TorahParsha

How should work define us?

(for Parshat VaYeitzeh)

 

i

Jacob loves Rachel.

He asks her father Lavan

to shepherd Lavan’s flocks

in exchange for Rachel’s hand.

And Jacob shepherds for Lavan for twenty years,

day and night.

(And the name Rachel means sheep.)

*

Jacob’s sons describe the family thus:

we are shepherds

as our fathers were.

*

This family holds no divide

between shepherding and marriage

between shepherding and lineage

between work and family.

 

ii

Jacob’s children become slaves in Egypt.

When God frees Jacob’s children, He says:

Gather in your homes with your families

to a feast of lamb;

place lamb’s blood on your doorposts

so you, inside, will not be engulfed

by the havoc I bring on Egypt.

*

So lamb—shepherding—

becomes the divide

between family and Egypt

between slave-master and home.

 

iii

At first the family

is only another realm for work.

But leaving Egypt,

our calling,

our work,

becomes the food we feed our families

becomes the substance that protects our home.

Work exists

so the family can be.

*

It is in this reversal

that freedom comes.

 

 

____

Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

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Who can lead?

for Parshat VaYeitzeh

 

i

Lavan promises his daughter,

Rachel,

to Jacob

for a wife.

On their wedding night

Lavan switches Rachel

with Lavan’s older daughter,

Leah.

Jacob does not know

until morning.

*

(But Jacob does marry Rachel, too, in the end.)

 

ii

So Leah becomes

the accidental wife.

And Leah names her first three sons

saying these things:

- With this first son, now my husband will love me.

- God has heard that I am hated, so He has given me a second son.

- My husband will join me now  for I have birthed him three sons.

*

This is naming

of Lavan’s world—

where another decides

who you are;

where another decides

who is a bride,

the chosen daughter,

a wife,

beloved,

unloved.

 

iii

With her fourth son

Leah says:

this time

I will Praise HaShem.

She names him Judah,

Yehudah,

Praise God.

*

In Judah

Leah ends

Lavan’s worldview:

she becomes simply one woman,

praising God.

 

iv

And Judah will sire

the line of David,

father of kings.

*

—perhaps to show

that the leader we seek

will not rule us:

but he will bring us to know ourselves

enough to come to God.

 

 

Based partly on Rav Amnon Bazak’s writing on the Books of Samuel 

 
_____
Shabbat shalom,
Abe

 

Please pray for for Ayelet Yakira bat Chaya Hinda Matel Nechama, and for NeshamaEmunah bat Batya
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Thought for Parshat VaYeitzeh

Is traveling spiritual?

 

i

Jacob leaves his father’s house to go to Charan.

On his way he comes to the place.

The place is not named

(although later it is named).

*

Jacob falls asleep.

He dreams of a ladder.

The ladder’s base is on the earth. Its top is near God.

Angels of God ascend and descend on it.

*
Here is the gate to Heaven, Jacob says.

 

ii

When you travel from place to place, you are in no-man’s land.

Your place has no name,

as Jacob’s place has no name.

*
But traveling, you learn that you can arrive at a place from somewhere else:

Charan from your father’s house.

*

From this knowledge, you can understand how all directions are connected:

how above can be reached from below

how you can walk from Earth to Heaven.

You will see the tall ladder, spanning from Earth to Heaven.

You can see the creatures ascending and descending on it.

 

iii

If you can see that you can reach Heaven from where you stand, then you will know that you are at the gate to Heaven right now,

wherever you are.

 

 

Based largely on Avivah Zornberg 

 

____

Shabbat Shalom, Abe

 

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 Please pray for the infant Achinoam Rina bat Avital Hodaya, and please continue to pray for Ahuvah Rachel bat Orah and for Rachel Tovah bat Yehudit Esther

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Vision (for Parshat VaYetzeih)

i

Jacob sleeps in a place.

 

Suddenly, God appears to him in a dream.

 

Jacob says: HaShem is in this place, and I did not know.

 

*

Jacob is to marry Rachel.

 

But on the evening of their wedding, Lavan—Rachel’s father—switches Rachel with her sister, Leah.

 

And it came to pass that in the morning, behold: it was Leah.

 

*

Jacob is a man who does not see.

 

He does not recognize the place of God.

 

Even in the morning, the text never says: Jacob saw Leah.

 

 

ii

Later Jacob grows wealthy. And Lavan grows to mistrust him.

 

And Jacob saw the face of Lavan; and behold: it was not towards him as before.

 

*

Jacob saw the face of Lavan.

 

Jacob has learned to see another person.

 

 

iii

It is then that God, who has not spoken to Jacob for twenty years, says to Jacob: Return to the land of your fathers.

 

And Jacob journeys away.

 

And angels met Jacob.

 

And Jacob saw the angels.

 

And Jacob said: This is God’s camp.

 

*

Jacob sees the face of another person.

 

In this he becomes able to see God’s world.

 

________

Shabbat Shalom, Abe

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