Go Out! Parshat Vayeitzei

"Vayeitzei Ya'akov- And Ya'akov went out from Be'er Sheva..."

Our reading begins with Jacob fleeing for his life from his brother’s rage.

"Vayifga bamakom- He encountered the Place..."

This word for "The Place"- HaMakom- is unusual because it’s also one of the Names of God.

So why is God called The Place?
 
Jacob falls asleep and dreams of a ladder set toward the earth, with its top reaching toward the heavens. There are angels going up and down the ladder. Suddenly he has a vision of the Divine and receives a special message of hope and protection.
 
When he wakes up, he says,

“Akhein, yesh Hashem bamakom hazeh, v’anokhi lo yadati-
"Surely the Divine is in this Place, and I didn’t even know it!"
 
The word for knowing- Da’at or Da’as- isn’t the same as the English word for knowing, which implies an intellectual understanding. The Hebrew word is the same word used in the Garden of Eden story-

“V’ha’adam yadata et Khava- and Adam knew Eve...”

This the knowing of intimacy and connection, not the mind and thinking.
 
So the hint here is that if you want to really "see" the Divine in this Place- the Makom that you’re in right now- then you have to really connect with it fully and consciously. Know- Da- that there is only one experience happening right now, that everything within your experience in this moment is arising within the open space that is your awareness.
 
If let your awareness open and connect deeply with the fullness of what’s happening, then you’ll know for yourself-

“Akhein- Yesh Hashem bamakom hazeh!"

The Divine is not just in this space, the Divine is this space. And all aspects of your experience- your thoughts, feelings, sensations, and perceptions- are all one with the space that you are:

The open space of awareness within which this moment arises.

But to know that, to be intimate with the space of this moment, you have to go out- Vayeitzei- from those limited forms of consciousness- the thoughts and feelings we often think of as “me”- and into the vast open space of Presence.
 
So my friends, on this Shabbat Vayeitzei, the Sabbath of Going Out, may we all remember to “go out” from ego to meet the Timeless that glows softly within all things. And, let’s go out to greet the Timeless One as the Shabbos Kallah, the indwelling Presence of Shabbat.

Good Shabbos good Shabbos!!!
love,
brian yosef

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