blessings: on whose authority?

[cellio]

This isn't the first time I've wondered about this, but the first relevant Torah portion just came around again so it's now fresh.

(For those following along, we're in Parsha Toldot, Gen 25:19 - 28:9.)

Rivka and Yaakov engage in a bit of trickery to enable Yaakov to "steal" Esav's blessing from Yitzchak. (Yaakov disguises himself as Esav, Yitzchak blesses him as the first-born, and then Esav shows up and says "hey, where's my blessing?".) Later, we will see Yaakov bless all of *his* children. And the content of these blessings is about future fortunes -- who rules over whom, who will have plentiful harvests, who will receive riches, and so on.

There's just one problem with all of this: why do *men* have the power to hand out these blessings? Blessings of this sort are in God's jurisdiction, not man's. *We* can't control who will be rich vs. poor, satisfied vs. hungry, and so on. At best, Yitzchak is making a *prayer* for Yaakov's future (and so on for the others who hand out blessings in the Torah).

The author of one of the parsha commentaries I read every week (Rabbi Mordecai Kamenetzky) just sent his out for this week, and he talked about the blessings. (Not on this point -- something else about the whole exchange.) So I took the opportunity to write and ask about this.

His response was interesting: just as we need physical additives for some aspects of life (God makes the grain but *we* make the bread -- we have to add our work), we also need spiritual additives (prayer augments God's actions). In other words (this is me talking now, not the rabbi), we can through our actions enhance God's actions, and our participation is at least sometimes actually *necessary*. We can't just sit back and wait for God to bail us out or whatever.

This resonates. A few years back when I was just starting to "get religion", it felt as if God was trying to get my attention but it would have stopped if I hadn't then turned around and reached out to Him. My active participation was necessary to build the relationship that eventually grew from those first tentative steps (when I wasn't even sure God existed).

And as an aside, rabbis who answer email from random strangers within minutes are pretty darn cool. :-)

Comments

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

Basically, it all boils down to the point reiterated in several cultures. The American Indian saying, "Call on God, but row away from the rocks," is one good example. Here's the joke versions of the lesson, one Christian and the other Jewish in origin.

A priest sailing across the ocean falls overboard in a choppy sea. He prays to God to save him. Soon, a boat comes by, and the Captain offers to pull him aboard. The priest declines saying that God will save him. Later, a helicopter swings by and offers to rescue him. The priest declines again, saying the same thing. Eventually, of course, he tires and drowns. At the throne of God, the priests asks why God did not save him. God says, "I sent you a boat and helicopter, what else did you want?"

Max prays to God hoping to win the lottery. He doesn't win it the first year, nor the second year he prays even harder, nor the third. Finally, he curses God, demanding why He has not answered his prayer. A voice from Heaven resounds, "Max, meet me halfway. Buy a ticket."

do not rely on miracles

[cellio]

I agree with the "call on God but row away from the shore" approach (and have always enjoyed those two stories). This seems, from the plain text, to be a slightly different situation, though; we're told that Yitzchak is "blessing" his sons (and later Yaakov), but blessing seems to me to be God's sole right and power, not Yitzchak's. If we interpret it as prayer rather than blessing, though, it's much less presumptuous. And the whole idea of us being in partnership with God is important, and reiterated in many places by the sages.