Toldot

[cellio]

The sixth aliya of yesterday's portion is particularly poignant and the trope helps amplify it, so before reading I gave an overview to help people listen for it. I said approximately:

In this week's parsha Yitzchak, now old and blind, blesses his sons before his death. In the fifth aliyah Yaakov tricks his father into thinking he's Esav; Yitzchak is initially doubtful but then accepts the deception. (Rashi says one of the reasons he doubted is that "Esav" was too polite.) The aliyah I'm about to read begins with Yitzchak's blessing of Yaakov. After this Yaakov will leave and, in the very same verse, Esav will come in for his blessing. When Yitzchak hears Esav he trembles, saying "then who was that?", and when they realize what has happened Esav begs his father -- "barcheini gam ani, avi", "bless me too, father". You can hear the desperation in the trope. Yitzchak responds that Yaakov took his blessing, and not only that, but listen to what I gave him. Esav begs his father again, asking "have you only one blesing?", and repeats his plea, "barcheini gam ani avi".

D'var torah:

It is clear that Yitzchak's blessing is vitally important to both of his sons. One son begs and pleads, grasping at straws, saying, essentially, "surely you can come up with something?". The other, portrayed as virtuous by our rabbis but not so saintly in the text, is willing to lie, cheat, risk the wrath of his brother, and be estranged from everyone for twenty years just to get this treat. Why? What's so special about Yitzchak's blessing?

Let us first establish what it is not. Yitzchak is not a prophet nor a messenger of God. He can wish well for his sons; he can ask God to grant them favor; he can say words that will reassure. But to all appearances he cannot himself grant anything; the dew of the heavens, the fat of the land, and the service of nations are God's to grant, not man's. Zichut avot, the merit of the fathers, goes only so far. Yitzchak's blessings are half hope, half prayer, but they are not guarantees. Surely his sons know this too. So why all the fuss?

I don't think it was really about the blessings.

I am not an only child, so the phrase "mom (or dad) likes you better" is not unfamiliar to me. As a child I both heard it and said it. Keeping score of parental favor seemed to be part of growing up. We wanted our parents to praise us, but we especially wanted them to praise us at least as much as they praised our siblings. Merit did not necessarily enter into it; we sought validation.

That's fine for kids, but what about Yaakov and Esav, who were grown men? Am I trivializing them, treating them like children? No, I don't think so. I think even as adults we sometimes behave like Yaakov and Esav, and the torah presents this lesson to us in a simple story to make it easier to see.

Most of us probably do not seek validation specifically from our parents any more. But don't we seek it from others? We want our managers to appreciate us at work, and not just for the financial reward that might come. We want the leaders of our communities to praise us, to take notice of us; we want to matter. We want our friends to tell us we're good people. When this doesn't happen, we are disappointed.

Wanting to be thanked and recognized for our work is healthy and natural. The danger comes when we feel validated only when this happens, when we are not able to see our own merit and must rely on others. I think we all know people who seem to assume they have no merit unless told otherwise, and I think we all fall into that trap ourselves from time to time. The good in us won't always be noticed by others. We have to be able to see it ourselves, and sometimes we feel too insecure to do that.

I'm not suggesting we become arrogant. Arrogance is the other side of the problem; it's what happens when we decide we don't need validation from anyone. We need to balance between arrogance and insecurity; our goal should be self-awareness -- honest self-awareness. We can provide our own validation, and it won't hurt as much if we don't get it from others. If it does come from others, we can enjoy the pleasant surprise.

I think both Esav and Yaakov had trouble with this. Yitzchak's blessing was so important to each of them because they were unable to see their own merits. Yaakov fixated on getting the blessing so much that it didn't matter if it was a lie, if this "validation" wasn't real. Esav needed his father to give him any blessing; it doesn't seem to matter what. Yaakov and Esav both felt validated only by good wishes from someone else, and they needed this external validation so much that they were willing to break up their family over it.

Let us not be like Yaakov and Esav. May we be secure in ourselves, so that praise from others is a treat but not our only source of sustenance.

Comments

[woodwindy.livejournal.com]

What a warm and insightful d'var torah -- thanks for sharing.

[cellio]

Thank you.

[ralphmelton.livejournal.com]

I actually ended up discussing this passage with Lori on the drive back from South Carolina. I didn't come to much conclusion; I said, "Gee, from the story, it seems clear that this giving of a blessing is something that is not sharable and has no takebacks. That doesn't match my model of a blessing at all. I wonder what it meant to them?"

[cellio]

A further question: If it's from a person what power does it have, and if it's really from God (just channeled through the person), do the people involved really think God can be fooled by a hide shirt?

Someone challenged me Shabbat morning, arguing that he was right -- what he said came true. But if you take that approach, where is the line between blessing and prophecy? (I say it's the difference between causing/influencing something and forseeing it.) When Yaakov "blesses" his own children at the end of the book of Genesis, it's much more clearly predicting that he's doing (you will do such-and-such, you will be thus-and-so, etc).

One other thing I should come back to sometime: Hebrew is less precise than English when it comes to imperfect verbs. "He will verb" and "may he verb" and I think even "he might verb" are all rendered the same way; you're supposed to figure it out from context. Well, what if the context isn't sufficient? I mean to ask my Hebrew professor when we get to imperfect verbs.

Where's Rebecca?

[(Anonymous)]

Your sensitive and cogent comments omit any judgments about Rebecca. Having been raised by a good feminist, I can somewhat understand her having to connive to have a role in the decision of who gets the blessing -- in today's world, surely both parents would discuss and arrive at some kind of joint decision (or am I being naive?). Nonethe less, if there is a villain in this story, I nominate her. Jacob is both a sneak and a mama's boy -- or maybe we should look at his description as ish tam, a simple man, and translate simple not as unpretentious or humble, but as not given a full complement of smarts. Ah, what a soap opera this is, the saga of our dysfunctional family.

Re: Where's Rebecca?

[cellio]

You're right; Rebecca was certainly a key player in this, and I didn't consider that. The "mama's boy" aspect is significant; thanks for pointing it out.