A Soulful Journey

Machpelah: Rav and Shmuel comment on its meaning:   Rav says there were two caves, one inside the other. Shmuel says that one cave was on top of the other. What the Hebrew tells us is that Machpelah means “double.”  - Talmud, Eruvin 53:a

There are four couples that are interred in Kiryat Arba: Adam and Havvah, Avraham and Sarah, Yitzhak and Rivkah, Yaacov and Leah. -Eruvin 53a

There were seven prophetesses. Who were these? Sarah, Miriam, Deborah, Hannah, Abigail, Hulda and Esther... Miriam, as it is written, "And Miriam the prophetess the sister of Aaron" (Exodus  15:20 ). Was she only the sister of Aaron and not the sister of Moses? Rabbi Nahman said in the name of Rav: Because she prophesied when she was the sister of Aaron and said, "My mother is destined to bear a son who will save Israel." When he was born, the whole house was filled with light, and her father arose and kissed her on the head saying, "My daughter, thy prophecy has been fulfilled.' But when they threw him into the river, her father arose and tapped her on the head, saying, 'Daughter, where is thy prophecy?' So it is written, "and his sister stood afar off to know," (Exodus 2:4) to know what would be the end of her prophecy. - Babylonian Talmud Megillah 14a

“Whoever feels pain at the beginning, will be calm at the end. And no one has felt pain at the beginning more than Abraham: he was thrown into the oven, had to abandon his father’s home, was chased by sixteen kings, went through ten challenges and buried Sarah. But in the end he was calm, as it is written:  ‘In time Abraham became old, while God had blessed him in everything’  (Gen. 24:1) ”    Midrash Tan h uma, Ekev, art. 3 There is a wheel in the universe.  It ever  turns.  Everything is seen and accounted for and we find reward for our faithfulness.....