Va-Yishlach: Jacob is so two-faced... and so is Israel!

In our Torah portion this week, a Divine messenger - an angel - attempts to change our ancestor, Jacob's name to "Yisrael." Oddly enough, it doesn't "stick." In Genesis, 32:29, the angel renames him... yet in the very next verse, the text begins, "Jacob said..." A few chapters later, God tries this again; yet this time coming down to change Jacob's name to Yisrael once and for all! Chapter 35, verse 10, states unequivocally: "God said to him, 'You whose name is Jacob, you shall be called Jacob no more. But Israel shall be your name.' Thus God named him Israel." Surely it'll work this time, no?? Four verses later, we read: "and Jacob set up a pillar at the spot where God had spoken to him..." (v. 14) What the heck is going on here?!? God has changed people's names before, and will do it again later, and every time the shift has worked. So how come Jacob - I mean, Israel - stubbornly refuses to let go of his birth name???

I had the pleasure of studying this text with Ohev's new rabbinic intern, Amotz Kohlmeier, this week, and we stumbled upon an interesting commentary. The Hebrew professor and Biblical scholar, Robert Alter, recently came out with a new translation and commentary on the Torah text, in which he discusses the life of Jacob... sorry, "Israel." He offers this fascinating insight when talking about the famous scene of Jacob (pre-name change) wrestling with the angel: "The image of wrestling has been implicit throughout the Jacob story." Alter refers to Jacob and Esau wrestling in their mother's womb; then Jacob stealing Esau's birthright and then their father's blessing; later, Jacob fights constantly with his uncle, Laban, and Laban's herdsmen; and now his life of struggle is made EXPLICIT with this name change. Another great commentary, that of Everett Fox, even translates the name "Yisrael" as "God-Fighter." It sure sounds like strife and contention are the hallmarks of Jacob's - dang it; Israel's! - entire life.

It sounds burdensome and exhausting to be constantly fighting like this, and yet I also find it incredibly human and relatable. None of us behave in one way, all the time, with every person in our lives. How we are with our parents differs from our interactions with friends, and is not the same as how we treat our children, which deviates from exchanges with students, colleagues, or co-workers. Does this make us two-faced? The implication of which is disingenuous, fake, hypocritical, and even devious? Personally, I think to be human is indeed about learning to interact differently with the various groups of people in our lives, and maybe that *is* two-faced (or three- or four-faced), but I don't think it necessarily has negative connotations. In the Torah text, our patriarch seems to hold onto *both* identities at the same time; sometimes feeling like Jacob and other times like Israel. On occasion, he is strong, confident, and a leader... while other times he cries, messes up, and is frightened. Isn't that true for you and me as well?

It isn't easy to balance these multiple identities. Having acknowledged all of the wrestling that Jacob (argh! ISRAEL!!) did throughout his life, things don't exactly get easier for him. There is more fighting, deception, and strife ahead. And again, I think there's an incredibly valuable lesson for all of us in this narrative. Maybe the goal isn't to achieve Oneness. Perhaps that is exclusively the realm of God. Our task is to strive for harmony and balance. We embrace the occasions where we feel fearful and insecure, and accept that it's ok to frequently NOT have all the answers. We also need to be present to our successes and our achievements, and allow ourselves to feel pride and gratitude for the things we are able to do well. The goal may be to find a sense of balance and equilibrium among these disparate emotions, personas, and characteristics. I think by the end of his life, Jac... *Israel* learns to embrace his various components. He isn't done wrestling or arguing... but at least he comes to an understanding about his varied roles and relationships. It seems to me that is a very good goal to which each of us can strive. After all, we are the Children of... Israel, aren't we?

CC images in this blog post, courtesy of:
1. JamieHarrington on Pixabay
2. Filip Lachowski on Wikimedia Commons
3. Wannapik.com
4. bertomic on Pixabay

L’Chaim (newsletter) article, November, 2021: Experimenting with Prayer

One of the congregations in New York City that is considered edgy, progressive, “out there,” and forward-thinking is called LabShul. Even the name of the community embodies who they are, and the principle they’re espousing with their “brand” really resonates with me. What might it mean to think of prayer, services, the Siddur, and our individual relationships with God as opportunities for experimentation and exploration? We don’t often think of the synagogue or the Sanctuary as a laboratory… but why not?

There is, of course, value in repetition and familiarity as well. The two do not have to be mutually exclusive. It can be a tremendously spiritual experience to close your eyes, sing along to the Shema or the Aleinu, or any other oft-repeated prayer, and just feel comfortable and in sync with everyone else. AND there are also times when we can - and maybe should - delve deeper into the meanings behind the prayers. I think it is vitally important to ask ourselves why we chant these words, why we sit or stand or bow, and why we start where we do, move along through these particular prayers in this prescribed order, and then conclude where we always have.

So, how would we find answers to these questions, and maybe discover new questions we didn’t even realize we had before?! Perhaps we need to put our services, our tefillot, under a microscope or in a test tube, and really investigate their core properties. Well, that is exactly what we intend to do! Starting on November 7th, our Sunday morning minyan is going to magically transform into “MinyanLab.” We are going to depart from the regular order of services, and instead focus on just 3 or 4 prayers, over the course of a 45-minute service, to really explore and dissect what they are all about. We’ll also incorporate some chanting and meditation, to help create the mood and proper atmosphere for prayer.

I want to thank Naomi Wicentowski, our new Ritual Committee Chairperson, for working with me on launching this, and a very special thank you to the minyan regulars - our Minyanaires - for allowing the congregation to experiment with our Sunday morning minyan. MinyanLab will take place *every* Sunday, and each week will focus on a different aspect of the service and how (and why) we pray.

I hope you’ll consider attending. MinyanLab can’t work if we don’t have participants to delve and deconstruct and question and explore. I want to go on this journey with all of you, and I want us to craft and discover meaning within Jewish prayer *together*. I can’t do it alone. So please bring your questions, your struggles, and your curiosity, and join me every Sunday at 9:00 a.m. (starting in November) for our new Ohev Shalom MinyanLab. Happy exploring!

Sincerely,

Rabbi Gerber

Va-Yeitzei: The Power of Biblical Karma

Karma isn’t something we talk about all too often in Judaism. But even when we don’t use the term, the concept is actually quite prevalent in the Biblical text… especially in Genesis. Time and again, the Torah wants its readers to understand that our behaviors and actions - all of them - have consequences. When we perform mitzvot and acts of kindness, we are often rewarded in one way or another. (And sometimes in ways we NEVER expected or could have predicted…) At the same time, when we behave deceitfully and hurt other people, a similar fate may indeed await us. Now, I think we all know this isn’t a one-for-one equation. You can’t observe a mitzvah and then be disappointed when you don’t see the immediate return on that “investment.” In fact, sometimes we may not notice the repercussions at all. Yet I personally feel that there is a lot of power in energy, attitude, and inclining ourselves towards the good. If you conduct yourself seeking out opportunities to love (all) your neighbor(s) as yourself, the compassion and kindness you are putting out into the universe DOES come back to you. And I would say that our Torah preaches that very same concept.

In this week’s parashah, Jacob has fled from his parents’ home, and he makes his way to his uncle, Laban’s house in Haran. It isn’t clear at first whether Laban knows what happened in Canaan, or why his nephew has shown up on his doorstep (tent-step?). Has word gotten back to him that Jacob deceived his father, Isaac, and stole his brother’s birthright and firstborn blessing? The text doesn’t reveal the answer explicitly, but the message is nevertheless conveyed loud and clear. When Laban tricks Jacob into marrying his older daughter, Leah, instead of the girl Jacob WANTED to marry, Rachel, Jacob complains to him about this dastardly thing that he has done. Laban retorts, “It is not the practice in our place to marry off the younger before the older…” (Gen. 29:26) It is possible that Laban STILL knows nothing of the drama back in Canaan, but it sure sounds like he’s throwing it in Jacob’s face: “Maybe you think that you, the younger child, can get away with anything you like back home… but that ain’t gonna fly around here, buddy!” Or, perhaps, phrased another way, the message that Jacob hears - and that really stings - is, “what goes around, comes around…”

But Laban isn’t exempt from this either. Every time we’ve seen him, he’s tricking someone, scheming something, or saying one thing while behaving in the opposite manner. Several times, he tries to ensnare Jacob or con him out of his wages, his livestock, or even his family! In the end, however, God helps Jacob keep what is rightfully his - due to hard work and honest behavior (maybe Jacob *finally* learned to improve his own karma…) - and punishes Laban for his dishonesty. By the end of Jacob’s twenty-year service, he has taken both of Laban’s daughters, his baker’s dozen of grandchildren, most of his flock, and more possessions still! I wonder if Laban had anywhere near enough self-awareness to see that his bad fortune was indeed the result of his own behaviors. He only had himself to blame for living by deceit and making his fortune through treachery. The end of his story brought him precisely the comeuppance he deserved…

What I especially like about this Biblical lesson is that it doesn’t apply to “bad” people in the Torah. Everyone, back then and even today, can be affected by the energy that we put out into the universe. Sadly, it doesn’t protect us from accidents, illness, pandemics, or tragedy. It isn’t a protective and impenetrable dome. Nevertheless, I believe our deeds matter, and in the long run, we DO experience reward for the mitzvot we perform and the acts of chesed (kindness) we commit to. If nothing else, we may earn the respect and gratitude of those around us, and from people who can see the true value of our character. Even then, bad things may befall us and we can always become the victims of bad luck… but I still stubbornly maintain that the karma we create follows us around through life. We certainly see it play out in the lives of Jacob and Laban, and it’s a message the Torah hopes you and I will take to heart as well.

CC images in this blog post, courtesy of:
1. Nick Youngson on Alpha Stock Images
2. Seth Lemmons on Wikimedia Commons
3. Zane A. Selvans on Jamesbeard.org
4. 8 Kome on Flickr

(Repost from 2013) Tol'dot: A Fresh Look at (Ancient) Mom and Dad

We don't get to choose our parents. There are a lot of things in life that we can control (or believe we can...), but one of them is NOT lineage. Nevertheless, our relationship with our folks can be turbulent. As children, we idolize our parents; as teenagers we're constantly embarrassed to be associated with them; and as adults we both discover how much we are like them, and we learn to respect their choices and challenges. But it can be a difficult relationship. Sometimes the patience and understanding we have for other people is hard to extend to family members. Our issues (and theirs) are just too close and too personal; we can't look at them objectively. All of these realizations that I've listed can also be transferred to our ancestors, our parents' parents a hundred times over. Usually, we don't know that much about these REALLY distant relatives... but then, of course, there's the Torah.

I've always struggled to understand Isaac. He seems to have no identity besides being the son of Abraham and the father of Jacob. He's a placeholder, a bench warmer. Overwhelmingly, the stories of our ancestor Isaac involve action that happens TO him or around him. He's never the active DOER, he never takes control of his life and his fate. Look at what we know about him: He is nearly sacrificed by Abraham; Sarah and Hagar fight over him; A wife is found for him; His wife and son trick him. Even in the stories of his interactions with the Philistines, we hear of him digging a well and being chased away by bullies, only to dig another one and be driven away again, and then a third time as well. What is the point of Isaac? What purpose does he serve?

But then I have to stop myself. We do this to people in our lives a lot, don't we? Think about whether they do or don't serve a purpose in OUR lives? We criticize who they are, encourage them to be 'better,' challenge them to shape up, and eventually try to threaten them into changing. And all because they don't look/act/speak/behave the way WE want them to. Maybe we're embarrassed that Isaac is our ancestor? We like strong leaders, like Abraham, Joshua, and David. But that is precisely why we have to remind ourselves that we don't get to choose our ancestors. We don't pick our parents, and we cannot force someone else to conform to our ideals or expectations. Isaac is a human being. In fact, I'm more certain that he was a real person than many other Biblical figures, because I doubt anyone would purposely write an imagined character this way! Just as we need to, in life, transition from eye-rolling teenagers to respectful adults, here too we need to accept Isaac for who he is, and strive to understand and make our peace with him.

So now that we're ready to take a fresh look at Isaac, what do we see? First of all, we surely underestimate the strength it took to survive the incident with his father on Mount Moriah. What must it have taken to persevere and recover from nearly being sacrificed on an alter by your parent? With no psychologists to help you process, and no prescription medicine?? He stayed in the land during a famine - a true test of faith - something his father was unable to do. Eventually, Isaac decided to become a farmer, a profession about which he knew nothing, and he became incredibly successful and wealthy. And perhaps the greatest lesson we learn about Isaac is that he was a man of peace. Despite provocations from Philistines, and strife between his children, Isaac remained a diplomat and kept his cool. And we miss all these things, because it's just so hard to admire Isaac when we're too busy judging him, and comparing him to other ancestors. Sometimes our emotions and our tightly-gripped grievances cloud our vision, and make it hard to appreciate traits that really are impressive and laudable. We just need to take a step back and open our eyes (and hearts) to really see that. What an important reminder to us all, whether we're talking about ancient forefathers or present-day fathers. 

Photos in this blog post:

1. CC image courtesy of Sam Hames on Flickr

2. CC image courtesy of Pimkie on Flickr

3. CC image courtesy of Jeff Sandquist on Flickr

4. CC image courtesy of roberthuffstuffer on Flickr