Parshas Lecho Lecho 5777

Abraham and the Fugitive

After the war of the four kings and five kings, and the capture of Abraham's nephew, Lot, a fugitive brought the news to Abraham as the Torah writes (Genesis 14:13):

The fugitive brought the news to Abram the Hebrew, who was dwelling at the terebinths of Mamre the Amorite, kinsman of Eshkol and Aner, these being Abram’s allies.

The question is who was that person? The simplest explanation is that it was a someone escaping from the war who knew of a relationship or some connection between Abraham and Lot. This is the explanation that Ibn Ezra (ibid) cites:

"The fugitive" - for he escaped and fled from the among the people Sodom, like it says "and a fugitive came from Jerusalem (Ezekiel 33:21)

However, the verse uses the word "הפליט" - "THE fugitive" instead of "fugitive" implying that this refers to a specific fugitive that we know about. This is why other commentators try to connect this verse with a fugitive known elsewhere. The Pesikta deRabbi Eliezer as cited by the Chizkuni (ibid) explains this was the angel Michael:

For at the time G-d throw down Samael and his side from the holy place, he [Samael] grabbed at the Michael's wings to make him fall with him, and G-d saved him and therefore his name is called "fugitive" and about him Ezekiel writes that a fugitive came to him (see Ezekiel 33:21)

Og, the Fugitive

Alternatively, Rashi (ibid) and the Talmud (Niddah 61a) identifies this person as Og, the king of Bashan:

According to the real meaning this was Og who had escaped from the battle with the Rephaim (see Genesis 5:5) and it is to this that the text refers (Deuteronomy 3:11) “For only Og king of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Rephaim”, and this is what is meant by נשאר “left”, for Amraphel and his allies did not kill him when they smote the Rephaim in Ashteroth Karnaim. So is the statement in the Tanchuma (Chukat).

The Sifsei Chachamim (ibid) says that the reason why Og came to Abraham was to get revenge against the four kings that killed out his people

and:

But according to the Midrash Genesis Rabbah (Genesis Rabbah 42) it refers to Og in allusion to him as the only one of the generation of the Flood who escaped that catastrophe, and this is what is meant (Deuteronomy 3:11) “of the remnant of the Rephaim”, for it is said. (Genesis 6:4) “The Nephilim (= Rephaim cf. Genesis Rabbah 26) were in the earth etc.” His intention in telling Abraham that his nephew was captured was that Abraham should wage war against the kings and that he should be killed so that he, himself, might marry Sarah.

As explained further in Sifsei Chachamim (ibid), in the first explanation of Rashi, the reason why Og is identified with the fugitive here is identified as a fugitive from the Rephaim later on in Deuteronomy. However, why do we identify Og as a fugitive from the Flood?

Genesis Rabbah (26:7) explains that giants are referred to with seven different names:

"And Nephilim were on earth in those days" - they are called seven names: Eimim, Rephaim, Giborim, Zamzumim, Anakim, Avim, Nephilim.

Thus, the Rephaim in Deuteronomy from which Og was a remnant are the same as the Nephilim before the Flood. Therefore we end identifying Og as having escaped from the Flood.

Og and the Flood

The question is how did Og escape the Flood?

Pirkei deRabbi Eliezer (23) describes one such answer:

And except for Og, the King of Bashan, for he sat on one of the beams of the Ark and swore to Noah and his children that he would be their slave forever. What did Noah do? He made a hole in the Ark and gave him [Og] food every day and he was also saved

According to this opinion. Noah saved him because Og agreed to be his slave.

It is also interesting to note that Matnas Kehunah (Genesis 32:8) cites a variant reading in a Midrash that Cain held on to the door of the Ark until the Flood washed him away which is similar to Og's story. It may be possible that there was a tradition that someone was outside the Ark but different Midrashim name different people as to who that was.

However, the Baalei Tosfos (Moshav Zekeinim, end of Chukas) writes that Sihon was the son of Noah and Og was Noah's stepson:

Noah's wife died before the Flood, and Noah married the mother of Og. Og was already born when her first husband was alive, and she married Noah once Og's father died. And she conceived Sihon from Noah before the flood and he was born in the Ark

According to this opinion, it would seem to imply the Noah would have saved him since Og was his stepson, although it does not describe how exactly.

[There is a third opinion that Og survived by going on top of a mountain or living in Israel, but I haven't been able to track down the sources for that yet]