Parshah Summary – P’sha
The parshah opens with Yitzhak/Isaac praying for a child after Rivkah/ Rebecca had been unable to conceive, and immediately his prayer is answered. But, she experiences difficult pregnancy as the “children struggle inside her.” She prays that the cause of her suffering be revealed, and Hashem responds that “two nations in your womb.” Esav/Esau emerges first, and Yaakov/Jacob is born clutching Esau’s heel. (Yaakov, Jacob, means “heal.”) As they grow up, Isaac favors Esau, but Rebecca loves Jacob more. One day, when Esau returns home exhausted and hungry from the hunt, he sells his birthright to Jacob for a pot of red lentil stew.
In Gerar, in the land of the Philistines, Isaac presents Rebecca as his sister, out of fear that he will be killed by someone coveting her beauty. He farms the land, reopens the wells dug by his father Abraham, and digs a series of his own wells, and Esau marries two Hittite women. Isaac grows old and blind, and wants to bless his first born Esau before he dies. While Esau goes off to hunt for his father’s favorite food, Rebecca dresses Jacob in Esau’s clothing, covers his arms and neck with goatskins to simulate the feel of his hairier brother, prepares a similar dish, and sends Jacob to his father. Jacob receives his father’s blessings for “the dew of the heaven and the fat of the land,” as well as mastery over his brother. When Esau returns and the deception is revealed, Isaac blesses him as well with the “fat of the earth and dew of the heaven,” but also that he shall live by the sword and serve his brother, though there will come a time when he will “break the yoke” from his neck. Jacob leaves home for Haran to flee Esau’s wrath and to find a wife in the family of his mother’s brother, Lavan/ Laban. Esau marries a third wife--Makhalat, the daughter of Ishmael…
Torah of Awakening
וַיִּתְרֹֽצְצ֤וּ הַבָּנִים֙ בְּקִרְבָּ֔הּ וַתֹּ֣אמֶר אִם־כֵּ֔ן לָ֥מָּה זֶּ֖ה אָנֹ֑כִי וַתֵּ֖לֶךְ לִדְרֹ֥שׁ אֶת־יְהֹוָֽה׃ וַיֹּ֨אמֶר יְה–ֹוָ֜ה לָ֗הּ שְׁנֵ֤י גוֹיִם֙ בְּבִטְנֵ֔ךְ... The children struggled within her, and she said, “If so, why am I like this?” So she went to inquire of the Divine. Hashem said to her, “Two nations are in your womb…” - Bereisheet (Genesis) 25:22-23
A young man came to the rabbi of Rizhyn with a question: “What can I do to break all of my distracting impulses that keep me in a state of restless anxiety and sorrow, so that I may have true inner peace?” The rabbi chuckled and his eyes twinkled: “You want to break your impulses? You will break your back and hip, but you will never break your impulses! Nevertheless, if you meditate and learn and pray in a spirit of simplicity, your distracting impulses will vanish on their own.”
There is a paradox in the rabbi’s answer. On one hand, he is instructing that we should meditate with a spirit of simplicity. But isn’t the very organizing of our lives to accommodate spiritual practice itself a complex matter? וַיִּתְרֹֽצְצ֤וּ הַבָּנִים֙ בְּקִרְבָּ֔הּ – The children struggled within her… The conflict between Yaakov and Esav within Rivkah’s womb can be seen as embodying this fundamental paradox: וַיְהִ֣י עֵשָׂ֗ו אִ֛ישׁ יֹדֵ֥עַ צַ֖יִד – Esav became a man knowing the hunt… “Knowing the hunt” means complexity – it means using the mind to extract benefit from the world. Just as the hunter uses knowledge to go out into nature and kill animals for sustenance, so too we, from the moment we wake up every day, must use our intelligence to navigate the complexities of the world and “capture” what we need from it…. וְיַעֲקֹב֙ אִ֣ישׁ תָּ֔ם יֹשֵׁ֖ב אֹהָלִֽים׃ – Yaakov was a simple man, dwelling in tents… The word “simple,” תָּם tam, conveys the opposite of the cunning we need to secure benefit from the world; it implies accepting the world as it is. This attitude of acceptance is the quality necessary for recognizing the dimension of reality we call the Divine, which is represented by אֹהָלִֽים ohalim, “tents.” We see this understanding of תָּם tam explicitly in the psalm: מִי־יָג֣וּר בְּאָהֳלֶ֑ךָ: הוֹלֵ֣ךְ תָּ֭מִים... Who may dwell in Your (God’s) tent? One who walks in simplicity (tamim)… - Psalm 15 We can also see the connection between “tent” and the Divine in the words themselves, which are exactly the same letters, in a slightly different order: אֱלֹהִים Elohim – God אֹהָלִֽים Ohalim – tents And this is the paradox, the inner duality of being human: to exist in this world, we must cultivate intelligence for navigating and extracting what we need. And yet, if we wish to enjoy the fruits of the spirit, we must also learn to “dwell” in the deepest level of our being, that simple, open space of consciousness which is tam by nature; we must learn to dwell in the אֹהָלִֽים ohalim of אֱלֹהִים Elohim, the “tents” of the God. But how can we do this, if we are immersed in a world that requires being an אִ֛ישׁ יֹדֵ֥עַ צַ֖יִד ish yodea tzayid, using our minds to navigate the “hunt”? וְאֵ֗ת עֹרֹת֙ גְּדָיֵ֣י הָֽעִזִּ֔ים הִלְבִּ֖ישָׁה עַל־יָדָ֑יו וְעַ֖ל חֶלְקַ֥ת צַוָּארָֽיו׃ She covered his hands and the hairless part of his neck with the skins of goats… Just as Yaakov tricks his father Yitzhak by disguising himself as Esav in order to steal the blessing, so it with us: If we wish to “steal” the blessing that transcends the world, we must “disguise” our practice in the clothing of the world; we must treat it as an agenda on the to-do list. This is counterintuitive and difficult for many people. We tend to not want spirituality to just another thing on the to-do list. Presence is not an agenda; Presence does not get you somewhere; it’s not an achievement, it’s not a badge you can wear, it’s not something you can accomplish and then cross off your bucket list. Presence is a way of Being. It is an approach to this moment right now that sets you free. And, as such, it very easily gets psychologically overshadowed by nearly everything else in life. It’s not hard at all to taste the freedom of Presence, but it can seem nearly impossible to make it into a Way of Being, rather than just an occasional experience, until you learn the Art of Disguise. Meaning: we must “dress us” Presence in the clothing of time-bound agendas. That means, prioritizing: setting aside time for meditation and prayer, perhaps even setting aside time to revisit and absorb this lesson. You’ve got to work it into your schedule, just like everything else, even though it’s fundamentally not like anything else. And this brings us to the second strategy: once we prioritize spirituality, how do we motivate ourselves? Just as Yaakov wouldn’t give Eisav any stew until he gave up his birthright, so too, we can use our natural impulses as a cue to surrender, to become תָּם tam. You have an impulse to eat, to satisfy your hunger? First, stop. Say a brakhah. Realize that it’s not a given that we should always have food to eat. Realize that this moment could be your last, that this moment is all we truly have. Give thanks for the gift of nourishment, and for the privilege of Being. Then eat; then give Eisav his stew. But this strategy can go far beyond saying a brakhah before you eat. You can take any of your common activities, and attach them to taking a moment of Presence, so that Presence becomes habit. Before bed at night, you can stop and meditate even for a few moments. However it works for you, the key is to train yourself, just like you would a child. You might feel lazy or you might feel that everything else is more important, but if you want real transformation, you’ve got to make Presence into a regular habit. Disguise it as an agenda and trick yourself into doing it! This is Netzakh, the sefirah of Persistence. Then, once you’re inside it, surrender; become תָּם tam; this is Hod, the sefirah of gratitude and surrender. Because in this moment, there is no agenda, there is no movement, there is no time. There is only the blessed space of Being within which everything is unfolding, and you are that blessed space.
Read past teachings on Toldot HERE
Learn Integral Jewish Meditation
Get Free Guided Meditation Below:
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
December 2024
|
RSS Feed