Abraham is told that the covenant is between him AND HIS SEED. Women don’t have seeds (sperm), they have eggs. So: How can you say that Judaism passes through the mother? Are you really going to tell me that Erza understands the Books of Moses better than Moses understands the Books of Moses?
Answer:
The Sages derive from verses in the Torah that the Jewish religion is transferred through a person’s maternal lineage. This, however, is not true of the Patriarchs, who were not part of the “Jewish nation” that came into being upon its redemption from Egypt. With regard to the Patriarchs, the lineage is paternal, as befitting the promises given to Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov.
Concerning the question of “seed,” the Torah mentions a woman’s “seed” in a number of places (e.g. Bereishis 24:60), so that there would be no problem for the promise to be fulfilled by maternal lineage. Even were this not the case, there would not be difficulty in suggesting that the nation of Israel is called the seed of Avraham, even if the belonging to the nation depends on maternal lineage.
Sources: Concerning the Patriarchs, see Nedarim 31, where the “seed of Avraham” is defined as Yitzchak and Yaakov.
