Two thoughts from last week, Parashat Vayera, before I forget them:
1) How can Lot simultaneously be so evil as to offer his daughters to the people of Sedom, while doing so in the name of protecting guests?
One approach, which doesn't seem to reflect the accepted reading of the words (but maybe it does), is that Lot's question about offering his daughters is rhetorical. He's really saying "Hey look, I have two daughters. I would as soon offer them to you to have your way with as I would offer up my guests." According to this, Lot is actually not offering up his daughters, but successfully clinging to hachnasat orchim, and doing so quite well.
Another approach is to say that he indeed did offer up his daughters instead of his guests. His willingness to do so is reflective of the influence that Sedom had upon him. Lot was raised with Avraham Avinu's sense of values, especially his renowned sense of hachnasat orchim. Thus, when Lot found himself in Sedom, a city that specifically rejected the inviting in of others, a city defined by xenophobia and careless to the needs of the stranger, Lot felt the need to compensate by over-emphasizing the value that was under attack. The problem, though, is that when one over-emphasizes one value in order to protect it, it warps one's entire value system, perhaps even without the person's knowledge. Part of morality is the interrelation of values and knowing how to balance competing values. This becomes twisted, and the "ignored" values may become, finally, immoral.
Thus, Lot's efforts to defend himself from the ideals and values of the city of Sedom had an insidious effect upon him and his values, in spite of his best efforts.
2) Why is the haftara for parashat Vayera about Elisha and the revival from the dead of the son of the Shunamite woman?
The obvious connection is the informing of a barren woman that she will have a child. In the parsha, it is done by an angel, and in the haftara, it is done by Elisha himself.
Perhaps there is another connection: The attempt to save Sedom-Amora and the attempt to save the child of the Shunamite woman.
What is the whole issue of Avraham's debate with God about saving the Sedom-Amora metropolitan area? At first it seems to be about how God shouldn't unjustly slay the righteous along with the wicked. But soon it becomes about how God should save the wicked because the righteous are among them. Somehow, either the presence of the righteous raise hopes for the repentance of the wicked, or the attachment of the righteous to the wicked moves God to relent, perhaps because He sees the love of the righteous for the wicked and wishes to reward the righteous.
This is also a theme in the haftara. The boy is not revived because Elisha did CPR-- such an idea is somewhat annoying, and doesn't even warrant discussion. He is revived when Elisha attaches himself to the boy-- matching his life up against the boy's, sharing his breath with the boy. It is a case of the righteous attaching himself to the one who is doomed, and demonstrating his love for the doomed. (One can hardly say the boy is wicked, so I write "doomed" because it seems that God didn't really want this boy to exist in the first place, and later seems to have killed him). God didn't hear Elisha's prayer to revive the boy. God responded when Elisha identified himself completely with the child.
