Комментарий к Берешит 18:3

'ויאמר אדני אם נא וגו AND HE SAID, MY LORD, IF NOW etc. — He addressed himself to the Chief of them; calling them all “lords”, (אדני may mean “my lords”), whilst to their Chief he said “Do not I pray thee pass away”, for he knew that if he would not pass by, his companions would certainly remain with him. In this explanation the word אדני has a “profane” sense (does not refer to God, being merely a term of address, “Sirs”) . Another explanation is that the word is “holy” (referring to God): he asked God to wait for him whilst he ran and invited the travellers. For although this is written after the words “and he ran to meet them”, yet the conversation took place beforehand. It, indeed, is the way of the Scriptures to speak in this manner as I have explained in my comment on “My spirit shall not strive” (Genesis 6:3) which is written after the passage. “And Noah begot” (Genesis 5:32) whereas it is impossible to say otherwise than that the decree of a respite of 120 years made in reference to this verse “My spirit shall not strive etc.” was twenty years before the birth of Noah’s sons.) Both these explanations of אדני are to be found in Genesis Rabbah 48:10 (see also Shevuot 35b).

‘ADONAY,’ IF NOW I HAVE FOUND FAVOR IN THY EYES. We find the word Adonay here in the books marked with a kamatz.⁷²A word whose end is voweled with a kamatz stands by itself and is not in construct form. This is not the case with a word whose end is voweled with a patach. Thus, Ado-noy voweled with a kamatz, must have reference only to G-d, but Adonay voweled with a patach, has a “profane” sense and does not refer to G-d. Ramban continues: Since we find the word in this verse written in the books with a kamatz, and Abraham was speaking to the angels, it must be because he referred to them by the name of their Master. Thus it must be that he called them by the name of their Master, i.e., with the Aleph Dalet,⁷³Ado-noy. as he recognized them to be angels of the Supreme One, even as they are called elohim and eilim.⁷⁴See Ramban, Exodus 20:3 and Leviticus 18:27. For this reason he bowed down to the earth to them.

אל נא תעבר, he addressed the one whom he considered the senior one of the three, saying “do not merely deliver your message and leave immediately, but take some refreshment first.”

ויאמר, אדני, אם נא מצאתי חן, He said: "my lords, if I have found favour, etc." We need to know why Abraham did not speak to all three of them at the same time. Bereshit Rabbah 48,10 mentions that Abraham said to the leader, Michael, that "a little water should be taken, etc." This is merely a homiletical explanation. How would Michael know that Abraham's invitation was addressed to all three of them when Abraham spoke to Michael in the singular?

ויאמר אדוני, our sages (Shevuot 35) are of two minds as to the meaning of the word A-donay in this verse. Some say it is sacred, an attribute of G’d; others hold that it is profane. If it is the latter, Avraham would have addressed the biggest one of these men. He would have used his own intelligence in making this choice. According to Rashi in the Talmud quoted, Avraham chose the middle angel, (man) as the one whom he addressed as their leader. We know that the angels are not all on the same level. We also know from the descriptions in the Book of Daniel that the senior angels may give instructions to their junior companions. (Daniel 8,16) Even though these men had come to him in the guise of men, human beings, seeing that Avraham had prepared water for them to wash their feet, he addressed the leader in the plural mode, -with the vowel kametz instead of in the singular mode with the vowel chirik as an expression of special honour. We find something parallel in Judges 6,15 when Gideon asked the (lone) angel ”my lord(s), (adonay) how can I help the people of Israel?” He had not been aware at that time that he was addressing an angel. The sages who hold that the word a-donay here is sacred, explain that Avraham used the plural mode because he was addressing G’d Who had visited him, asking Him to wait until he had been able to perform the duty of being a good host to these travelers who had suddenly appeared at the entrance of his tent. The lesson to be derived from this is that the merit of welcoming guests and making them feel at home is even greater than the merit of welcoming G’d into one’s house.

אל נא תעבור, “please do not just pass by.” According to the commentators who perceive this plea of Avraham as being addressed to divine beings, holy ones, i.e. Avraham asking G’d to wait until he had had finished attending to something he had already started, it is difficult, seeing that we know already that he had run to meet these messengers. What reason would he have to ask G’d to wait, seeing he had already welcomed G’d’s messengers? We would have to answer that he had experienced G’d’s presence departing the moment he had given his attention to the three men (angels) he had seen. When he turned in the direction of his vision again, G’d’s presence returned, and he asked G’d to wait until he had fulfilled his obligation of hosting his guests.

He was speaking to their leader... Rashi is answering the question: Why did he first say אדנָי, the plural form, and then אם נא מצאתי חן בעיניךָ, the singular form? Rashi answers: He was speaking to their leader [yet referring to them all]. And there is no difference between אדנַי and אדנָי; both are plural form. You might ask: How did Avraham know who the leader was? The answer is: He reasoned they were two disciples and a teacher. And normally, the teacher walks in the middle with the greater disciple to his right and the lesser one to his left.

ויאמר: אדוני, “the vowel under the letter ד is a kametz, to indicate that the word is used by someone who was aware that he addressed a messenger from G-d, not just a plural ending; (Minchat Shay) [For practical purposes this means that the word must not be erased as it is one of the holy names of G-d. Ed.]

אל נא תעבר מעל עבדך, the word נא is a kind of plea, Avraham begging these strangers not to pass him by without stopping to take some refreshment. The reason why this whole incident has been recorded in the Torah is to teach people how to relate to fellow human beings with charity and love. It is an act of loving kindness to welcome guests into one’s home in order to honour them and to look after their personal requirements, such as letting them wash up and stay overnight.

אל נא תעבור מעל עבדך, “do not pass your servant by.” He addressed these words to the senior one among them, including his two companions in his remarks. Alternatively, he addressed each one of these individuals separately, asking them to stop by. Some commentators believe that he only needed to make this request from one of them, as the other two had come to deliver a message to him (as opposed to dealing with the Sodomites.) They therefore had to stop by his house to deliver their messages.

Both explanations are in Bereishis Rabbah.e., the explanations of whether אדני is holy or profane—not those of לא ידון וכו'. (Kitzur Mizrachi)

The reason Abraham addressed only Michael was that he felt that the other two were going to come to him even without a specific invitation, seeing that G'd had despatched them with messages for him. One was meant to cure him, the other to inform him of the impending birth of Isaac. The same did not apply to the third angel Gabriel, whose function it was to destroy Sodom. He had no task to perform in Abraham's home. This is why Abraham appealed to him not to depart until he had partaken of his hospitality. Gabriel consented.

PASS NOT AWAY, I PRAY THEE, FROM THY SERVANT. Abraham spoke to each one of the angels, as is the way of the whole Torah: Ye shall keep all My statutes… and do them;⁷⁵Leviticus 20:22. According to the author of Kesef Mezukak, the verse here should be [ibid. 18:5]: Ye shall keep My statutes, and Mine ordinances, which if a man do…. Here, as in the succeeding examples, the verse begins with a plural and ends with a singular because the Torah speaks to each person. The nakedness of thy father, and the nakedness of thy mother, shalt thou not uncover;⁷⁶Ibid., 18:7. And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corner of thy field;⁷⁷Ibid., 19:9. And from thence ye will seek the Eternal thy G-d, and thou shalt find Him, if thou search after Him with all thy heart and with all thy soul.⁷⁸Deuteronomy 4:29. The greater part of the Mishneh Torah⁷⁹The book of Deuteronomy. See ibid., 17:18, for origin of the expression. is written in this manner. A counter-example to the above is the verse: Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse.⁸⁰Ibid., 11:26. Here He speaks to the whole congregation as a unit and not to each person individually.
Now our Rabbis have said,⁸¹Bereshith Rabbah 48:9. “Abraham spoke to the chief of the angels.”⁸²According to this opinion, the word Adonay does not refer to G-d. It is also possible that he said to the chief, “Pass not away, I pray thee, [in the singular sense], and thou and thy companions who will remain with thee wash your feet,” [the verb “wash” being in the plural form].
The correct interpretation appears to me to be that he called them all “lords,” and he turned to each individual, saying to the first one: If now I have found favor in thy eyes, pass not away, and to the second one he said the same, and the same to the third one. He begged each one individually: If now I have found favor in thy eyes, pass not away, and, let now a little water be fetched, and all of ye wash your feet.⁸³Verse 4 here. This was by way of ethical conduct and respect out of his great desire to show kindness towards them. Now he recognized them as transients who did not have the desire to lodge there. This is why he asked of them only that a little water be fetched to wash their feet a little from the heat, to give cold waters to a faint soul,⁸⁴Proverbs 25:25. and that they recline under the tree in the cool of the day without coming into the tent and the tabernacle.

אל נא תעבור מעל עבדך, “please do not continue without stopping by at your servant.” Avraham addressed the most important one of them. To the question how he knew which one was the most important one, the answer is that the other two appeared to walk alongside him on either side in the manner that students do when they accompany their Rabbi. We know this from the Talmud, Yuma 37. The text there reads as follows: when the three angels appeared to Avraham, Michael walked in the center and Gavriel and Rafael on either side of him. (Our sages supplied us with the order of the hierarchy of the angels. (Compare an interesting edition called malachey elyon, by Rabbi Reuven Margolit, published by Mossad Harav Kook.) Rashi adds; “even though the Torah reports Avraham as running to meet them after he had already addressed them, the Torah did not report this in the chronological sequence. He had run to meet them before, as otherwise he would have had to shout at them. You might disagree by quoting the Talmud in Pessachim 6, according to which the principle of the Torah not being bound to report in chronological sequence only applies when two or more different occurrences are discussed, and here we are dealing with a single occurrence; but according to Rashi, the system used by the Torah here, is the one known as מקרא מסורס, “a truncated verse.”