Q: I always wondered about Genesis 12:17: “And the LORD plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai Abram’s wife.” It was Abram who said Sarai was his sister, a partial truth. Why did the Lord plague Pharaoh? What’s the cause and effect here?

A: The name Sarai שרי in Hebrew has the same letters as the word for a song (שיר) The song or singing is an expression of the creation, as reflected in the name of Avram (אברם), meaning ברא+ם, “created the 40,” or the manifestation.

Pharaoh (פרעה, 355) is an expression of disturbed human thought (מחשבה, also 355), or cognition that lures a person to believe that the human mind can absorb whatever it sees and make sense out of it.

Moreover, the marriage of brother and sister was well recognized in Egypt, that was how their kingdom operated. Therefore, the fact that Pharaoh took Abraham’s sister is ludicrous, because in Egypt “sister” was a synonym for “wife.” If someone were to take Pharaoh’s sister or wife, it would be casus belli, a cause for war, since it would be seen as a threat to the kingdom.

Any interference with life as it is creates more and more splits and distance from the Source. And taking Sarai is the act of splitting and separating reality into two, which is impossible. Can anyone capture singing and store it? People can catch birds, as things, but not the singing, the singing of life. Singing is nothing, impossible to grasp, like fresh air. For example, if someone tried to catch air with his fingers or his palms, he would be seen as someone biting himself.

The sages say that this event was a prequel to the ten plagues of Egypt, showing that man and his thought are not above nature. Man cannot control nature, nor life itself.

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