Excerpt Browser

This page displays the full text of excerpts.  When viewing a single excerpt, its “Share,” “Switch Article,” and “Comment” functions are accessible.

GENESIS — 29:7 still

GEN1293 We should protest against injustice even if we do not know the person who is being wronged.  When Yaaakov saw the cattle lying down (verse 2), he thought that the shepherds were preparing to herd the cattle into their pen. Therefore, Yaakov reminded the shepherds that it was still day and there was still time for the cattle to graze.   That is, if they were hired men, they had not yet completed a day’s work for their employer. (Midrash cited by Rashi).   Although Yaakov did not know the owners of the sheep, he nonetheless admonished the shepherds not to be lax in their obligation to their employers.   The righteous man is repulsed by wrongdoing, even when it is committed by strangers against strangers. (Sforno).   All too many people have lost their sensitivity to preventing others from being dishonest, even though they themselves are honest. A friend of mine recently told me that while he was riding in a bus, someone sneaked in through the back door to avoid paying his fare.   When my friend politely told him that he ought to pay the driver of the bus, several other passengers called out, “Why does it bother you? Leave him alone.” We must learn from our father Yaakov to abhor dishonesty and act accordingly.   PLYN 100

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

GENESIS — 29:14 embraced

GEN1294 Even if [a] person [is] more evil than good, but not so evil that he is a chronic sinner, one still should judge this person’s actions favorably whenever there is room to interpret the behavior as moral or immoral.   Chofetz Chaim, Issurei Lashon Hara 3:7. … Nevertheless, Jewish law says that Jews may indeed judge unfavorably a known evil person. … King Solomon already informed us that when a basically evil person seems to be doing something good, we should not believe him. Proverbs 26:25.   Proverbs also says that a righteous person can recognize the cunning ways of someone who is evil, implying that any good that an evil person seems to be doing is sometimes feigned. Proverbs 21:12 The classic example of this can be found in the Torah when Laban, the father of Rachel, whom Jacob had just met at the well, ran out to kiss and hug his long lost relative.  Rashi explains Laban’s intentions behind each seemingly positive action towards Jacob as a means to find and take any jewels that Jacob might have been hiding on his person.  Once a person or group of people have established for themselves a well-deserved reputation as evildoers, it is very difficult undo this characterization and judge their actions favorably, no matter how good they later appear.   AMJV 206-7

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

GENESIS — 29:20 loved

GEN1296 Our tradition gives us no reason to turn the love we are ordered to have for God into some bloodless spiritual abstraction. When the Bible talks of love, it is describing the same extraordinary emotion that we thrill at today. Thus we read in Genesis: Though Jacob served seven years for Rachel, they seemed to him but a few days because he loved her [this verse].   Biblical love takes the many forms that fill fortunate lives: Jacob’s love for Joseph, Ruth’s devotion to her mother-in-law Naomi, and the classic story of David and Jonathan, a love threatened by King Saul’s enmity for David. But Jonathan’s “soul became bound to the soul of David; Jonathan loved David as himself” 1 Samuel 18:1.   And then there is that whole book devoted to love, the rapturously named Song of Songs. On the surface, it seems like a passionate series of exchanges between two lovers. But then, how did it become part of Sacred Scripture? Something about human love must have indicated a similar relationship between God and people. Still in rabbinic times, when the final canonization of Scriptures was taking place, there were those who thought Song of Songs too earthly to have been God – Inspired. Yet not only did the rabbis insist that Song of Songs be included, but they began reading it as the love-talk between God and the people of Israel. They would not deprive love of its full libidinous nature, even as they understood it as modeling the most sublime divine-human intimacy. In medieval mysticism, these erotic connotations came into full play. The Zohar, the most important Kabbalistic text, relates in one of its less overtly sexual metaphors: “The angels in the hall of love introduce love between Israel below and the Holy One above. And they all arouse love and remain in a state of love. And when love is aroused from the lower to the upper realms, and from the upper to the lower realms, this hall becomes filled with many good things… and the love of the lower world penetrates the love of the upper world and they are united together” Zohar II, 253b. BOROJMV 316-7

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

GENESIS — 29:25 morning

GEN1298 And was she not Leah until now? – Because of the tokens that Jacob had given to Rachel [so that Lavan not substitute Leah in the darkness], and which she, in turn, had given to Leah [so that she not be shamed in the situation she had been placed into], he had not recognized her until that time [when it became light] Megillah 13b TEMIMAH-GEN 130-1

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

GENESIS — 29:25 why

GEN1299 Rebuke someone who has cheated you; but do not become angry.   Yaakov’s self-control is amazing.   After laboring seven full years for Rochel’s hand in marriage, he had been deceived.  Instead of being married to Rochel, he was tricked by Lovon into marrying Leah. Most men would have become furious.  Yaakov, however, did not become angry.  He merely admonished Lovon and asked him what his motive was. (Rabbi Yeruchom Levovitz in Daas Torah: Limudai Mussray Hatorah, vol, p. 183). PLYN 101

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

GENESIS — 29:31 hated

GEN1302 Was Leah hated? No. The previous sentence has just told us that she was loved. What then does the Torah mean by “hated”? It means, that is how Leah felt. Yes she was loved, but less than her sister.  Leah knew, and had known for seven years, that Jacob was passionately in love with her younger sister Rachel. The Torah says that he worked for her for seven years “but they seemed to him like a few days because he was so in love with her” Genesis 29:20 Leah was not hated. She was less loved. But someone in that situation cannot but feel rejected. The Torah forces us to hear Leah’s pain in the names she gives her children. Her first she calls Reuben, saying “it is because the Lord has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.” The second she calls Simeon, “Because the Lord heard that I am not loved.” The third she calls Levi, saying, “Now at last my husband will become attached to meGenesis 29:32 – 35. There is sustained anguish in these words. We hear the same time later when Reuben, Leah’s firstborn, finds mandrakes in the field. Mandrakes were thought to have aphrodisiac properties, so he gives them to his mother hoping that this will drive his father to her. Rachel, who has been experiencing a different kind of pain, childlessness, seize the mandrakes and asks Leah for them. Leah then says: “Wasn’t it enough that you took away my husband? Will you take my son’s mandrakes too?” Genesis 30:15 The misery is palpable. Note what is happened. It began with love. It was about love throughout. Jacob loved Rachel. He loved her at first sight. In fact, there is no other love story quite like it in the Torah: Abraham and Sarah are already married by the time we first meet them; Isaac has his wife chosen for him by his father’s servant. He is more emotional than the other patriarchs; that is the problem. Love unites but it also divides. It leaves the unloved, even the less-loved, feeling rejected, abandoned, forsaken, alone.  That is why you cannot build a society, a community, or even a family on love alone. There must be justice-as-fairness also. SACKS 43-4

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

RSS
12345678910
Back To Top