to give huge buckets of water, enough to satisfy ten camels. Ten camels. You know how much water that is? That's like a water company. It actually specifically says that Eliezer had to wait, meaning it took a long time. We're talking about a long time, hours, because she had to go to the well, take the water, bring it to them. Take the water, bring it to them. Do you ever try to take something out of a well? It's not so easy. I didn't try nothing. I just pressed the thing and the water comes out. But anyway, it seems like it's hard. In the movies, anyway, it seems hard. And she went and did it. Now, the Midrash actually says, I'll give you guys a little beautiful pearl, is that first it says that when Rivka went to the well, HaShem said that because she was so holy, the water from the well came up to the top of the well by itself.

6:04Meaning that it was easy for her to get water. But the second that she agreed and offered to give Eliezer the water for him and all of the camels and so on, the blessing stopped. She had to go and manually do everything. Why? You would think, wait, listen, you just agreed to something. give her the blessing, right? That's our logic, give her the blessing. Why why are you making it more difficult? If it came up there, when she wasn't just getting it for herself and for our family, the water came up all the way from the bottom of the well to the top of the well. She didn't have to do much, she just had to that's it. Now she's going to go help ten camels, a bunch of strangers, should be But Hashem wanted to show us, He wanted to teach us. She didn't offer to bring the water because it was easy. She didn't want to do the mitzvah, she wasn't so excited about the mitzvah because it was an easy mitzvah. And

7:13she wanted to do because of the mitzvah mamash, and therefore HaKadosh Baruch Hu wanted to give her full reward for it. Every Jew must remember that he is a Jew, and she is a Jew. We do not celebrate non-Jewish holidays, even if they seem harmless. It is a zilzul, a disrespect to the Torah, and it leads to chillul Hashem, a desecration of God's name. Stick to our holy Torah and our own holidays. That is the path of a true Jew.