Page 122 - 24107

24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Cyan
24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Black
#24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Yellow
24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Magenta
#
Orchard of Delights
One of life’s greatest challenges is how to contend with the constant
run and return dynamic, and especially how to balance, what appear
to be, the highs and the lows of our mood swings. The Ba’al Shem Tov
explained that in the verse “I shall place God before me at all times”
the word meaning “I shall place” (sheviti) also means “I shall make
equal.” (Psalms 16:8). Therefore, he explained the verse to mean: I
will carve into my consciousness the message that I should accept
everything that happens to me with equanimity, for all that happens
to me at all times comes from God. Having adopted this approach
to life, the very notions of “up” and “down” become less absolute,
the highs are not as high and the lows are not as low. We need not
experience our mood swings as manic gyrations of the pendulum,
nor do we need to experience our lows as abysmally depressing. This
newfound equanimity, though, should not eliminate our “going with
the flow” and actually experiencing highs and lows as such; however,
we should attach far less importance to them and constantly remind
ourselves of their impermanence.
Of course, finding inner peace of mind, while simultaneously
striving for constant improvement and spiritual advancement, seems
to be a contradiction in terms. Actually, it is the best we can hope
for. On the ladder of life, ups and downs are inevitable; the choice we
need to make is how to react to life’s roller coaster ride. The choice
is not over whether or not to struggle, but over which struggles to
engage in and how to conduct each one.
Parenthetically, the Sages question whether the righteous will
rest in the World to Come. They respond that the righteous will
not experience rest in the sense of inaction or as an ongoing status;
rather, they will ascend from “strength to strength” (Psalms 84:8).
Even in the future, in a utopian setting, change will be constant; the
soul and the spirit will constantly strive to ascend.
We might ask at this point how Jacob actually fared after the
dream and how much of the dream’s symbolism he was able to
integrate and translate into his reality. According to the Sages, Jacob
was deemed “the choicest of the patriarchs” because he was able to
accomplish so much while facing an unending barrage of challenges
in the mundane world (Bereishit Rabbah 76:6). He gave birth to and
122
#24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Yellow 24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Magenta 24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Cyan 24107-EYAL - 24107-EYAL | 4 - B | 18-01-28 | 12:12:04 | SR:-- | Black
Toldot
previous section, completely ignore this possibility. Therefore we
must look deeper into Isaac’s reasons for wanting to bless Esau.
According to Kabbalah and Chassidut Isaac sought to confer his
blessing on Esau for a number of related reasons. One approach
suggests that Isaac, after receiving Abraham’s blessing that all the
nations of the world would be blessed through him, assumed that
Esau and Jacob would ultimately join forces to achieve that goal.
Esau would handle the physical side of things (dominion over the
world), while Jacob would handle the spiritual side. Isaac knew that
Jacob would willingly and successfully take on such a task, but he
felt that Esau needed some prodding, so he wished to strengthen his
positive side by blessing him. Ultimately, the physical and spiritual
sides would unite and everyone would benefit.
Rebecca thwarted Isaac’s wishes because she, like Sarah before
her, was blessed with an even deeper level of prophecy than her
husband. She foresaw that Esau was not up to the task, and even
divined that the physical and spiritual realms had to be united in one
person. Dividing the spiritual and physical between two individuals
would lead to a fractured and discordant world, so she tried to ensure
that Jacob received the blessing.
Another approach suggests that Isaac’s powerful prophetic
abilities explain his choice. Isaac foresaw Esau’s deep sparks of
holiness manifested in his descendants, Rabbi Akiba and Rabbi Meir.
Isaac wanted to provide these sparks with the incentive to manifest
themselves in Esau, and he hoped that by blessing him this might
occur.
On a similar note, we may propose that since Isaac had integrated
a certain degree of chesed from his father Abraham (although his
primary trait was still gevurah), he too acted out of chesed. Just as
Abraham had pleaded with God to save the wicked city of Sodom
due to the sparks of holiness he saw embedded there, similarly Isaac
attempted to redeem Esau’s sparks.
Yet according to the Kabbalah, Rebecca thwarted Isaac’s plans
because her prophetic abilities were even more powerful than her
husbands: she foresaw that even though Rabbi Akiba descended
103
#