There’s something so richly rewarding about returning again and again to our foundational stories in sefer Bereshit year after year. As we learn in Perkei Avot, often translated imprecisely as ethics of our fathers, turn it turn it, for everything is in it. I approach Torah year after year with the intuitive sense that something new will emerge—Torah will reveal herself to me in an entirely new way this year. My experiences, like Torah, therefore, can never be static. The inner life of the spiritual seeker is one of profound self-inquiry, uncovering layers of our past and present experiences as if we were pulling back the endless layers of an onion.
These twelve weeks of inhabiting and immersing ourselves in the profundity, tragedy, trial and triumph of sefer Bereshit are weeks of such richness that determining how one ought to focus one’s Torah teaching is an exercise in self-limitation. Though we divide the Torah into 54 parshiyot designed to be read over the course of a calendar year, the narrative flow and contiguity between parshiyot, particularly in Sefer Bereshit is something we must not lose awareness of.
We were introduced to Yaakov Avinu, our third and final patriarch last week in parashat Toldot when we learn that he emerged into the world grasping the heel of his older brother, Esav. We later learn that Yaakov was a simple man, a tent-dweller, perhaps in our pandemic time we might call him a natural introvert or homebody. By contrast, Esav is a man of the outdoors, someone who loves to hunt. Their relationship was a rocky one from the get-go—perhaps our Torah is hinting at discord when it presents us with contrasting profiles of the two brothers, just as it will contrast two sisters in our parsha this week. This discord comes to a head at the end of parashat Toldot following Yaakov’s stealing of Esav’s blessing through an act of deception orchestrated by Rivka. Numerous commentators, contemporary and historical alike have offered insights into Rivka’s decision-making process, Yaakov’s choice to go along with it despite initial misgivings and Yitzchak’s reaction—did he know what was going on or didn’t he?
What interests me most of all is something deeper and yet more profound. Ours is a tradition that does not shy away from the hard, messy reality of human life. How many of us find ourselves part of deeply flawed, profoundly imperfect and truly, deeply human family structures? Our Torah records these foundational ancestral narratives, and we return to them year after year because we know in our bones that they are just as human as we are, and we are no less human than they were. Our western conception of religion seems to tell us that religious figures whom we revere and look up to, in one fashion or another, must by their very nature and designation as holy be without flaw. By contrast, our Jewish tradition argues the opposite. Our humanity in all of its messy, complex and contradictory reality has existed from the very beginning and we will continue to contain multitudes far into the future. Our Torah, speaking to us in every generation and throughout time and space records these foundational narratives because they have the power to reveal so much about ourselves. It is easy, perhaps, to look at Rivka’s orchestration of a tremendous act of willful deception and respond assuredly that G-d-forbid, we would never act so crassly. If we hold to the idea that progress is inherently linear, a notion deeply popular in the west, then it is easy to look at an ancient, far-removed text, read this episode and dismiss it outrightly as a relic from a bygone era. Our Torah cautions against this smugness and asks us to look deeply within and engage in some soul-accounting or cheshbon nefesh. When have we acted deceptively, deliberately or accidentally? Have we made choices that resulted in someone feeling stripped of their human dignity or agency? What were the underlying conditions, physical, psychological, spiritual and emotional that lead us to that point?
Our Torah also demonstrates to us repeatedly that our decisions and actions have consequences, consequences which can last for generations. In our parsha this week, Laban, Yaakov’s uncle and the father of Leah and Rachel engages in an act of deception which mirrors in some important respects that which Yaakov and Rivka perpetrated against Yitzchak when he reverses the marriage order. Yaakov awakes after what he believes to have been his wedding to his beloved Rachel only to discover that he had married and spent the night with Leah, the elder sister, whom our Torah contrasts with Rachel by describing her eyes as being dim, weak, not as beautiful. Though Yaakov does marry Rachel, he is never settled. His father-in-law, Laban, mistreats him, changing his wages many times. Rachel and Leah’s relationship is a challenged one and Leah, knowing in her very soul that Yaakov’s affections are squarely with her sister is left seeking, yearning for that which remains distant from her.
Leah, often seen, unfortunately in my view, as the least consequential of our matriarchs offers us a glimpse into the complex but all-too-real reality that so many experience of being made to feel like an outcast in their own families. From the very depths of what I can only surmise was unspeakable grief and pain, upon the birth of her fourth son, Yehudah, Leah says she will now thank Hashem and names Yehudah thusly. We am Yisrael, the Jewish people, carry that sense of gratitude, of hoda’ah because of Leah’s expression of pure gratitude. And we know that that gratitude does not erase the pain, the injustice, the unfairness of it all. Oh, do I wish the circumstances of Leah’s life had been dramatically different. And indeed, how might Yaakov’s life have been different had he not engaged in willful deception? Furthermore, how would Yitzchak’s life have been different had the Akeida—the near-sacrifice—not taken place? One can only imagine the permanent psychological imprint of that trauma.
When we revisit these narratives year after year, we are asked not merely to immerse ourselves wholly in what we might comfortably describe as the dysfunctional lives and family structures of our ancestors. We are also asked to immerse wholly in the stories of our own lives. What an opportunity our Torah presents us with if we choose to accept it. It is certainly not easy but toiling in Torah is never meant to be simple, straightforward, without struggle. May Torah continue to reveal herself in all of her beauty, uniqueness and profundity to each of us, individually and collectively.
Torah From A Mussar Perspective Mishpatim 5781
Our parsha this week, Mishpatim is largely concerned with providing us the beginnings of an answer. We are given laws governing interpersonal disputes, property conflicts and so much more. It is one thing to stand as a collective at Sinai to receive the Torah in all of its richness. That, indeed, is another-worldly experience. It is another to come down the mountain, as it were, and begin to integrate that experience into the messy, complex, challenging reality of what it means to be human.
In Exodus/Shmot 23:1-2, we learn:
“You must not carry false rumors; you shall not join hands with the guilty to act as a malicious witness. You shall neither side with the mighty to do wrong—you shall not give perverse testimony in a dispute so as to pervert it in favor of the mighty.” (JPS Translation).
We are to act truthfully and righteously in all of our interactions, being sure neither to perpetuate false and malicious rumors nor to side with those who act wrongly in service of their own power and prestige. We might understand the Torah’s command in a number of ways. Many of us are experiencing heightened tension with those in our pods, given that we have spent many months with just them. In a time, such as ours, when our bandwidth for disagreement and conflict is short, and when our external culture rewards polarization and strife in service of the ego and personal power, it is tempting to opt for falsehood and rumor over truth and messiness. Too many of us lack skillful means for managing emotional upheaval and personal conflict. I imagine that our ancestors who, for so long, lived lives lacking in personal agency, found themselves learning as they went how to establish what we would today call boundaries with others as a means of managing interpersonal conflict as they established themselves as a nation. Our rabbis teach that the Torah is eternally relevant, speaking to each generation in its own way. So, too, does the Torah speak in the language of human beings. Our Mussar practice encourages us to do daily cheshbon hanefesh, soul accounting, as a vehicle for encountering our own soul curriculum and areas for growth.
My teacher, Rabbi David Jaffe of the Inside Out Wisdom and Action Project, which is a space for Jewish social changemakers to engage with Mussar practice as a means of building a deeply rooted spiritual practice to sustain them in their work, teaches often about the middah of savlanut, frequently but imperfectly translated as patience. In our Western cultural context, so consumed by the need for instant gratification, savlanut can feel unattainable. In a society so beset by systems of inequity and structural oppression, savlanut can ring hollow at best and feel deeply alienating at worst. Yet, Rabbi Jaffe reminds me that Savlanut is, at its core, the capacity for us to respond with equanimity to conditions that arise which might elicit strong responses such as anger and frustration. Neither of these emotions are negative inherently—indeed, anger can be quite productive—and when accessed and utilized skillfully, can lead to much-needed change. When we find ourselves in conflict with another, be it interpersonally or politically, we can utilize a teaching from the Tomar Devorah, a classic Mussar text written in the Land of Israel in the 16th century. Rabbi Moshe Cordovero, its author, notes that the Divine is not separate from us but indeed endures the insults, the trials and tribulations that we do. Nothing is hidden from G-d’s watch. There is not a single moment, Rabbi Cordovero teaches, in which a human being is not sustained by the flow of Divine abundance. When a human being uses this Divine sustaining power to commit a wrongdoing, G-d suffers along with the one who was wronged. Therefore, G-d yearns for human beings, as the Prophet Micah teaches, to do teshuvah. The middah of savlanut, then, allows us to remain hopeful that true teshuvah is possible. We must always keep our goodness flowing to the other, even and especially when we are not sure that the other will do teshuvah.
I readily admit that it can be hard to wrap our hearts around this in a time in which so much wrongdoing is occurring with impunity. Indeed, our Mussar teachers emphasize that free will is bestowed to every human being by the Divine and that we are responsible for our choices and actions. When we find ourselves experiencing conflict with another, we might adopt a kabbalah that derives from this source, a mantra of sorts.
Take your seat. Focus on your meditation anchor, be that the breath, sound, or something else. Call to mind the one with whom you are experiencing conflict. Repeat softly to yourself, “I keep my goodness flowing to you”. Keep repeating this phrase for five minutes or for however long you have. Notice what arises for you, physical sensations, emotions, feelings in the body.
I recommend anchoring your practice in a single interpersonal conflict at first. You might later expand this to send goodness out to those outside of your circle, to the world, etc. This practice is one I have found to be quite centering.
Our Torah reminds us to always act with truthfulness and equanimity. Let us extend that outward, so that as we change our own souls, we might impact those of others in our midst.
For focus:
What is one conflict that I am experiencing presently? When I call that conflict to mind, how does it land with me?
How does the idea of being sustained by the Divine at all times resonate with me?