This week’s post will be my last of 2021. Thanks to all of you fabulous readers for sticking with me for yet another year of Take on Torah. It boggles my mind that I’ve posted well-over 600 times over these 12+ years. Thank you.
I also want to add that I’m dedicating this post to the Daled (fourth) and Hey (fifth) grade classes in our Hebrew School. They put together a terrific D’var Torah for this Shabbat, and truly inspired this post. I feel really blessed to get to work with such awesome students! 🤩🤩
What does it mean to bless someone? Is it just something nice you say to them? “I think you’re great!” Or “you look lovely today.” Are those blessings… or just nice compliments? These were some of the questions I discussed with our Daled & Hey students over the last few weeks, as we prepared a D’var Torah together for this
parashah. I think what really threw them for a loop (along with basically anyone reading Genesis, chapter 49…), was how our ancestor, Jacob seemingly intended to offer blessings to his children before he died… but then cursed and scorned several of them! Some of his “blessings” were pretty terrible... perhaps even mean. So that really challenged us to discuss what it even means at all to bless someone. I invite you to take a moment for yourself and think about how you would answer that question…
First of all, Jacob only blessed his sons, which upset everyone in the class. What about his daughter, Dina?!? Patriarchal society, sure, but total silence?? However, we then read the first couple of “blessings,” and decided that maybe Dina actually dodged a bullet. He started off telling his oldest son, Reuben, that he’s the firstborn and deserving of honor (v. 3). BUT then proceeded to chastise him for something that happened *years* earlier (4), and ended his words with rebuke and a curse, all because of this grudge he never could shed (or even express aloud!). As if that wasn’t bad enough, his second… um… “blessing” (?) was even worse. He admonished his two sons, Simeon and Levi, also for something that happened years prior (5-7), and finished his statement by declaring that he did NOT want to be associated with the two of them. Ever. Yikes.
Some of his subsequent declarations were much more kind and praising… but in some ways that just made the bad ones sting even more! Many of the students in the class were incredulous, and when they each took on the persona of one of the children, and expressed how that person felt about their father's words, even the ones who got good blessings mostly just expressed how badly they felt for their “siblings.” So having read all of Jacob’s… er… opinions, we came back to this challenging question of what it means to bless someone. And we discussed how it could indeed be praise or filled with kindness, yet we also acknowledged that sometimes it can be about saying something hard to hear. Perhaps Jacob meant to challenge his more rebellious children; bluntly telling them that if they don’t shape up, bad things will befall them? Or even if he didn’t intend it that way, we talked about how the recipients of these reproaches could choose to reframe them for themselves, and vow to prove their father wrong! In a way, that too could serve as a blessing, regardless of intent. As a wakeup call, an eye-opener, or a jarring rebuke; it could *still* prove beneficial if the person took action or changed their behavior, to ensure that the future would be better than the prediction.
My favorite part of this endeavor - other than the wonderful responses the students created for each Biblical character - were the blessings their parents offered them. The class teacher, Allison, and I asked each child’s parents to offer a short blessing for their child, using the guidelines our class had discussed about what is, and is not, a blessing. What they wrote was truly beautiful. And it reminded me that blessings can be incredibly powerful. Our words can lift someone's spirits… or scar them for life. And when phrased as a blessing - one that actually intends to help and inspire the person - it can be an incredible force in their lives. So my final takeaway from this Torah portion, and this wonderful class (and the end of 2021...), is to not let any moment go to waste. We should bless one another now, later, and as often as we can push ourselves to think of it. It can be an immense gift to share with someone, and it costs us absolutely nothing. At this holiday season, and as we prepare to enter a new year, let’s think about the gifts we give one another. Let us perhaps move away from the material presents, and instead offer a blessing and some inspiration to one another, which can really help each and every one of us start this new year in the very best way possible.
I'll offer you an intention to conclude this post: We often say that kind things "go without saying." They're obvious and known; why mention them? I challenge us all to have our sentiments of goodness, kindness, praise, and support instead go WITH saying. Even if/when you think they know it already, take a moment and say it. Out loud. Trust me. May you all have a blessed AND HEALTHY start to the new year!
No comments:
Post a Comment