Q:
Why did Avraham Avinu pray for the men of Sedom if they were so wicked?
A:
Why did Avraham pray that Sedom should not be destroyed if Sedom was so wicked?
Avraham Avinu did what I told you before. When you do a kindliness to those who don’t deserve it, you’re actually גומל נפשו איש חסד; you become great thereby.
Now Avraham wanted Hakadosh Baruch Hu to spare Sedom chiefly because of Lot. Because we saw there was a peril to Lot when Sedom was overthrown. Actually his wife perished and his married daughters perished and Lot himself was barely saved from Sedom. And therefore Avraham was actually praying for Lot. But he prayed for Sedom too, because despite the wrongdoers, every community has certain people that are not completely bad.
When we speak about Sedom as being wicked, it doesn’t mean everybody was wicked in Sedom. There was wickedness in Sedom. But I want to tell you, there was less wickedness in Sedom than in New York City. I’m not talking about gentiles. The Jews in New York City!
You know, in the gay community, the Jews play a very big role. Now if somebody would pray for the gays, it wouldn’t be considered such a wrong thing to do. He prays they should do teshuvah before they die – because they’re all going to die anyhow sooner or later by means of this great plague – so we pray they should do teshuvah, that they shouldn’t have wasted their lives entirely. It’s not out of place to pray for wicked Jews.
And before Matan Torah, there was no havdalah bein Yisroel l’amim. And therefore Avraham prayed for Sedom like you pray for wicked Jews that they should be spared, and maybe the better ones should have their lives saved, and maybe even the more wicked ones will repent. Because before Matan Torah there was not this big difference. The Gemara says that Avraham’s children became geirim at Sinai, but before Sinai they were all called Bnei Noach. The Gemara says that. Before Sinai, they were all called Bnei Noach. And Bnei Noach includes everybody.
So therefore it wasn’t out of place to pray for them and Avraham thereby gained a very great perfection. And this perfection is written in the Torah as a model. That’s one of the tests that Avraham passed and it’s a model and it teaches us we should have compassion on our fellow Jews even in the midst of their sins and pray and try to save them.
(October 1988)
