Even the Greatest Challenges Can Be A Small Price to Pay - Parshat VaYetzei

 

Lately I've been facing a number of difficulties in my life and have even felt despair over them.  Of all the things that have helped, making myself do something nice, good, beneficial, for my family, a congregant, a stranger, has helped me the most.  Not only does it take my mind off it, but it does something more.

In the parshah this week, Jacob arrives to his uncle Laban's.  He falls in love with Rachel.  To marry her, Jacob agrees to work for seven years, and after he is tricked by Laban into marrying Leah instead, forced to work another seven.  

The Torah says the following about this:

וַיַּעֲבֹ֧ד יַעֲקֹ֛ב בְּרָחֵ֖ל שֶׁ֣בַע שָׁנִ֑ים וַיִּהְי֤וּ בְעֵינָיו֙ כְּיָמִ֣ים אֲחָדִ֔ים בְּאַהֲבָת֖וֹ אֹתָֽהּ׃

"So Jacob served seven years for Rachel and they seemed to him but a few days because of his love for her." 

When we are working with love in our hearts, even if things are difficult, that feeling, that emotion, allows us to go on.  

When I can think about the happiness or the ease that it will bring to one of my family members by stepping up and doing something for them, or reaching out to anyone in need, there is love in that action.  You help that person, you help yourself, you spread love, and you find that the grip your hardships have on you is loosened.

And maybe you realize the one other thing I have also found.

The commentator, Sforno, about the "seven years" reference, observes, "he considered himself as having struck a good bargain, considering Rachel as worth far more than seven years of his labour."

If we can realize this, our motivation to help others, the sharing of love, and the lessening of the hurt of our troubles is compounded exponentially.  Just think - how lucky am I that I have the opportunity to do this for this other person!  Certainly, we should strive to have this in mind about our loved ones at all times.  But we should think of even the stranger as being as precious to us as Rachel is to Jacob.  How fortunate I can do something for this random person, my troubles are nothing compared to this chance to help.  

I hope you all have Rachels in your life, precious beloved ones, and total strangers.  And more importantly, I hope you act with kindness towards them, even when it's hard.  It may turn out it isn't so bad afterall.  

Shabbat Shalom

A Benediction of Life for September 11th, 2024

From the Suffolk County 9/11 Memorial Ceremony:

“Now, do not be distressed or reproach yourselves because you sold me hither; it was to save life that God sent me ahead of you.” 

With these words does Joseph reveal not just his hidden identity to his brothers in the biblical story, but his view of life.  Rather than focus on the fact that his brothers sought to and almost killed him, that he suffered as a slave, that he was accused of crimes he didn’t commit, Joseph’s priority is that he ended up in a position where he could save countless people from the famine sweeping across the world – and he is going to save his brothers as well.

Those of us who can remember September 11^th, 2001, will never forget the horrible, gut-wrenching, sickening, images of that day.  Evil on full display. 

And also, will we never forget in the days afterwards, the show of American pride and values.  True patriotism on full display.  Kindness and togetherness and fellowship.  Volunteerism.  Compassion and consolation.  The very best of America, the expression of all we hold dear. 

May we never forget the attack on our soil, the innocent lives lost, the heroes and their sacrifices.  And neither may we ever forget the expression of, the choice of life that came after.  As a people, as a nation, in the darkest of times and at all times, may we always appeal to the very best that is within us and choose the pursuit of happiness, choose liberty, and choose life. 

May this be the will of the Divine which we aid in making manifest today and always, and let us say, Amen. 

The Lapidation of Josh Shapiro?

 from my Times of Israel blog:

I’m old enough to remember (not to mention being old enough to say things like, “I’m old enough to remember) when Al Gore introduced Joseph Lieberman as his running mate, how moving it was that in his remarks, Lieberman paraphrased the words of shehecheyanu, giving thanks, in part, that America was a place where an observant Jew could be on a major party ticket as its choice for vice president.

While as of this moment, sitting Vice President Kamala Harris has not made her choice for a vice presidential nominee, Governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, like Lieberman also an observant Jew, is looking like the favorite.  A big part of me will be exceedingly proud that someone who could easily be a congregant of mine (let alone a classmate, again, old), could be deemed fit to hold such an office.  It will be a “win” for showing that Jewish observance, and religious practice in general, can and should contribute to our civic discourse.

Yet another part of me prays he won’t be chosen.  And that is not a partisan thing, but it is a Jewish thing, and an American one, I think, too.

In the Middle Ages in Europe, as part of the celebrations surrounding Easter, it was commonplace that Christians would march through Jewish neighborhoods and “lapidate,” that is throw stones, at the houses and sometimes the residents, as a way of punishing their own local Jews for the crimes the Jews of antiquity were accused of having perpetrated against Jesus at the times of his execution.

That he would be on the shortlist of contenders would suggest that Shapiro has the experience, policy positions, and beliefs appropriate to be the Democratic Party’s nominee for vice president.  Yet concerns, as covered by Axios, New Republic, New York Times, and others, that his pro-Israel views and his willingness to call out as antisemitic protesters on college campuses, warrant making him nominee non grata.

As bad as that would be, what troubles me even more, is that he could be the nominee, and either on the campaign trail and if elected, while in office, be compelled to back away from or even denounce his beliefs – so as to make him palatable to those parts of the electorate who see him as “guilty” of “genocide” as such people believe Israel is itself.  That he will have to in some way be the “good Jew” who can get the “bad ones” to behave in some “only Shapiro can go to Israel” way of thinking.

I’ve never understood why support for Israel needs to be a partisan issue.  Why your opinions about the economy or abortion should limit your position choices on Zionism, but increasingly it seems to be the case.  It would be a loss for the Democratic Party and for the United States if a politician like Josh Shapiro need to deny such a critical aspect of his identity, something that probably makes him the successful Democrat he is, in order to fit the measure of party purity.

Historically, the lapidation rituals were banned, by the Church or the secular authorities, and often in response to complaints made by the Jewish communities themselves.  I can only pray that all our leaders here in the United States will protect and even encourage Jews and everyone who decries antisemitism and who proudly stands up for Israel and Jews so they can do so without fear of reprisal or rebuke.

If you do that, you’ll have my vote.