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PARASHA VAYISHLACH
GENESIS 32:04-36:43
RABBI ARTHUR L. SEGAL
RABBI DR ARTHUR SEGAL www.JewishSpiritualRenewal.com/books www.FaceBook.com/Arthur.L.Segal www.FaceBook.com/RabbiArthurSegalJewishSpiritualRenewal www.RabbiArthurSegal.blogspot.com
Jewish Spiritual Renewal
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"Strummin' on Her Ol' Banjo"
SYNOPTIC ABSTRACT:
Esau and Jacob meet after 34 years of separation. Jacob wrestles with the Angel and is renamed "Israel." Jacob and his 11 sons, one daughter and four wives arrive in Shechem. Dinah, his daughter, is raped. The brothers trick the men of Shechem into thinking that Dinah can be the wife of the prince of Shechem, and that all of Shechem may join the Children of Israel, if all the male Shechemites circumcise themselves. They agree to
this. On the third day, while the men of Shechem are in pain from this surgery, the brothers slaughter them.Rachel gives birth to her second son, Benjamin, but dies in childbirth. Reuben sleeps with one of his father's wives. Jacob sees his father, Isaac, after many years of absence. Isaac dies and is buried by both Jacob and Esau. The generations of Esau are listed before the parasha ends. To learn some more, please read on.
Most of the commentary on this portion is deeply shaded by the times in which they were written. Talmudically, these were times under Roman conquest. The period of Rashi's time, circa 1060 CE, was under church domination and relentless persecution. Even up to the twentieth century, commentaries are overshadowed by the Shoah and anti-Semitism. In all of the these, Esau is painted as being evil. Esau is called Edom (blood red). The Torah states that one of the many descendants of Esau is Amelek (Gen. 36:11). The Talmud records that Esau's descendants are the product of incest and adultery.The Talmudic rabbis say that Esau is the father of the Romans. They say he stuck a stick into the Mediterranean Sea and that sand began to collect around it. Within time, the Italian peninsula was formed. The Church replaced the Roman Empire, and therefore, indirectly, as one reads between the lines of the rabbinic writings of the Middle Ages, Esau is embodied in the anti-Semitic practices of the Church. But let us peel back 2000 years of layers, as we have done so many times in this series, and see what the Torah is really teaching.
We first need to remember that it was Jacob who steals from Esau. Jacob finds that Esau is coming toward him with 400 men. Jacob is frightened. He does not know Esau's intentions, but he assumes they are bad. So Jacob prepares militarily. Jacob strategically divides his camp and prepares a tribute for Esau. When Jacob sees Esau, he walks towards him bowing seven
times. Esau, on the other hand, runs toward Jacob,"embraced him, fell upon his neck, and kissed him, and they wept" (Gen. 33:04).
Jacob's emotion is fear. Esau's emotions are love and joy. Jacob has to beg Esau to accept his gifts. Esau says that he already has "plenty."
Esau wants to help Jacob by assigning him some of his people. Esau wants to ride along with Jacob so that they can become brothers once again. But Jacob lies to Esau and says that he has a slow caravan, and that Esau should go on ahead and that Jacob's group will catch up with Esau's group at Seir. Esau agrees. Jacob however, takes a different direction and ends up in Succoth, and eventually in Shechem.
The Torah is clear that Esau harbors no bitterness toward Jacob. Yet Jacob projects his belief system unto Esau. In Jacob's world, if you cheat someone, there will be "payback." Laban cheated Jacob with the wife-swapping episode. Jacob retaliates by tricking Laban with a bit of genetic animal husbandry. Jacob assumes Laban will be upset, so he sneaks way from Laban, never allowing Laban's four daughters and grandchildren
to say goodbye. Laban comes after Jacob. Jacob is "afraid" (Gen. 31:31) then also.
The rabbis of the Roman Diaspora parse the words of this portion to make sure that Esau is 100% bad. They place dots over the words for "kiss" to tell us that the kiss was insincere. They say that Esau, when he fell on Jacob's neck, was really planning on biting Jacob's jugular vein and kill him. The rabbis write that when Esau says he has "plenty," he was boasting. Jacob says that he has "everything"(Gen. 33:11). The rabbis posit that a righteous man always has everything, as he trusts in God, but an evil man has plenty because he continually counts his possessions.
They say that because the Torah does not say that Jacob and Esau kissed when Esau left before Jacob did, the implication is that Esau's intentions were evil. The Midrash says that Jacob gave Esau annual tribute to appease Esau. The Talmud says that when he refused Jacob's gifts, Esau was being insincere.
The Midrash records that before the Rabbis would negotiate with the Romans, they would read this parasha first. They said it taught them to pray to God for strength and guidance, to act obsequiously, to give tribute, to keep apart from the Romans, and be secretive. The rabbis used this same technique for two millennia after. The Talmud records how rabbi Yannai went to negotiate with the Romans and forgot to read this portion
before he went. His trip was a dismal failure.
The Midrash blames Jacob for the eventual Diaspora. The rabbis write that Jacob should have taken the long way around Edom and avoided Esau, because no good ever comes from meeting and negotiations with non-Jews.
They cite how when two Hasmonean brothers were having a power struggle over the control of the Second Temple, the weaker brother invited the Romans to help him. This is how the Romans gained a foothold in Israel, which eventually lead to the Diaspora.
The rabbis of the middle ages say the same rules apply to the "new Romans"-- the Church. Even discourse with Christians on any matter of substance was disallowed. The church-demanded debates between their clerics and the Jews' rabbis almost always ended in tragedy for the Jews.
Jacob and his family settled in Shechem. Dinah,"the daughter of Leah...went out to look over the daughters of the land" (Gen. 34:01). The Talmud says we are reminded that she was the daughter of Leah because Leah also "went out." In Genesis 30:16 Leah is described as going out to meet Jacob to tell him that it was her turn to have sex with him that night.
The Talmudic rabbis say that this behavior is appalling and call Leah "she who is fond of going out." They say, regarding Dinah, "like mother like daughter," and blame the rape on Dinah's behavior. We still see this thinking in courtrooms today. Some Arab tribes today will kill family members who are raped, as it brings shame to the family.
The men of Shechem want to leave in peace with Jacob's family. They offer Jacob land to live among them and to trade and intermarry. The brothers say that the Shechemites must become circumcised. This is the Hebrew method of conversion. The Shechemites are not converting for sincere reasons. They think it will be good for trade, as well as for a source of wives for them, and husbands for their daughters.
The sons of Jacob deceitfully accept them into the covenant of Abraham and then kill them three days later. The rabbis say that this is allowed, as the men of Shechem were not going to be sincere Jews and accept Torah values. Are they reading the same Torah we are today? What values did Jacob and his sons possess? Jacob is a master of deceit. He learned this well from his mother and his uncle Laban. Even two of his wives, Leah and Rachel, were in cahoots with Laban, because how else would Leah have tricked Jacob into thinking she was Rachel on the wedding night?
The Talmud says that Rachel was under the bed, talking to Jacob, while he was having sex with Leah, so that he thought he was with Rachel. The rabbis say that Jacob's sons were justified in killing all of the men of Shechem, as rape is one of the seven prohibited Noahide laws. But 400 years later, we learn in the Torah that if a man rapes a virgin, he has the option of marrying her or paying her father a fine. There is no death penalty for rape of a virgin. If you rape another man's wife, it is adultery and therefore punishable by death.
We also learn in the Torah that before a war is fought, your enemy must be given a sincere chance to make peace. Further, when a Jewish army attacks, it must leave open an avenue of escape for the enemy. When is it a Torah value to condemn an entire nation for the sin of one man? Jacob's only concern about this annihilation is not based on Torah morality. It is based only on his fears. He is only concerned that friends of the Shechemites will "band together and attack" him (Gen. 34:30).
What is the Torah trying to teach us? Are we being taught that xenophobia and deceit are admirable traits? Are we being taught that wholesale slaughter is good? Of course not. If anything, we learn in a few portions later that this behavior against neighbors will eventually turn brother against brother.
In the Sephardic Haftarah, Obadiah says "as you did, so will be done to you" (Ob.1:15). Obadiah prophesied during the reign of King Ahab and his Queen Jezebel.
In the Askenazic Haftarah, the 8th-century BCE Hosea says that Jacob's sons "lie," "deceit," and are "wayward toward God" (Hos. 12:01). Hosea accuses Jacob of stealing from Esau while they were still "in the womb" by taking "his brother by the heel" (Hos. 12:04). The prophets deplore this behavior and agree that the ends do not justify the means.
We are taught in this parasha that Jacob wrestles until dawn with "a man" (Gen. 32:25). When dawn broke and the fight was over, Jacob asked this man for a blessing, and Jacob was given the new name of "Israel." "Israel" means "prevailed or struggled with God." The Talmud says that this "man" was really the guardian angel of Esau and was Satan himself. They see Israel as the champion of good, and Esau as the leader of bad.
Remember, the rabbis of this time assign evil to Rome, and the Church that follows Rome, as a direct descendant of Esau. Later in the Torah portion, in Genesis 35:10, we read that God also renames Jacob to Israel . But the Torah says that this will not be a permanent name change. The rabbis posit that when Jacob is involved with mundane things, the Torah calls him Jacob. When Jacob is involved in spiritual affairs, he is called Israel.
When Abram received the new name of Abraham (father of nations), he is never referred to again as "Abram." Abraham's new name is permanent. But Jacob does not get a permanent name change. This is because Jacob did not wrestle with the guardian angel of Esau, or with Satan. Jacob wrestled with himself. Jacob wrestled with the spark of God that is inside each of us. All of us have the potential to be "heels" and therefore deceitful (as the name "Jacob" means in Hebrew). Yet all of us have the power to be Godlike as well. We have to continually struggle and wrestle to be truly "Israel."
What we learn from this Torah portion is not how to behave like our Talmudic rabbis thought, but how not to behave. The fight is never over. It is never over internally nor externally. Someone will always try to be "in the kitchen with Dinah, strummin' on her ol' banjo." We cannot control others' behaviors. We cannot control outside forces. But we can control our attitudes and responses to events over which we have no control. It is up to us to find ways of dealing with life's tragedies in ways that do not pull us spiritually down, along with the physical or emotional pain we experience. This is our eternal struggle. This is why we are the Children of Israel.
Shabbat Shalom,
RABBI ARTHUR SEGALRABBI DR ARTHUR SEGAL www.JewishSpiritualRenewal.com/books www.FaceBook.com/Arthur.L.Segal www.FaceBook.com/RabbiArthurSegalJewishSpiritualRenewal www.RabbiArthurSegal.blogspot.com
Jewish Spiritual Renewal
Jewish Renewal
Jewish Spirituality
Hilton Head Island, SC; Bluffton, SC; Savannah, GA
If visiting SC's Low Country, contact us for a Shabbat meal, in our home
by the sea, our beth yam.
Maker of Shalom (Oseh Shalom) help make us deserving of Shalom beyond all
human comprehension!
Jewish Spiritual Renewal
Jewish Renewal
Jewish Spirituality
Hilton Head Island, SC; Bluffton, SC; Savannah, GA
