Dvar Torah Parsha VaYetzei 11 27 22

Bereishit (Genesis) 28:10-32:3 5783

Summary

Yaakov (Jacob) flees from Esav (Esau) who is furious that his blessing was stolen. First night he sees a ladder with angels going up and down, doing the work of HaShem. He names it the House of HaShem or Bethel. Sets a stone, anoints it with oil, and promises to give offerings.

He travels on, sees a group at a well. Interesting that Itzhak’s wife was first encountered by the servant of Avraham at a well, likely this well. He learns that these are the people of Laban. Rachel approaches and Yaakov is drawn to her beauty. He tends her sheep, tells her who he is, and she goes back to tell Laban. Laban rushes out to greet Yaakov and he is invited back to his tent. Staying with Laban, he is drawn to Rachel. He offers to tend Laban’s flocks for seven years to marry her.

After seven years, the wedding is set. Yaakov thinks he is marrying Rachel, but it is the older sister Leah who weds him, wearing a veil. The next morning, he wakes up and discovers the deceit. Laban says it’s the custom to marry off the elder first, but he can marry Rachel after the obligatory seven day waiting period, provided he agrees to stay and work another seven years. Leah came with her servant Zilpah and Rachel with her servant Bilhah.

Thus begins the birthing competition. Leah bears Reuben (The Lord has seen my affliction. Now Yaakov will love me.) Then Simeon (Lord knows I am unloved; He has heard me.) Next came Levi (This time the Lord has heard me; Yaakov will be attached to me). The fourth child is Yehudah (Judah) (Praise the Lord).

Rachel, frustrated by her inability to give birth, offers her servant Bilhah who bears a son she names Dan (She has been vindicated). Then another son Naphtali (A contest for HaShem; got divine favor).

Leah then offers her servant Zilpah as concubine. She bears Gad (What luck) and Asher (Happy). So Reuben is in the field one day and he finds mandrakes, the roots of which were known to have a narcotic effect, sleep inducing and painkiller, and believed by many to have aphrodisiac properties. Rachel asks Leah for the mandrakes, agreeing to send Yaakov to her tent that night. As a result, Leah bears Issachar (affirmation of belief) and then after that Zebulun (give or raise up). After that a daughter Dinah is born. No explanation for her name.

Then Rachel gives birth to Yosef (Joseph) meaning to look back with anguish of past mistakes but look forward with hope. Thus ends the birth narratives, beginning with the name of HaShem and ending with the same.

Yaakov asks Laban to leave, but instead a deal is reached where he will stay on. Yaakov agrees to take all dark sheep and spotted and speckled goats to be kept by his sons 3 days distant. It appears Yaakov is about to repay trickery by Laban with trickery of his own. Yaakov tends Laban’s animals. He strips the bark from poplar, almond, and plane branches, placing them for in front of the water troughs where the goats mated. For the sheep, he faced them towards the dark animals. He then brought the stronger animals to mate in front of the rods. His herd increases and the number in his camp grows.

Strife grows between Laban and Yaakov. HaShem tells him it is time to return to his people. He discusses it with his wives, and they agree, leaving while Laban is out with his animals. As they leave, Rachel steals her father’s idols, unbeknownst to Yaakov. Laban returns and rides out with his men to catch up with Yaakov. He no doubt intended harm, as HaShem warned him to do neither good nor harm to HaShem. Yaakov explains he feared Laban would not let him take his wives with him, thus the secrecy. Laban laments he would not have been able to say farewell to Rachel and Leah, and why did they take his idols. Yaakov insists they did not and invites him to search saying if one of his took the idols, they must die. First his tent, then Leah’s and next Rachel’s. Rachel had hidden the idols in a camel cushion and sitting on it said she could not get up as it was her time of the month. After quarreling some more, they declare a non-aggression pact and stand a stone to mark the occasion. They feast that night, and part ways the next morning. Traveling, Yaakov sees angels, declares it as HaShem’s camp, naming it Mahanaim.

So, our parsha begins with Yaakov fleeing after tricking his brother and father out of both Esav’s birthright and blessing. He flees to his mom’s brother Laban. He meets and falls in love with Sarah, at the very well that Rivka (Rebecca) had met the servant of Avraham to negotiate a marriage to Itzhak. He meets Laban with whom he agrees to work seven years to marry Rachel. He in a sort of cosmic justice, karma if you please, works seven years, but Laban the trickster pulls a switch and clad with veil, Yaakov marries Leah. Then another seven-year obligation to marry Rachel as well.

I am fascinated with the way our stories develop, as with Avraham and Itzhak with their interactions with Gerar covered in previous parshat, the meeting at the well of Laban’s land, repetition that provides a certain continuity to the larger story. Sharon Brous of IKAR in her Dvar only yesterday led me down a rabbit hole of my own. She spoke of the competition between Leah the unloved and Rachel the loved in their efforts to have children. Two sisters in serious competition with each other over the attention of Yaakov. Their baby naming, prayers of a sort over their own feelings of uncertainty or inadequacy. I could not help but note that it was Yehuda (Judah), Leah’s fourth son where she named him simply in praise of HaShem, who’s tribe would eventually dominate Israel and for whom we Jews are named.

But back to sibling rivalry. In our last parsha, the rivalry was between two twin brothers, where we learned popular belief in Biblical times involved the idea that twins possessed traits which together created the whole person. As if jealousy and rivalry come from the desire of the one to have that the other possesses. Now here we are with two sisters, one desiring the love given to the other, the other desiring the family given to her sister. I in our time think that if only each could have accepted themselves as the creation they are, without the fear and jealousy of the other, how much better their lives. But of course, the ramifications of our stories are far greater, the story of the creation of a people. Unlike the creation mythologies of our day, such as the founding of America, where the founders are all imbued with a façade of legend and unlikely perfection, our founders were real humans with imperfections, character faults, stumbling through life and yet who’s actions are retold year after year millennia later. There is a price for words spoken and actions taken. Soon to come in a future parsha, Rachel dies giving childbirth. Likely for Yaakov’s proclamation that whoever took the idols will die. Of course, we all must die sometime. But do we despite our imperfection, create a life story that goes on beyond our short lives here? If only stories that would survive so long. For we all are a part of our own creation story. It’s up to us what we do with it.

One final thought. Since forever, primogeniture has been a thing. But time after time, we see those rules violated, favor to the first born, by HaShem. It’s an interesting thread that appears repeatedly. Perhaps more simply stated, HaShem will choose whoever HaShem will choose.

Baruch HaShem.

Dvar Torah Parsha Toldot 11 20 2022

Bereishit (Genesis) 25:19-28:9 @Parsha_Toldot @DvarTorah_ParshaToldot

Our parsha this week is about Itzhak (Isaac), Rivka (Rebecca), Esav (Esau) and Yaakov (Jacob). In the beginning of the Parsha, we see a repetition of the barren wife motif seen first with Sara, now Rivka. She prays and HaShem opens her womb. She finds herself pregnant with fraternal twins. In Biblical writing, often twins are portrayed as owning two halves of a complete personality. She feels them struggling within her womb. HaShem tells her she is carrying leaders of two nations within her. One will be mightier than the other, and the mightier shall serve the lesser.

Sure enough, she has two boys. One is red cheeked and hairy, the other follows holding onto the heel of the first. The first is named Esav. The other fair skinned boy is named Yaakov. Esav grows up a rugged outdoors man, a hunter, while Yaakov tends to stay close to home, quiet, and introspective. Itzhak seems to prefer Esav while Rivkah prefers Yaakov. One day Esav returns home from hunting, and he is famished. Yaakov is preparing a lentil stew and Esav asks for a bowl of it. Yaakov says he will, provided he surrender his birthright. This held importance in the lives of the people then, but he surrendered it anyway for a bowl of “the very red food.” We see the recurrence, from his reddish skin to the red soup, the color red. Thus, he is named Edom. It serves according to Nachmanides as a tool to justify his naming of Edom, a variant spelling of red in Hebrew. He becomes a neighboring nation, but not of the promised land, because of his shortsightedness in selling his birthright.

So back to our story, we seem to step back before the twins are conceived or born. Itzhak come on bad times (like Avraham) and go to Avimelech in Gerer. Like Avraham, out of fear, he introduces Rivka as his sister. Avimelech spots him being intimate with Rivka, summons Itzhak and demands to know why he did this. It’s again a repetition of the life of Avraham. They are granted protection. He reopens wells dug by his father and problems arise as they become more powerful, and they move to the wadi of Gerer. Another conflict and they move after their wells are filled, and finally they find a spot with no conflict. Interestingly, he renames the wells the same names his father had given them. It is almost as if he is reliving his father’s life. Also interesting to me is the fact that he is the one patriarch who does not experience a name change.

Then returning forward in time, Esav marries a Hittite woman. Neither Itzhak nor Rivka are happy about this. Our story continues when Rivkah overhears Itzhak telling Esav to kill some game and prepare it and he will offer his blessing. By this time Itzhak cannot see well, so Rivkah hatches a scheme. She has Yaakov kill a lamb, and she cooks it up and has Yaakov, dressed in Esav’s clothes and lambskin to simulate the rougher skin of Esav. He goes in pretending to be Esav, and Itzhak gives him the blessing instead. Esav arrives and is furious that his brother has stolen his blessing to lead the people. He absolutely wants to kill Yaakov. Rivkah makes plans to send him to her family for safekeeping until his brother cools down. Itzhak seems to realize this was the will of HaShem.

In the last parsha, we saw Itzhak and Ishmael together at the funeral of Avraham and one theory emerged. Another theory in another midrash is offered as well. After the binding of Itzhak, we see no interaction at all between Avraham and Itzhak. Might Itzhak have been so shaken at his near death by sacrifice that he left and joined his brother Ishmael and Hagar, staying near them until his father’s death. I know if my dad had taken me up onto a mountain to be sacrificed, narrowly escaping after heaven’s intervention and his mother having just died, well, I’d likely move on, I think. He would have remembered how his brother and Hagar had been sent away. Did he join them after this harrowing event?

As Yaakov is about to go to stay with Rivka’s brother Laban, Rivka goes to Itzhak and says Yaakov must not marry a Canaanite woman. Itzhak gives Yaakov a blessing and instructs him to find a wife from Laban’s people. Esav realizes his father does not like Canaanite women, so he goes and marries the daughter of Ishmael, Mahalath.

As I read this parsha, I wondered to myself, what a recipe for dysfunction. Each parent playing favorites for one of the two children. Sibling rivalry can be an issue regardless, but how it complicates things when parents play favorites. Goodness, I grew up with a brother, five years younger than myself. It began when he was brought home from the hospital. I wanted a sister but there he was. As a young child, he really wanted to be close to me. I remember when he might have a bad dream and come over and crawl into bed with me. The times we would fight. When once when older, I was working on a car and my brother would chime in and tell me I was doing it wrong. I would be irritated, claiming I knew what I was doing. The irony is that I had no skill whatsoever with anything mechanical while he was gifted in such matters, but I could not see that, exercising the arrogance of age and ego. I look back with deep regret for the way I often treated him. Marlowe, if you happen to read this, know I am sorry for the way I so often behaved with you as children. I think I’ve shared that before, but it bears repeating. And I am so happy for the joy you have found in life! You have love and an amazing wife and who could ask for more in this lifetime.

In our story, Esav was so angry he wanted to kill his brother. Now it is reasonable to say that Esav did not have the temperament to lead a nation. But the deception leading up to that final blessing will in future parshat bring a lot of deep soul searching. It’s a process of maturation and time to reach the point where Yaakov becomes Israel. Making amends often takes time and may require growth to fully realize it. As they say, hindsight is 20/20. May we all find our way to reconciliation and restoration in our own broken relationships.

Baruch HaShem!

Dvar Torah Parsha Chayei Sara 11-18-22

This week we study Chayei Sara, even as we honor those trans souls lost to violence over the past year. Our parsha begins with our Matriarch Sara who dies at the age of 127. Though not stated in Torah, many have suggested she died from shock at the news Avraham (Abraham) had gone up the mountain to sacrifice Itzhak (Isaac), not knowing the angel of Hashem had intervened at the last moment!

I smile at the things said about Sara. It was said she had the innocence of a 7-year-old at age 20, and the beauty of a 20-year-old when she 100.

Avraham goes to Ephron of the Hittites, offering to purchase the site at Hebron called Machpelah including caves and the land around it. Ephron offers to give him the land, but Avraham insists on paying full price, knowing this was the land promised by HaShem. Sara is buried there.

The parsha continues with Avraham sending his servant to find a wife for Itzhak, who returns with Rivkah (Rebecca) and ends with the passing of Avraham at 175 who is also buried at Machpelah. Both Itzhak and Ishmael are in attendance. Torah does not tell us why Ishmael suddenly shows up after having been sent away, but midrash suggests that after Sara died, Avraham sent for Hagar and Ishmael to come back.

In this parsha, we focus on a key tenant in Judaism, Yizkor, remembering our dead. It is at Machpelah that people remember our Patriarchs and Matriarchs to this day. Which brings us to this annual remembrance for those trans lives lost this past year to violence. People who were killed because of their perceived gender difference.

Back in the 1990’s I discovered a transgender chat room on AOL called the Gazebo. For a long time even the mention of the words transgender or transsexual were violations of the Terms of Service on AOL and could get you banned. In San Francisco, a trans activist by the name of Gwen Smith stepped forward. She negotiated with AOL to remove the stigmatization of trans people from their Terms of Service. Gwen succeeded in getting chats for trans men and women a reality. It was amazing to suddenly be in touch with trans people all over America and elsewhere. We take for granted the openness of the internet today, but it was not always like that.

Over time I got to know Gwen well, and in the chat rooms we began to hear about and discuss various attacks on trans people. Until then we had been unaware, knowing only that sometimes people like us were being killed. One murder was Chanelle Pickett in Massachusetts in November 1995. We began doing memorials in our chat room as these incidents occurred. In June 1997, Gwen came to Houston where I lived, to attend the International Transgender Law and Employment Practices Conference, and she got to meet my partner Skip. Sadly, two months later, my beloved Skip passed away, my friend and trans activist Dee McKellar just two weeks later. I was a hot mess. I held both in my arms as they crossed over. Gwen devoted time in our chat to memorialize them.

In 1998, the tipping point came. Another trans woman, Rita Hester, killed in November again in Massachusetts. Gwen Smith developed the Remembering Our Dead project and one year later approaching the anniversary of Rita’s death, she decided to hold a vigil at Harvey Milk Plaza in the Castro District of San Francisco on Nov 20th. There were 12 murders on that list. Simultaneously a vigil was held in Boston. From these beginnings, Trans Day of Remembrance began.

With expanded knowledge and reporting, numbers went up. Tonight of course, I am speaking to the numbers reported in the US, but TDOR observances have become worldwide.

We are called to remember. Just before the pandemic, there would be 20, 23 names on a list and considering the number of trans people compared to the overall population, those are high numbers. But today we have become the target of certain politicians, portraying us as pedophiles or “groomers”, perverts etc. So it was that last year, the number of people perceived as trans who died a violent death was 50, more than twice that of a few years ago. This year, the records show 66 deaths, 15 by suicide or other causes, 51 by violence. Record numbers in succeeding years.

Those killed come from all walks. Many are persons of color. All possessed that special gift of our one precious life, and it was taken from them. And those of us who are still alive know it could as well have been us. May we remember them and pray that this insanity end sooner rather than later.

I’d like to end with an abridged version of a spoken word piece I wrote some years ago when two trans women were shot and killed in their car at an intersection. For even as we remember those we lost, life, and love goes on as well. Even as Chayei Sara means life of Sara and yet begins with her passing. I wrote:

I am woman. My heart my being my spirit and soul seeing Screaming from every pore for all to hear… I am woman! Touch my soul and know the vision which after body revision Remains the same. Taste my lips a woman’s lips softened by Tears and years of caring and daring to be the same as that person Who stares out through these weary eyes… So many sighs.

Tears of joy, and tears from indescribable heart break
Family torn asunder and former friends wonder and the loss
And hurt tearing away at ego but also taking pieces of myself along the way.
Is self-truth always this brutal? And is it so dangerous
That we are killed and beaten and thrashed and trashed just for being who we are?
Just the other day, two women like me shot over and over in their car.

Is the death of transcendental souls one more symbol of the fear of a privileged gender
afraid to surrender even a tiny vestige of its power and hold
Over the hearts and minds and possessions of fifty one percent of all of us?

From one woman to another, we share our lives and our stories and our souls
And we do rituals and honor croning and maidenhood and motherhood as women have done
Throughout the expanse of life’s journey. Our tears and our laughter are offered before the Great Mother
Who smiles at our offerings with a gleam of delight.

But in those moments, those horrible wrenching moments when Difference rears its head, when the “But” comes to rule,
The arrow of despair pierces my heart and one more tear is offered from coffers that have no bottom.

So, it is in my walk of life. I am woman to most, other to some, non-human to still others
Loved, hated, smiled at, and reviled. Praised and hated a source of confusion for many.
I do not understand it, some say. I do not want to understand it say others.

But life goes on and love goes on and hate and fear go on also.
To all who hope that my kind will disappear and those who revel in my difference
What we have not in common rather than what we do, I smile sweetly, and offer this simple reality:
I can only be me and you can only be you and we can be we or never
But my truth will remain, agree, or complain, and from my truth you cannot sever
For in truth to self I have found truth in others and the same for love it is clear To leave behind that which is me would leave me with nothing but fear.

My soul lives and will beyond death and it is a beautiful soul prepared to love, prepared to live, prepared to dance.
If you dance with me, then we dance together, but if you cannot, I shall dance alone.

Shabbat Shalom

@DvarTorahChayeiSara

Dvar Torah Parsha VaYera 5783

Va-Yera Genesis 18:1 through 22:24

So, a lot happens in this parsha. Let’s start with a brief synopsis. Abraham just circumcised himself and the men in his camp. Sitting in the tent, three men appear. He immediately goes to welcome them and has Sarah bake bread for them. One of the men asks about Sarah, who says he will return in a year when she bears a son. Sarah laughs quietly at the notion as she’s 90 years old, and her husband is 100. She’s asked why she laughed? She becomes afraid and says she didn’t laugh, but HaShem says, “Yes you did.”

The men leave for Sodom, and Abraham learns of the coming destruction. He bargains with HaShem, what if there are 50 good men, 40, 30, 20 finally 10 good men, then He will spare the city? HaShem says yes. The men/angels show up at Lot’s front door and he invites them in. A crowd gathers and demands he deliver these men so they can have them sexually. Lot offers his daughters instead. More to say about this later. The angels tell Lot to gather his family and to flee because the city will be destroyed. His wife and two daughters go, but the daughters’ betrothed stay behind. Abraham is warned not to look back, but his wife does and is turned into a pillar of salt.

Lot and his daughters wind up in a cave in the hills. They are concerned they will not ever have children, and so cook up a plan to get their father Lot drunk, and one takes him sexually while he is asleep, then the next night the other one does. They bear children that later become the Ammonites and the Moabites, neighbors of Israel.

Meanwhile, Abraham travels to the land of Abimelech, king of Gerar. Abraham AGAIN introduces his wife as his sister. Abimelech summons Sarah to his court but does not molest her. Later he gets a message from HaShem that she is the wife of His chosen. Abimelech goes to Abraham and asks why he called her his sister. Abraham says he was afraid for his life, and offers something new, that they shared the same father but not the same mother. This is a one of however, and other genealogies in Torah suggest otherwise. Abimelech gives them cattle and oxen and offers choice land for them to graze and restores Sarah to Abraham.

God remembers Sarah and she becomes pregnant with Isaac. Isaac is circumcised on the eighth day and on the day he was weaned, there was a great feast. But Sarah sees Ishmael making mockery and Sarah asks that Hagar and Ishmael be sent away. Abraham didn’t want to (because of his son) but HaShem told him to do so anyway.

Hagar is wandering in the wilderness and has run out of water. She weeps, praying she doesn’t have to watch her child die. HaShem comes to her, has her rise, and pick up her child. Her eyes are opened, and she sees water and knows all will be well. Ishmael grows up to be a master archer. Then finally the Akedah, where Abraham is tested and told to go to the land of Moriah and sacrifice his son Isaac. He goes without questioning, and they go to the top of the mountain, and they prepare for the sacrificial killing and fire, Isaac is bound, but then an angel intervenes and says not to killing Isaac and a ram is provided in its place. They sacrifice the ram, and an angel comes telling them from Abraham and Isaac will become a great people. They them return to Beersheba.

We who are Jewish are also called Israel, that is One who wrestles with HaShem and prevails. I’ve got a lot of wrestling to do. At the beginning the three strangers who we later learn are angels arrive. Abraham welcomes them and tells his wife to cook them bread while he schmoozes with them. One asks about her; says she will give birth in a year, and she laughs to herself. I mean she is 90 and Abraham is 100 years old. I’d laugh as well! So HaShem confronts her, asking why she laughed? Now just in our last Parsha, Abraham is told of this, and he falls to the ground laughing hysterically and HaShem said nothing. I’m also wondering, since Abraham already knew, why did he not share that with Sara? It seems clear the primary role for the angels visiting besides telling Abraham about Sodom, was informing Sarah about what was to come. It is also clear that is far too often the case, this woman is held to a higher standard than the men around her.

Moving forward, the angels arrive at Lot’s door in Sodom. He of course shows hospitality and welcomes the strangers in. Soon however the townsfolk are banging on the door. They demand that he send them out so they can “have their way” with the visitors, i.e., rape them. He begs them to reconsider, but then offers his own daughters in their place. Hospitality is one thing, but this is a step too far. Thankfully the strangers/angels step in and shut the door. Later they escape the city, but his wife turns around despite HaShem’s warning and she is turned to a pillar of salt. Was she warned by her husband? Was she concerned about those left behind? We will never know because she became a part of the salt pillars by the Dead Sea.

So, following this, Abraham moves to the kingdom of Abimelech, and he repeats the story that his wife is his sister. Are wives so unimportant to their men that they willingly offer them up? I mean he knows what can happen because he did so with Pharoah. Of course, HaShem steps in and protects her, but could He not just say, Abraham, cut it out. Interestingly Abraham identifies Gerer as a people who do not fear G_d. He got it wrong with Sodom, and he gets it wrong here. He’s just not very good at this sort of thing it seems. Still HaShem intervenes.

After all of this, Sarah has Isaac. Wanting to protect Isaac’s legacy, she asks Abraham to send Hagar and Isaac away. Abraham doesn’t want to, but HaShem says to do it anyway. An aside: Tikvah Frymer-Kensky in Torah, A Women’s Commentary notes she is not sold as would be the usual fate of slaves but left a free woman. Anyhow, Hagar in the desert runs out of water. I can’t imagine the depth of anguish she feels, knowing she may be about to see her child die. Fortunately, HaShem intervenes, and her eyes opened to a well of water.

Towards the end, we have the Akedah, that final test. Why did Abraham agree without question regarding the sacrifice of his own son, when not long before, he spoke up for the Sodomites? Why does he not discuss any of this with Sarah before he leaves? In the next parsha, she pays a heavy price for this silence. Why does HaShem put him through this ordeal? He tests Abraham, but not Sarah. Why?

I believe we must ask these hard questions. Our Patriarchs and Matriarchs are visibly fallible, as are we all. But also, we must look to HaShem. They say we are created in His image, but if we are to call our ancestors to task, how much more to the creator of all humanity. Women in Torah are uplifted in places but very much subjugated by the beliefs of their time. Heck, some of that is still true today. We expect them to do better, but that applies for us as well. It’s from the failures, ours or HaShem’s, that we can learn and grow to repair the world. May it be so!

Jessica Wicks 11-7-2022