Look Up at Miracles

Does God appear to us when we look up? Are miracles all around us if we lift our eyes?

In the opening of this week’s reading, the Torah proclaims: “The Lord appeared to Abraham at the oaks of Mamre; he was sitting at the entrance of the tent as the day grew hot. He lifted up his eyes and saw three men standing near him.” (Genesis 18) These men are divine messengers who foretell Isaac’s miraculous birth to aged parents.

In the desert one can often see people approaching from a great distance and yet Abraham does not notice them until they are standing next to him. What took him so long to see these messengers approaching from a distance? Perhaps he was napping. The rabbis suggest he was still recovering from his recent circumcision. Regardless, all he needed to do was lift up his head.

And then God appears when he looks up, when he lifts up his eyes (vayisah einav).

There is a sense that lifting up our eyes is different than seeing. It involves more than looking. The head moves. The body turns. We see something that was there for some time or perhaps always there, but for some reason we were unable to see it until we move our eyes, until we open ourselves to the miraculous.

The refrain of lifting our eyes appears again at the end of this portion. An angel appears and tell Abraham not to sacrifice his son at the very moment he lifts the knife above his neck. The Torah continues: “Vayisah Avraham et einav—And Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw there a ram caught in the thicket by its thorns.” (Genesis 22). How long was this ram there? If it was caught in a bush, it must have been struggling to break free. How did Abraham not see the ram?

Was Abraham blinded by his obedience to God’s command? Was he unable to see because he was overcome by zeal to sacrifice his son? Did he not look up because he was so distraught that this is what God asked of him? In the last moment, Abraham moves his head, lifts his eyes and sees what God really intends: to sacrifice a ram and not his son.

Miracles stare us in the face but too often we are unable to see them.

The Psalmist declares: “I lift up my eyes to the mountains; from where will my help come? My help comes from the Lord, maker of heaven and earth.” (Psalm 122)

Perhaps the miracle is the mountain. Perhaps help comes from looking up at nature.

Stop looking down. Start looking up. Don’t let the world, and its horrors, keep us from lifting up our eyes.

Miracles are all around us.