Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hello my friends, and welcome back to this week's episode of the Practical Parasha Podcast. This is Rabbi Shlomo Cohen and I hope you are well.
[00:00:07] For this week we continue with Parshas Vayetze.
[00:00:12] And before we begin, as always, if you have any questions, comments, or just would like to reach out to say hello, don't be shy, send that email. Introduce yourself.
[00:00:25] My email address is rabbi shlomo kon kohnmail.com I'd love to hear from you.
[00:00:31] This week's Parsha is Parshas Vayetze. The parsha begins with Yaakov Avinu Jacob fleeing from Beersheba from his parents house.
[00:00:42] And he's going to Haran to find himself a spouse and also to run away from his brother Esav. So he shouldn't kill him, right? His mother is scared that Esav is, you know, he's so angry that Yaakov, you know, quote unquote, he stole the brachos from him, he deceived. He's so angry that he stole the brachos from him that he runs away. And on the way the Parsha tells us how he, you know, he has to spend the night in this location.
[00:01:16] And we are told that he takes these stones and puts it around his head and he has a dream. And it's not a regular dream, it's a prophetic dream.
[00:01:27] He sees a vision of a ladder with angels going up and down the ladder.
[00:01:35] And we'll talk a little bit today about the symbolisms or maybe one of the lessons from the ladder. But there's a lot of commentaries that explain the meaning of this specific prophecy of the angels going up, the angels coming down. And on the simple understanding, it's the he was about to leave the land of Israel, Yaakov. And therefore the angels of Israel were going up. And the angels of outside the land of Israel, of Chutzla Aretz of the Diaspora were coming to escort him. But there's many different explanations of the significance of this prophecy and we're going to touch upon one of them today, God willing.
[00:02:17] After Yaakov wakes up from this dream, he realizes that the place he was sleeping on was a holy spot and he names it Base Kel. And then Yaakov Jacob makes a promise that if Hashem takes care of him, gives him all his needs, and he's able to go back to his father's house in peace, he makes a deal with G D that he'll give a, uh, tenth of his possessions to Hashem.
[00:02:42] We're told in this week's Parasha. Additionally, how Yaakov meets Rochel meets Rachel. When Yaakov arrives in Haron, the city of Haran, he gets to this well where the shepherds are gathering to give their flocks water. Uh, and as was the custom in those days, since, you know, one man did not trust his neighbor, everyone would have to be at the well together in order that this giant rock, which they all placed on the well, could be moved, meaning no one was able to move it off by themselves. So they did this so that no one should steal from another.
[00:03:17] And only when all the shepherds would be in this location at one time could they roll the rock off the well and they would roll it back after everyone was done. And Rachel comes to the well.
[00:03:28] And Yaakov miraculously rolls the rock off the well and asks Rachel, you know, who are you? Where are you from? And she says, she's from the house of Lavan. Rachel goes back to her father's house, Lavan, who's the uncle of Yaakov, she says how she met Yaakov and how he rolled this rock off the well for her. And Lavan comes running to Yaakov, remembering the last time a messenger from his family comes, right? Eliezer, the servant of Yitzchak, who came to take his sister Rivkah back, right? He came with gold and silver and all these presents. And Lavan, who was a wicked man, remembers these gifts and thinks again to himself, it's time for me to make some cash. And he runs out to greet Yaakov, and he realizes that he is penniless. He doesn't have anything this time. But yet, at the same time, he takes pity on him because he is his family. And he says to him, if you want to marry my daughter Rachel, you need to work for me for seven years. And Yaakov, the Parasha tells us he works for Rachel seven years.
[00:04:37] But Lavan, who was a trickster, conniving person, plays a trick. He switches Rachel for Leah. Leah is Rachel's older sister. And Rachel, uh, in her piousness and her righteousness, gives this, you know, seek the code words that Yaakov set up with Rachel to her sister Leah in order that she should not be embarrassed. And Lavan, the trickster that he is, he says it is not the custom in our city to give the younger before the older. And therefore, Yaakov has to work another seven years for Rachel. Parsha tells us how Lavan tries to trick Yaakov in his dealings during his stay in his house. Always switching his deals and trying to get the best of situations, but yet Hashem, uh, is always watching over Yaakov of Enu, watching over Jacob, so that he always comes out ahead. The Parasha also tells us about the children that are born to Yaakov.
[00:05:37] And Leah has many children right away, but Rachel, it's, you know, she gets frustrated. And finally, this week's Parasha tells us she has one son. His name is Yosef. The parasha concludes with Yaakov speaking to his wives and discussing with them, um, about leaving the house of Lavan. Yaakov has been living there approximately 21 years and he realizes it's time to go. He doesn't want Lavan to influence him and his families. So he speaks to his wife, they make a conference and they decide that this is not the place for us and we are leaving.
[00:06:17] Parasha concludes with Lavan chasing after Yaakov until finally they make peace and they go on their own separate ways.
[00:06:28] The first idea I want to share with you today takes us to the beginning of the Parasha, when Yaakov has this prophecy.
[00:06:36] After leaving his parents house, the Torah tells us he puts 12 rocks around his head.
[00:06:41] And miraculously, actually after he wakes up, the 12 rocks merged into one. But either way, in this dream that Yaakov has, he sees this ladder with, goes from the ground and ascends heavenward. And on the ladder are, ah, these malachim, these angels going up and down.
[00:07:01] Like I mentioned before, there are different understandings of what are the significances of these angels going up and down.
[00:07:09] And one of the understandings, one of the ways that it's under and one of the ways that this prophecy is explained is that Hashem, uh, was showing Yaakov the different exiles that his descendants, the Jewish people, would have to go through.
[00:07:27] And each one of the angels represented the ministering angels of the different exiles and different oppressors that the Jewish people would have.
[00:07:38] So each angel, right, there's four exiles that the Jewish people have had in their history, meaning all the different exiles that we've gone through are part of these four exiles. You have the exile of Babel, which is the Babylonians. And he saw the angel of BABEL Go up 70 rungs and then fall down, which represented the 70 years that the Jewish people would be under the dominion of the Babylonians, that they would be in Gullus Bavil in the Babylonian exile.
[00:08:11] He sees the ministering angel of the Greeks. And he saw it go up, up, up, up a certain amount of years. And then finally, at the destined time, the destined amount of years, he sees it fall down. And then he sees the angel of the Persians go up, up, up, up, up, up. And finally, after a certain amount of years, it falls down.
[00:08:33] And finally he sees the angel of Edom of Rome, which is the exile that we're currently in. And he sees the angel climbing and climbing and climbing until he almost does not see the angel no more. And he's overcome with a tremendous amount of fear, saying to Hashem, when will this gullus, when will this exile end? And Hashem, uh, comforts him in the prophecy as well, that the gallus of Edom, the gullus of Rome, the exile of Rome, will end as well.
[00:09:07] I saw a fascinating midrash, though, that talks about this episode and this prophecy that Yaakov Inu experienced the midrash brings down in Vayikuraba that Hashem told Yaakov Avinu told Jacob to also ascend the ladder.
[00:09:26] Ascend the ladder.
[00:09:28] But Yaakov, in this prophecy that he was experiencing, he was afraid.
[00:09:35] He didn't want to.
[00:09:37] Why?
[00:09:38] Because he saw all the other angels going up and then falling down.
[00:09:44] And he said to himself, what if I go up the ladder, but I fall down just like everyone else is falling down? What's going to be with me?
[00:09:55] And because of that fear, he didn't go up the ladder.
[00:10:00] So even though G D told him to go up the ladder, to climb up, also he didn't.
[00:10:06] And the medrash tells us that Hashem told him, because you didn't go up the ladder, your descendants will be subjugated by these nations.
[00:10:18] Now, I'm sure there's a lot of deep ideas here, and I think you might have a lot of questions.
[00:10:23] What's the significance of Jacob going up the ladder? And why was he scared to go up the ladder? That's something that can be discussed. But what I want to focus on is this lesson that we see here. It's a very powerful lesson from Yaakov Avinu. I think we can learn that from this week's parsha, which can relate to us personally.
[00:10:43] Yaakov Avinu was afraid to go up the ladder because he might fall down because he might fail.
[00:10:53] And I think this is a very powerful lesson for us.
[00:10:58] How many, you know, great achievements don't happen because people are afraid to fail.
[00:11:08] How many, you know, good things would we not have if people would have had that fear?
[00:11:15] Right. We can't let fear of failure hold us back from the great things we want to do.
[00:11:24] And in fact, if people don't fail, that probably means they're not going to be successful.
[00:11:30] Because people who achieve great things in their life, they all failed at first before they got to that success.
[00:11:39] You know, statistically a person will fail, uh, uh, even a successful person, everybody's going to have failures. It's a reality of life, It's a reality of the world we live in. But there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with making a mistake. There's nothing wrong with being wrong.
[00:12:02] The main thing is are you trying, are you getting back up? Are you trying to go up? And that was Yaakov's mistake. Here again, why didn't he want to go up?
[00:12:13] What was the significance of him going up? That's a good question. But what I want to focus on now is this idea of not being afraid to fall.
[00:12:22] Right. If a child would know the risk of him falling down every time, he would never learn to walk, he would be afraid. He doesn't realize what he's doing, so he just goes and he falls down, but he gets back up.
[00:12:36] And we have to be like that child sometimes to not be scared of the risks that we're gonna take. I mean obviously we have to be responsible, but it's something we have to keep focused on that if we want to achieve and we want to do good and we want to be successful, uh, in all areas of our life, you know, spiritually, materially, you know, emotionally, everywhere.
[00:12:59] Don't be afraid to fail. And I think this is something, you know, which everyone can relate to. I myself feel that I can relate to this as well. We're afraid to do something because we're afraid we might be wrong.
[00:13:11] And we have to realize there's nothing wrong with being wrong.
[00:13:14] And I think one key, one trait which Robbie, uh, Turski brings down that I think could help us, um, give us the encouragement to go forward even when maybe we don't want to or maybe we're afraid to is if we know our self worth, if we know who we are and we have that self esteem of, you know, of our uh, things that we can do and our abilities and our good traits.
[00:13:46] So then the fear of failure is, is not as scary as opposed to somebody who doesn't have that self esteem, that doesn't know who they are, that doesn't know their capabilities.
[00:13:56] So if they make a mistake, it's going to crush them. But if a person has that self confidence, if a person knows who they are and knows what they want to accomplish. So if they make a mistake, it's fine. It's part of the bigger picture. It doesn't crush them. It doesn't destroy them. They'll keep going.
[00:14:14] So therefore, if we want to be those type of people, successful people, that successful, you'll make mistakes.
[00:14:21] I, uh, guarantee you ask the most successful people in the world, you know, whatever that means. In different areas, they all made mistakes. In fact, they probably made many mistakes. But they were not afraid to go forward. They were not afraid to act.
[00:14:36] Obviously, there's this balance of being responsible. But the point is, when we're able to look at a decision and, you know, look at it with a full picture and balance everything out, and then there's just this mental block. We just should go forward, go for the decision that we want to make, and don't let that fear hold us back. That's a very powerful idea we see from this week's Parasha. The second idea I want to share with you today is about the sons of Leah.
[00:15:03] Now, we know that Leah was not Yaakov's first choice to marry Yaakov. He wanted to marry Rachel. Rachel.
[00:15:15] But Lavan Laban, he tricked him and switched Rachel for Leah.
[00:15:22] And after marrying Leah, he eventually marries Rachel.
[00:15:28] But the Torah tells us that Yaakov had this love for Rachel. And this is a very, you know, there's a deep understandings over here. It seems like he had this special. He favored Rachel. And in the parsha, we see that when Leah gave birth right away to three boys, and each one of the names of one of her son of her sons signify her gaining the affection of Yaakov.
[00:15:56] And the Torah tells us, you know, she had the first son's name was Reuven, then Shimon, then Levi, and finally she has a son, a fourth son named Yehuda.
[00:16:09] The posse tells us that the reason why she names him Yehuda is because she was thanking Hashem. The posse reads as vatar oyd vatala bayin va toimer ha' pam oide es, uh, Hashem al khayin karashima Yehuda fatamo ymiledes.
[00:16:29] She conceived again and bore a son and declared this time, let me gratefully praise Hashem. Uh, therefore she called his name Judah. Then she stopped giving birth.
[00:16:41] And if you look at Rashi, Rashi explains to us, based on the midrash Shena tallti yoser Michelki, that Leah was declaring that Hashem ah has given me more than my portion, and therefore I have to give gratitude. And that's why she named Yehuda, Yehuda Ham Oyda. Oyda means to give thanks, thankfulness, gratitude.
[00:17:10] And it's actually, it's very interesting because the Gemara brings down that until Leah was grateful and had this thankfulness to Hashem, uh, till this point in time, no one else in creation, from the time of the creation of the world till now, had given thanks to Hashem, like Leah.
[00:17:33] And the obvious question is, like, what does that mean? What does that mean? That no one was thankful? How is that possible? Nobody was thankful. From the beginning of humanity till now, there was a lot of righteous people.
[00:17:45] And I think one of the ideas why I like this, this vort. Why I want to say this idea today, he's like, I'm recording this on Thanksgiving eve.
[00:17:53] Thanksgiving in the United States. It's all about, right, thanks. But what's the true meaning of Thanksgiving? That's what we have. We want to know what the Torah says about Thanksgiving.
[00:18:02] That's a little bit of this special Thanksgiving episode over here. And the question is, she was really the first person in the world to give thanks to Hashem. What about Avraham, Abraham? What about Yitzchak? What about the matriarchs? They didn't give thanks to Hashem for all the good things that had happened to them.
[00:18:23] And to understand this a little bit better, the midrash brings down a parable of a kohen, a priest who is by the granary and kohanim. In the times of the temple, they would receive certain tithes of grain, different parts, or animals. But either way, by the granary, the coin, he receives a big portion from one person, and he doesn't thank him.
[00:18:50] And then the midrash tells us that he received a small portion from another fellow and thanks him. And the fellow who gave him the big portion says, why did you thank one and not the other? He says, when you gave me, you gave me what you had to give.
[00:19:06] But when this fellow who gave me this small amount, he gave me out of his own right, because there's a certain percentage which has to be given to the kohen. So you were giving me what you had to give me.
[00:19:17] So therefore I didn't say thank you, but this fellow who was giving from his own, and he didn't have to give it, therefore I thanked him. Now, obviously, we thank everybody for everything. But the midrash is bringing down a powerful lesson.
[00:19:32] Leah, uh, knew that Yaakov Avinu, that Jacob would have 12 tribes. He prophetically saw that there would be 12 tribes of Israel that would establish the Jewish people.
[00:19:46] And with simple mathematics, if there was four wives, right. Yaakov had four wives.
[00:19:53] So each one, if you divide 12 by four, it's three.
[00:19:58] So each one of the wives should have bore three children, three boys.
[00:20:08] So Leah was the first one to give birth. She has 1, 2, 3.
[00:20:12] And now she has a fourth son. That means she's going to have a fourth tribe, meaning she's going to have more than the other wives. She's getting an extra tribe is going to come from her.
[00:20:27] So therefore, she was thanking Hashem, uh, for a portion which she didn't necessarily deserve.
[00:20:34] It was pure gratefulness, pure gratitude for something that, you know, she wasn't necessarily, quote, unquote, entitled to, but Hashem gave it to her anyways out of his goodness.
[00:20:47] The lesson for us from this episode, uh, in the Parsha is that true gratitude is when we, you know, we feel we're truly unworthy and undeserved, meaning when we have that full sense of thankfulness is when we have that feeling that we really don't deserve this, but we're getting it anyways. That's how we get to a true level of Thanksgiving.
[00:21:16] And I think this is important for us to remember and internalize because it's not just, you know, when people do things for us, we say thank you. Because there's a part of us that, you, uh, know, maybe subconsciously we say, yeah, it's coming to us, but we're not really thankful. We think, you know, I did someone a favor, so you do me a favor back.
[00:21:39] But the idea over here, and this is what it means that Leah was the first one to give thanks to Hashem. She was the first one in the world to have this full level of gratitude that through and through, that she felt she was totally undeserving of this, and she got it anyways, and she was thankful to Hashem for that. And I think we have to remember, when it comes to other people we deal with, when it comes to Hashem, we have to have this feeling of thankfulness, of Thanksgiving, of true gratitude, to not think that things are coming to us and give lip service. Oh, thank you. Right. We want to really appreciate the things that come to us, that happen to us, that people do for us, and to realize a lot of the time we're undeserving of it. And when it comes to Hashem's blessings, probably most of the time, if not all the time, Hashem is giving to us, and we're not necessarily deserving of it. So this is to give us a little bit of an outlook here when it comes to thankfulness and Thanksgiving on this day. So with that, I'm going to finish for today's podcast. I hope you enjoyed. If you have any questions, comments, would like to reach out, feel free to send me an email at Rabbi Shlomokon kohnmail.com have a great day.
