Imagine a universe where geography intersects morality. We plot our place by latitude, longitude, and decency. That’s what the Torah means by the question: Ayeka, “Where are you?” — from the root ayei. Like Magellan, Columbus, and Vasco da Gama, biblical heroes like Abraham, Sarah, and Isaiah are explorers — but on the frontiers of goodness.

Our sedra virtually opens (1:9) with visiting angels in human guise asking Abraham, “Where (ayei) is Sarah?” “Surely they already know,” Rashi observes. Where can she be in the middle of the wilderness, if not inside the tent? Ayei cannot be a geographical question; therefore, it must denote moral space, the madrega, or “rung” of goodness on which we perch. As they care for their guests, we discover that only physically do Abraham and Sarah reside in a desert. Morally, they remain committed to engaging, not abandoning, the world.

Our sedra jumps quickly to a place crying out for engagement: Sodom, where Lot has taken up residence and the next stop in the angels’ itinerary. Now it is the Sodomites who ask “Ayei?” “Where,” they inquire of Lot (19:5), “are the men [that is, the angels] who came to you last night?” Again, geographically speaking, the answer is clear: Where can they be but in Lot’s house? What the Sodomites want to know is what sort of people they are. Maybe they are fellow party animals, new and willing sexual players in Sodomite debauchery.

Where is Abraham during all of this? Having heard the angels announce their plans for Sodom, Abraham launched his failed negotiations with God on the city’s behalf, after which, “Abraham returned to his place.” (18:33) He had an option, of course. Our sedra has already informed us that Abraham is “a prophet” (2:7), so why didn’t he run off prophet-like, preaching repentance, to Sodom? Think of Amos personally denouncing the power structure of his time or, by contrast, Jonah fleeing in vain from his mission in Nineveh. Is Abraham presaging Jonah when he washes his hands of Sodom and returns home?

Tradition suggests that Abraham should have rushed to Sodom: Since the Zohar believes the entire world can be sustained by a single absolutely righteous person, Or Hachayim concludes, “If the uniquely righteous Abraham had descended into the depths of Sodom, he might have saved the place.” Think of Moses, who regularly overcomes God’s ire by refusing to abandon the sinning Israelite camp. Why did Abraham just go home?

The mystery disappears when we think of “home” not as a physical but as a moral address. Perhaps Abraham did hurry off to Sodom, hoping to save it from within. But so degenerate were the Sodomites that even Abraham feared for his moral integrity. Lot himself had practically succumbed to his environment just by being there — he actually offered his daughters to the unruly crowd bent on sexual depravity (19:8). Recognizing that Sodom was beyond prophetic intervention, Abraham concluded God was right. So he returned home to his moral place, rather than see his conscience corroded by Sodom’s wickedness.

The mark of wisdom is knowing whom we can save and whom we cannot. Jonah should have gone to Nineveh: God had told him Nineveh was not beyond hope. Abraham rightly abandoned Sodom, which would only have dragged him down into a quicksand of evil.

So think of our own country and ask Ayei? — “Where are we, morally speaking?” It has not been a good few years, what with recurring headlines of congressional and corporate wrongdoing and the telltale signs of selfishness that show up in a wealthy land where children still go hungry, the elderly eat dog food, millions go without health care, and the middle class shrinks while the gap between rich and poor is a widening chasm. God forbid we should be Sodomites, beyond the point where deliverance is possible. Maybe we are Lots, half-way into sin but still able to remember our former selves. We might even be Nineveh, properly hopeful of recapturing our best if only a prophet would come to remind us.

As descendents of Abraham, we can be such prophets. Assuming we are still a long way from Sodom, we ought to plunge into the midst of local and national affairs, not isolate ourselves from the public immorality we see around us. We should ask Ayei? of those in power and authority: Where are they on the ladder of human goodness? We are not yet at the point of having to “return home” as Abraham did, wiping our hands in silent despair at what our neighbors are doing.

The consequence of retreating into a tent of indifference would be this nightmare: Sodom once again, with ourselves at fault for letting it happen.