When the Parts Work Together

This week’s Torah portion is Mishpatim, judgments or laws. These laws were given to Moses by God, after the 10 Commandments. The experience of the Revelation, being so close to God, was too frightening for the people; so they asked Moses to hear the laws from God and to tell them what God wished to say. There are over 50 laws in this portion, ranging from laws concerning murder, injury, theft, care for and destruction of property, negligence, and social justice. There are laws about the punishment fitting the crime, integrity of words and actions, and also about not oppressing a stranger, a widow, or an orphan, those weakest in society. Finally, there are laws about the 3 agricultural pilgrimage holidays and a vision of God, seen by the Moses, Aaron, his two sons, and the 70 elders. In the Zohar, the book of Splendor from the Middle Ages, in the commentary for Mishpatim it says, “when one (Section 2, Page 124a) observes the ordinances of the Torah and diligently studies it, it is as though that one diligently studied the Divine Name. For the whole Torah is an enfolding of the one Divine Name, the most exalted Name, the Name that comprehends all other names;” This poetic comment is at the opposite pole from the actual words in this portion. We can study the laws as they are here given; and either agree with them or disagree with them; and either do them or decide that they have been superseded by advances in society. In this portion we can find the best of the Torah: the striving for social justice; and also the worst of the Torah: those laws about slavery or the possibility of the death penalty for lesser offenses than premeditated murder. This portion begins with laws: with reasonable demands that we can all understand; but ends in a mystical vision: gazing at the appearance of God, God’s throne, and the purity of the sapphire brickwork under the feet of God. Between these two poles: the logical and the mystical, lies the question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” which comes from the story of Cain and Abel in B’reisheet, the first Torah portion. Taking into account the reality stated in the quotation from the Zohar about the Divine Name; everything that is “named” in this portion, in the whole Torah, is God’s Name. Everything that is named, described, and taught, is God, because that’s all there is. The people in this portion: the widow, orphan, and stranger are God. The slave, the pregnant woman, the thief, and the virgin; the seducer and even the donkey crouching under its burden are all God. We are all a tiny part of God; “the name that comprehends all other names.” God is immanent in us, but transcendent over us. So what is the problem that is being set out for us? This portion is, in a sense, not only about action but also about peace. The S’fat Emet quotes the Psalm (29:11), “God will bless God’s people with peace,” and we say in the second Torah blessing, “God has implanted eternal life within us.” Then the S’fat Emet goes on to say, “this well is opened by the peace wrought by these statutes. For this reason the Midrash quotes here, you have established uprightness (Ps 99:4) because these statues lead people to love one another. The problem we must solve, then, is one of coordination: of getting all the parts to work together as a well oiled machine in which all the components are all operating harmoniously toward a productive end. If God is one, then everything is God and the challenge is to have it all working as if we are all one. That can only happen when we take care of each other, are fair to one another, and understand that the welfare of the whole is what we need to be aiming for, not just our own welfare; because our welfare is God’s welfare, is our neighbor’s welfare. When we cause pain, or create untruth, we cause a tear or a hole in the fabric of existence. We cause a breakdown in the oneness and harmony of the working parts, and we, ourselves will experience the pain we cause to another. We ourselves will fall into the hole we have dug or torn. It is all God, and that is why harmony is so important. Disharmony works against existence, against life, against us. Untruth severs the source of the electric current from the light bulb, so it can’t light up. The commandments are given to purify us and the Torah ties them all together so that we have a chance to understand it all. Torah is a reflection of the Oneness of all existence. It explains how all life should work, when it’s working properly. That understanding is so precious for us, because it gives us a chance to be part of a universe that is pulling together and not pulling apart. When we are focused on the welfare of the All, we are given glimpses of Divinity; intimations of the purity that is God and the harmonious, productive place that the world is meant to be. May each of us strive to realize these truths, so that the design of Oneness can become the reality; so that we can work happily, being at One with existence and expressing the harmony of all life.

Are we leading or being led?

This week’s Torah portion is Beshallach, which means, when he sent. When Pharaoh sends the Israelites out of Egypt, God leads them, with a pillar of cloud, away from the coast of the Mediterranean: not North but South. Hemmed in by the Sea of reeds ahead of them and the pursuing Egyptians behind them, the people despair that their lives are over. They cry out of God, who urges them to go forward. And you know the rest. God splits the water. They travel through the sea in safety, but the pursing Egyptian chariots and horsemen drown: the Divine retribution for throwing all male Israelite babies into the Nile. Then the people sing a song of gratitude to God. The beginning verse of this portion reads: “God did not lead them by way of the Philistines, though it was near, for God said, perhaps they will be led, when they see war, to return to Egypt.” And later it says, “God went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to have them led along the way.” And in the song of the Sea, the people sing, “With your kindness you have led this people that you redeemed. You led with your might to your Holy abode.” We can see that being led: God leading us, is prominently featured in this portion. It also says that God took the people around toward the Sea of Reeds. The word around, ya-save, connotes a circle, and in fact, we originated in Canaan and eventually returned to Canaan. The question is, how does all this leading fit in with our conception of Free Will? Are we really choosing or are we being led? We know that we do have free will. We can choose what to say and what to do. We change our reality every day by our choices. The Torah, even at the very beginning of Genesis, takes a stand for the beginning of history and linear progress over the passive acceptance of the ancient idea of the wheel of life: that nothing ever changes and we are merely repeating lives that have been and will ever be the same. There is a story in Midrash about “a king who had a son to whom he wished to bequeath an inheritance, but he argued: ' If I give it to him now that he is small, he will not know how to take care of it; I will therefore wait until my son learns how to write and can understand the value, then I will bequeath it unto him.’ This is what God said: … I had better give them the Torah first and then bring them into the Land.” Midrash Rabbah - Exodus XX:15 This passage speaks about learning and future choice. The Talmud (Er 53b) talks about this too. It says, “I was once on a journey when I noticed a child sitting at a cross-road. By what road, I asked the child, can we go to the town? This one, he replied, is a short way that is long and that one is a long way that is short. I proceeded along the short but long road. When I approached the town I discovered that it was hedged in by gardens and orchards. Turning back I said to him, ‘My child, did you not tell me that this road was short?’ — ‘And’, he replied: ‘did I not also tell you: that it was also long?’ The statement “there is a long way that is short and a short way that is long.” leads us to believe that the destination is the same, but that there are two ways to get there; and choice is at the heart of the difference. The seemingly easy way out of a situation may, at first look more promising than a scrupulously moral, ethical decision. And yet, though we may think it’s the easy way, we are really being led, like pharaoh, to our doom; or like the Israelites who could have gone North, to an insurmountable barrier. In a Biblical sense, we could ask, are we choosing life or choosing death? Perhaps what we are being taught is that certain of our choices are pro-life and lead to progress, while other choices will send us circling back on ourselves so that we end up stuck: unable to make that freeing forward movement that feels good and right. I’ve been speaking about choice seen through a personal lens, but it can also be seen through a collective lens. Martin Luther King said, “On some positions, Cowardice asks the question, "Is it safe?" Expediency asks the question, "Is it politic?" And Vanity comes along and asks the question, "Is it popular?" But Conscience asks the question "Is it right?" And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but we must do it because Conscience tells us it is right.” Heschl spoke about choice in two essays quoted in the collection Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity. He says, “the tragedy of man is that he is so great and that he fails to recognize his greatness. Jean-Paul Sartre has said ‘Man is condemned to be free.’ God has given us choice, the greatest obligation of freedom. God is waiting for us to exercise that choice. (P 218) …This is the decision we have to make: whether our life is to be a pursuit of pleasure or an engagement for service. The world cannot remain a vacuum. Unless we make it an altar to God, it is invaded by demons. This is no time for neutrality (P. 75).”
What is true of the aggregate is also true of the individual. How are we to decide which choices will propel us forward and not back? When the Israelites were paralyzed with fear of the past, represented by Pharaoh’s pursuing army, and also of the future, represented by the Sea of Reeds, they cried out to God, the correct response in this situation. God’s answer was, “let them journey forth.” Choose the future, not the past: not old patterns or going backward. Choose with courage! The Rimanover Rebbe said, “Belief and trust are linked. One who firmly believes also trusts.” We are being led, but how soon we get there and in what way is up to us. Free will determines how our life feels. Does it feel free with the freedom of forward movement, or does it feel like the slavery of being stuck in old patterns and the hopelessness of the repeating wheel of life? The Torah tells us that we are being led toward movement and progress, out of our metaphoric Egypt. The details, the scenery, and the comfort of the journey are in our hands. We are on the way. How long will it take us to get there?

Coming Back

This week’s Torah portion is Bo, which means, Come. God commands Moses to go to Pharaoh to warn him of the last three plagues. Later in the portion, the Israelites are given instructions about the Pesach offering to God, in preparation for departure; and the protection of marking the doors with the blood from the pesach offering; and also staying inside, away from danger. We are given our own calendar and the commandments concerning Passover, to celebrate it with matzah and bitter herbs as an eternal decree; the consecration of first borns to God. Then Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt.
The beginning of the portion reads, “God said to Moses, Come to Pharaoh, for I have made his heart and the heart of his servants stubborn, so that I shall place these signs of mine in his midst; and so that you may relate in the ears of your child and your child’s child how I made a mockery of Egypt and of my signs that I placed among them; that you may know that I am God.”
This portion is notable for many reasons; among them is something it does not say. Moses has repeatedly come before Pharaoh with the plea that Pharaoh let the people go on a three day journey to bring sacrifices to God. Perhaps the request is a ploy to allow Pharaoh to save face, but in any case, Moses’ request is unsuccessful. What is never said is: enslaving and subjugating people is wrong. God never says to Moses, Tell pharaoh that cruelty to other human beings, that making people suffer, is wrong. The question is, why is this never said? The first few phrases of this portion may allude to why. One reason is that we already know that cruelty is wrong. But how do we know? A clue in the text speaks about the heart. The S’fat Emet points out that the heart is always mentioned, never the mind. Also, the text says, “that I may place these, my signs in his midst.” But “In his midst” b’kirbo in Hebrew, also means within him. We are being directed to think about our inner selves. What is being addressed here is often called Natural Knowing: the emotions, the intuition, the gut, and not the conscious, intellectual functions of thought and reason.
It has been suggested that all wisdom is like a hologram rather than a photograph. In a photograph you can snip off a small price and that piece contains just the part of the picture that you cut off. But even the very tiniest piece of a hologram contains the entire picture. So it is with spiritual wisdom: we each contain the whole of spiritual wisdom in some way, whether we are conscious of it or not. Rabbi Arthur Green says, in a commentary to the writings of the S’fat Emet, “Truth is already implanted within us.” The Chassidic teaching is that the Torah is within us – those ethical commandments and deeds of loving kindness that help us to feel good about ourselves and know we are doing the right thing in the world. It’s a perfect system. What is good; what is right, feels good. Love feels good. Food feels good. Unselfishness feels good. The text gives us more clues about how to continue in this line of thinking. If we consider the name of the portion, Come; Come to pharaoh, in light of natural knowing; the word, Come, rather than go, begins to make some sense. Bo begins to mean, Come to a union, even with pharaoh. Disunity must cease. I am leading you to a new place; a place of coming together. The commentary also suggests, “I, God, am with you.” We are going on our mission together. Perhaps the opposite of love is not hate. The opposite of love may be winning; domination; subjugation. We are being led back to unity – to peace – to harmony, the fundamental nature of God. This is the completion of the cycle of creation. First there was One. Then creation occurs. Out of a multiplicity of forms, objects, forces, people; out of the many comes a re-union, on a different basis. Not undifferentiated Oneness, as before creation, but differentiated Oneness: the ultimate multiculturalism on the grandest scale possible, with no one and nothing left out. Forced to leave the Garden of Eden, because we have become fully conscious and responsible for our choices, we are given the mission of striving to create a new garden, based on the natural knowing that love and unity are correct and subjugation incorrect. May God help us to stay on the path that leads back to singularity. May our ability to choose love over winning, respect over disdain, and unity over separation, help us to be of those who embody the vision of eventual Oneness. May we be agents of positive change as we create harmony in our relationships, understanding and appreciating that we are playing a part in the redemption which, we hope, will occur long after we are gone. In Pirkei Avot, Rabbi Tarphon said: It is not up to you to complete the work, but neither are you free to refrain from it either. Bringing goodness and unity into the world depends upon us. Come, and we will do it together, and you will know, and your will feel that it is good.

Planting Suggestions

This week’s Torah portion is Va’eira, which means, and He appeared. God speaks to Moses about the Divine Name and promises to redeem the Israelites, which reassures him. But when Moses tells the people of a coming salvation, they don’t listen, because of their servitude and hard work. Moses again has doubts about the success of his mission and brings his frustration to God. God is patient, repeatedly speaking to Moses and Aaron, to give them insight and also a positive outlook. God says, “I shall harden Pharaoh’s heart and I shall multiply my signs and wonders.” Then later God says, “Pharaoh will not heed you,” and later, “Pharaoh’s heart is heavy.” Here, God is giving Moses a window into the process of redemption, a psychological view of what needs to happen before Israel is freed.
Commentators have struggled to reconcile how God could harden Pharaoh’s heart with the principle that God never takes away our free will. I have explained this to myself with the thought that increasingly cruel decisions produce increasingly more drastic results; power meeting power; and that rule still applies, but additionally there is another way to look at this contradiction.
Did you ever get ready to leave for work in the morning when an idea popped up in your mind like: should I take an umbrella, or did I put my phone, my keys, or my papers in my briefcase or pocketbook? Do I have my gloves? I have a feeling it will rain.. Of course, we all have. And some of these little thoughts we ignore and some we pay attention to. Some are warnings, and one of the principles of Torah is that there is usually a warning before something unfortunate happens. But also, some of these little thoughts are suggestions, and I believe these suggestions are planted there to help us and also to be tests. We always have free will as to whether to pay attention to them or not. Our free will is never taken away. We have the ability to choose freely – to decide and to act, or not to act, on these suggestions. These suggestions are opportunities in disguise: the opportunity to pass tests which is really grasping onto rungs of a ladder put there for us; to lead us to increased understanding of the reality of our relationship to God and to the world; to open our eyes to a deeper reality than the one with which everyone is familiar. We all have many voices inside – not only the two common ones, the optimist and the pessimist, but also the soul’s yearning voice, the generous, and the selfish voices, and many more. The suggestions that occur to us test us and allow us to choose which voice to pay attention to: the voices of conventional and logical reasonableness or the voices of joy and aliveness, faith, hope, and understanding.
It is interesting that God instructs Moses in this psychological way of thinking. God says, Pharaoh’s heart is heavy. In other worlds, Pharaoh is an unhappy person. He is suffering. I have sent him suggestions about what to do. He won’t choose to listen to the voice of kindness or compassion because of his own misery. It’s obvious, God seems to be saying. Even you, Moses can see it’s true. Even you can predict what Pharaoh will do. It will take a tremendous show of power to get him to pay attention to you. He will be very, very hard to educate.
It is a well known Jewish teaching that no one is given a test unless they can pass it. Not that we always do pass tests, but that we can; that we are capable right now, just as we are, of passing them. So in this New Year, let us all be aware of the possibility that the little thoughts that pop up in our minds are suggestions planted there for us, for our benefit – as tests – that we can evaluate; and that can lead us to increased understanding and to a more active relationship with God. The choice is up to us. May all of our choices lead us to great blessing in this New Year.

The Path to Becoming a Tzaddik

This week’s Torah portion is Vayeishev, which means, and he settled. Jacob settled in Canaan with his wives and 13 children. The teenage Joseph, second to the youngest, used to tattle on his older brothers. Joseph was the favorite son, the one given the coat of many colors or coat of fine wool, denoting family leadership; the dreamer who dreamed of future leadership, and let everyone know it. In this Torah portion, the brothers are pasturing their father’s flock and Jacob sends his young son, Joseph, to bring back a report. In essence, he is sent to tattle. When they see him coming, his brothers conspire to kill him. Reuben, the eldest, steers them away from murder, suggesting they throw him into a pit, with the intention of rescuing him later. Judah, the fourth son, advocates selling him to a passing caravan, agreeing with Reuben, saying, “Let our hand not be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh (Gen. 37:27).” The brothers decide to follow Judah’s lead and they do put Joseph into the pit. While they are eating a picnic lunch, traders sell Joseph before they can make a profit themselves, and he is eventually taken to Egypt and resold, ending up as a slave to Potifar, a high official.
This story pivots on hatred and jealousy – two emotions that are in every human heart. At this season of social and family gatherings, it may come up for us, making an unwelcome appearance in our lives. Why are we given these attributes? How do they serve us and, from a spiritual perspective, why are they wrong? The verse, “He is our brother, our own flesh,” is very enlightening. In a sense, all hatred is self hatred. This can be seen in the well known situation of the self hating Jew. But also, since the truth of reality, which the Torah teaches, is that we are all one: we are all part of each other. We are all brothers, sisters: family; and we are all part of the Divine Oneness. So we recognize in others that quality that is part of us: hatred or jealousy, and return it outward. Or we find a lack in ourselves and blame another person for it.
Hatred and jealousy come from a faulty understanding of the world. Rashi comments: snakes and scorpions were in the pit. The brothers placed Joseph physically in the place where they were emotionally: a place of snakes and scorpions. They separated themselves from Joseph, trying to get rid of their own negative feelings toward him. In a sense, all sins are sins of separation: separating us from one another and from God. If the truth of existence is that we are One, then any separation goes against the way the Universe is made. It is a step backward, toward the corruption of society in the time of Noah, rather than forward, into the messianic vision of the future.
One of the underlying principles of the Torah is that one who separates will herself or himself be separated. This was true of Rebecca, who was separated from her beloved son Jacob. It was true of Rachel, who was separated from Jacob, her husband, Joseph and her newborn son Benjamin, and from life itself, by her early death. And it was true of Judah in this Torah portion, whose wife and two sons died untimely deaths. Hatred and jealousy are challenges within us that we can strive against. They are prime attributes that we can decide to overcome, providing rungs on the ladder leading toward spiritual progress. They can spur us to goodness when re recognize them and honestly admit to their source within us. They can show us a path of action to redress wrongs or injustice in our relationships and in the greater society; and they can help us to achieve and attain for ourselves what we have always wanted to be, IF and only if, we put these attributes in the service of unifying and not separating. The world looks separate to us and is not. People look separate from us and are not. Hatred and jealousy hurt us, not others. The path to becoming a tzaddik, a righteous person, is long, but Joseph the tattletale achieved it. The brothers: Reuben, Judah and the others achieved it. And so can we. May jealous and hatred not find a place to lodge in our hearts, and may we grow in goodness and righteousness, acting out of and choosing the truth of our unity.

Spiritual Completion & How We Grow

This week’s Torah portion is Toldot, which means offspring. It tells of Isaac and Rebecca’s family and the birth of Rebecca’s twins. The first baby to be born was covered in red hair, so they named him Esau. Rashi says everyone called him Esau because he was fully made, completed. Esau comes from the verb ASA, to do or to make, and Esau was also a doer: a man of action. Jacob was born second, grasping Esau’s heel, and he was named Yaakov, heel or that which follows. The JPS commentary also links Yaakov to the Semitic word for protection, a plea for Divine shelter and blessing. The Torah gives a brief description of the two boys. About Esau it says, Esau became one who knows trapping, a man of the field. The description for Jacob reads, and Jacob was a quiet man, abiding in tents. Not all translations say quiet. Rashi says wholesome. The Women’s Torah commentary says homespun. Another translation is mild. But the Hebrew says, Tam. Tam literally means finished, perfect, complete whole, innocent, or simple. It is the same word used for the Simple Son in the section of the Passover Hagaddah that tells of the four children, or the four sons. The simple son is the one who is Tam: whole or complete. We can see that Jacob and Esau were very different, but that each was complete in his own way. Esau is physically complete and ready for action. Jacob’s completeness is more about inner resources, the ability to be quietly alone, to be a thinker, the ability to meditate, the ability to be in relationship with people and not only with things; but also he is a planner and a schemer. Neither boy had it all, but each was described as being complete. Their completeness brings us back to a verse in B’reisheet: “The heavens and the earth were finished and all their array. By the seventh day God completed the work which God had done, and abstained on the seventh day from all the work which God had done. God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it because on it God abstained from all the work which God created to make.” The verb, to make, Laasot, is puzzling. The end of the quotation should say, that God Made. To make, points us into the future. From this our sages derive the principle of Shutfei Elohim, being in partnership with God. My teacher, Rabbi Gelberman expressed it this way: God said, nothing I do anymore will be done alone. From now on we will finish the work of creation together. And this is precisely the case for Jacob and Esau, and also for us. We are born perfect and complete, just as creation was perfect and complete after the sixth day of creation. But we are also incomplete. The S’fat Emet expresses this in another way: “All things are brought into being by God. But the point is hidden and we have to expand it. This depends upon the point within us, for the more we expand our own souls, the more God is revealed to us in every place.” We are meant to be a work in progress that we, ourselves are bringing to completeness with our Divine partner. Or rather, that God is bringing to completeness with us as a willing or unwilling partner. Jacob and Esau are again instructive. As young men, their lack of a trusting, loving relationship is obvious. Esau’s anger and hostility toward Jacob for stealing the blessing and Jacob’s scheming, manipulative nature, his willingness to trick his way through life and run away from his problems repulse us. But their actions should give us great hope. Who of us doesn’t cringe at things we have done when we were younger, or even last year? If Jacob and Esau can become holy, so can we. As middle aged men, in next week’s Torah portion, Jacob and Esau have left their infantile selves, having done the inner work that allows them to express their love for each other and to see Divinity in each other’s faces, reestablishing their deep bond of understanding and caring for each other. We, too, are being led on a path of spiritual growth and development. Just as we have an innate program of physical development that unfold in our bodies, so we have an innate program of spiritual development that unfold in our souls. The events of our lives, our choices, and our feelings about our choices and those events are the engine which propels our growth. Each experience is an opportunity or test for us to choose with love, caring, and generosity. Each choice comes with the feedback of our feelings about how we have used the gift of free will. This is the creation of new Torah within us every day. This is how God communicates with us. Each new day is an opportunity to triumph over our yesterday’s selves. We may lose the contest numerous times before we are ready to advance. But we will surely advance, for we are being led by the Eternal One toward perfection, wholeness and the spiritual simplicity of pure love. Flawed as we are, Jacob and Esau teach us that each of us can attain great spiritual heights. Our sages said, “The offspring of the righteous are good deeds.” May we participate eagerly and fully in our growth toward righteousness, and may all our choices be deeds and words and thoughts of holiness and love.

Chaye Sara: The Life of Rebecca

This week’s Torah portion, Caye Sara, the life of Sara, is named after our first matriarch; but really centers on the life of Rebecca, Rivka, the second matriarch. Sara dies and Abraham buys the Cave of Machpeleh in order to bury Sara. Then Abraham sends his head servant back to his family in Mesopotamia to select a wife for Isaac. The servant, Eliezer, prays to God that, when he asks a maiden for a drink, the girl who says to him, Drink and I will even draw water for your camels, will be the one who has been Divinely chosen to the be the right bride for Isaac. He is not even finished praying this prayer to God when Rebecca appears and says those exact words. The servant is amazed, caught in a coincidence that he knows is supernatural.
Last week I spoke about Abraham’s kindness and willingness to give, and how the giving and receiving of love is the model for all receiving and giving in the Universe. Abraham’s kindness was demonstrated again and again by his actions. Here we see in Rebecca the same qualities. There is very little in the Rabbinic commentary about Rebecca. I always felt a little embarrassed about Rebecca. One of the few complimentary things I found about her is from the Zohar (I:50a), which says,“For when a man is at home, the foundation of his house is the wife, for it is on account of her that the Shekinah departs not from the house. So our teachers have understood the verse, “and he brought her to the tent of his mother Sarah” (Gen. 24: 67), to indicate that with Rebecca the Shekinah came to Isaac's house.” Perhaps my talk tonight might be titled, A Tribute to Rebecca. Her actions show that she was young and energetic; kind and generous. The text says three times that, like Abraham, she hurried to help. She ran to the spring and kept running to draw water until all the camels had enough to drink. The servant gives her gifts and inquires whether he and his entourage may spend the night. She answers that there is room and plentiful feed for the camels at home. Like Abraham, she is one who offers hospitality. Eliezer has arrived to find almost a second Abraham. The similarities do not stop there. Eliezer asks her family for Rebecca’s hand in marriage for Isaac. They agree. The next morning Eliezer asks to leave with Rebecca and her family asks him to remain ten months to a year. But Eliezer wants to leave immediately. Thank God for the history of women that Rebecca’s family asks her permission before they send her off. They ask, “Will you go with this man?” She says, without any hesitation, “I will go.” This parallel’s Abraham’s leaving his homeland when he received God’s call, without any indecision or questioning. Their ability to seize opportunity, resulted for both of them, in their receiving undreamed of spiritual and material gifts. Rebecca’s plucky optimism, trust, adventurous nature, and her willingness to say “Yes” to life, betting on a happy future; shows that she is Abraham’s spiritual heir, as well as his biological heir. She is, in fact, his Grand-niece.
It is Rebecca who, in next week’s portion, inquires of God about the twins jostling inside her and receives a response, making her a prophetess. It is also Rebecca who is the cause of Jacob’s stealing the blessing, taking the responsibility upon herself, but thereby insuring the spiritual legacy and continuation of Judaism. Perhaps she used the only weapons a woman had in that society, not direct confrontation, but indirect, yet decisive, action. And speaking of action, like Abraham, who went to rescue Lot, Rebecca rescues Jacob twice. She takes the blame upon herself, instructing him to lie to his Father. Then, by subsequently sending Jacob off to find a wife with her family in Mesopotamia, she further insures his survival and the continuation of their line. Sending him to her family resulted in Jacob’s 12 sons becoming the 12 tribes of Israel. Not that lying and deceiving are to be condoned. Quite the contrary: but we should remember that Abraham did it too. We are told he lied twice. Perhaps it’s a case of us giving God lemons and God making lemonade, for these actions all resulted in mostly positive outcomes.
Rebecca is our first convert: like Abraham, a person of courage and generosity, kindness, action, optimism and faith. She was wise in her choices and visionary in her actions. Perhaps we should speak about Abraham, Rebecca, and Jacob when we mention our Patriarchs, for she deserves our admiration and gratitude, not only for our continuation but also for the quality of our spiritual legacy. Rabbi Nachman of Breslau famously said, “A person walks in life on a very narrow bridge. The most important thing is not to be afraid.” And Rabbi Gelberman’s book Spiritual Truths says this too: “When we expect good we are sensitive to all its signposts. We do not miss the boat!” Rebecca’s fearlessness as she looked into the face of the unknown, her willingness to help, her taking a stand for what she knew was right, no matter the consequences, her strength, and her faith in God, make her someone we can look up to. May an appreciation of her life help us to let go of the fears that keep us from finding and experiencing our own blessings. May we confront life as she did, having faith in the goodness of life, with optimism for the future; and giving of ourselves, that we may be a blessing to others and receive all the good that is surely coming to us.