Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hello, my friends, and welcome back to this week's episode of the Practical Parsha Podcast. This is Rabbi Shtomo Cohen, and I hope you are well for this week. We're back at it. I know I missed the parsha last week. I'm sorry. And you know, it's almost harder to miss a week and to restart again than to just push through and do it when it's really difficult. But sometimes life happens and, and you just can't do it. But I'm back this week again for the Parshas Toldos.
[00:00:32] And before we begin, as always, if you have any questions, comments, would like to reach out, feel free to send me an email at Rabbi Shlomokon kohnmail.com I'd love to hear from you.
[00:00:43] This week's Parsha is Parsha has told us. And just to give a quick overview of the weekly parsha. The parsha begins with the story of how Yitzchak and Rivkah, Isaac and Rebecca, they're childless, and how they pray to Hashem. They pray to God for a child, and Hashem answers their prayers.
[00:01:05] But there's something interesting here about this pregnancy. Rivkah.
[00:01:10] She notices that the child inside of her, right? Or she thinks at this point it's a child is.
[00:01:19] Is pushing or pulling for different things. The Midrash tells us that when she would pass a house of study, the baby would kick. But at the same time, when she would pass a house of idol worship, the baby would kick again. And she was confused, what does this child want? And she goes to the Academy of Shame to know what's going on, right? What's the message here?
[00:01:44] And she's told the tell us the verses. Tell us that she's told that there's two nations inside you. She's going to have twins, and each one will be a mighty nation. But only one can be powerful at a time. The Torah tells us about the birth of Yaakov and Esav, and these are the two sons of Yitzchak and Rivkah and the two nations that we're referring to.
[00:02:12] Esav is born first, and following him is Yaakov, who's holding on to the heel of Esav.
[00:02:22] Now, the Torah also describes to us the different personalities of Yaakov and Esav, just to give a quick overview.
[00:02:28] Yaakov is the Ishtam, um, he is a person who studies, working on his character development.
[00:02:34] And Esav is a hunter, a person who is a more gruffy person, a hunter, a person who's in the fields.
[00:02:44] And their personalities also emerge. Yaakov is doing the right thing, and Esav is getting himself into trouble. And in the course of this description, the Torah tells us about the sale of the birthright, right? So we know that Esav was born first. He is the bechar. He's the firstborn son and a firstborn. The Torah has certain rights. The rights that Esav had was the rights to the service of the Beis Hamig, their service in the temple.
[00:03:09] Esav comes in from the field, hungry, starving, and he sees that Yaakov had just prepared this dish of lentils. And the Midrashim tell us that these lentils were for the meal after, for a mourner. Because Yitzchak, Yaakov's father and Esav's father, right, he was sitting. He was sitting shiva, you know, he was in mourning for Avraham Avinu had just passed away. And Yaakov had prepared these lentils for him.
[00:03:34] And Esav is starving, hungry. He sees this food. He says, what's going on here?
[00:03:40] Yaakov tells him the background that he's making this for his father. And he asks Yaakov to pour this soup into his mouth to give him food. Yaakov sees this opportunity, and he tells Esav, uh, sell to me your right of the firstborn.
[00:03:59] And Esav, he does that for him. The serving in the Beis Hamikdash, this right that he has from birth for the spiritual, you know, benefits to do this is not really worth much to him.
[00:04:13] And he sells his firstborn, right? The Torah says that he is. He demeaned the firstborn, right?
[00:04:21] The Parsha also tells us the story of Yaakov stealing the blessings of Esav.
[00:04:28] Now, as Yitzchak is getting older, he. He sees that it's time for him to pass, and he wants to bless his son.
[00:04:36] Now, Esav is the firstborn. And we know the Midrashim tell us that Esav tricked his father. He made his father think that he was super righteous.
[00:04:48] Now, there's a lot of commentary on this and how he was able to do this. How could he have tricked his father, the great Yitzhak? How's that possible?
[00:04:56] And there's a lot of commentary here, but the Parasha, uh, tells us that Yitzchak made a decision in his mind that he wanted to bless Esav for whatever reason, different explanations.
[00:05:08] And the Torah tells us how. Rivkah, in her intuitive knowledge, sees what Yitzchak is going to do. And she quickly tells Yaakov to go, and he has to go in to be as his brother, to pretend that he's Esav to get the blessings.
[00:05:26] And she prepares a meal for him and puts on this special coat so he should be hairy like Esav.
[00:05:33] And the Torah tells us that Yitzchak doesn't realize his vision was not good vision. And he thinks that this person coming to him is Esav. And he gives him the blessing.
[00:05:46] And quickly after he's given the blessings to Yaakov, he leaves Yaakov and Esav comes in. And only at that moment does Yitzchak realize what happened, that he had given the blessings to Yaakov and that his decision originally to give it to Yitzchak and how he looked at and his decision originally to give it to Esav and how he looked at his son Esav was incorrect. He realizes how mistaken he was that he thought his son Esav was righteous when he really wasn't.
[00:06:17] And it's a moment the Parsha continues with how Esav plots in his heart to kill Yaakov at the right time. His hatred for Yaakov because he, quote, unquote, stole the blessings. And we've discussed this in other years, the, you know, the reasonings behind it and really how it was Yaakov because he had bought the firstborn right from Esav. But either way, the Parsha tells us how Yaakov has to flee from his house for a safety of his life, and he goes to the house of Lavan.
[00:06:52] The first idea I want to share with you today takes us to the beginning of the Parasha, where the Torah describes to us the beginning of. Of the life of Yaakov and Esav.
[00:07:03] We know that Yaakov was doing the right thing and Esav was not doing what he was supposed to do. But the Torah tells us that Yitzchak had this special love for Esav. It says, Esav Kitzai.
[00:07:21] And Yitzhak loved Esav because he was a hunter in his mouth, and Rivkah loved Yaakov.
[00:07:28] So we discussed earlier in the overview that Yitzchak was under the impression that Esav was righteous, that he was a doing what he was supposed to do, and he was a tzadik. And the question is, how could he have been tricked that like this? How did Esav manage to fool his own father when, you know, he. He wasn't really who he was?
[00:07:53] So Rab, uh, Destler brings down from the arizal.
[00:07:56] He explains that there's a hint to what he did. In this pasuk, it says he loved him because he was a hunter.
[00:08:13] Meaning literally, it means that he fed him, he gave him good food, he was able to give him his needs, right? He was able to hunt, bring him back delicious food. And it sort of causes affection and yitzchak.
[00:08:26] But there's a, uh, deeper meaning and a deeper understanding here and into how Esav, uh, operated and how he was able to, you know, quote, unquote, I don't want to say trick, but sort of misinterpret himself and present himself in a different way than who he really was.
[00:08:46] We know when it comes to being a better person, there's an expression you could talk to talk, but you have to walk the walk.
[00:08:54] You know, talk is cheap. We have to be able to take the things we talk about and we learn about and internalize it and to put it into action.
[00:09:03] That's what it's all about.
[00:09:05] But what did ASOV do? How did ASOV operate?
[00:09:09] ESAV operated. Everything was in his mouth, meaning he was able to present himself in a way. The way he talked was in such a fashion that his father got the impression that he was truly righteous. The midrash tells us that he would ask questions to his father that were sort of, you know, making him look like a super righteous person. But really, in practicality, they had no, you know, it was not practical at all. You know, for example, you know, father, do I have to. Do I have to take tithes off of salt?
[00:09:42] Right? These questions made him look very, uh, holy and lofty, but they are just meant to put a show on. And that's how Esav was. He was somebody who had everything in his mouth, but nothing was put into action.
[00:09:57] And, uh, that's how he tricked his father, because he knew how to talk the talk.
[00:10:03] But when it came to actually implementing the things that needed to be done, he didn't do it.
[00:10:09] Because that's what it's all about. It's about internalizing the things that we talk about, internalizing the things that we learn about.
[00:10:18] To not just talk about things, you know, that's just blowing hot air. That's the expression. We need to be people that integrate the things we talk about into our very being.
[00:10:31] And we know people that say, oh, I, uh, love everybody, uh, but people will pick up eventually. If you're not truly authentic and you don't really care about them, you just talk about how you care about them, and you don't really mean it. You don't show the actions that show that they're going to pick you up as a fraud.
[00:10:51] And similarly, when it comes to, you know, having principles, we could talk about principles, but you have to live by the principles that you talk about. And that's the hard part. And that's something we have to remember. And we see from Esav that he was just befiv. It was in his mouth.
[00:11:08] And that's how he was able to maybe trick his father for a limited amount of time. But ultimately in life, we have to remember. We have to have it penetrate our heart and our soul, you know, who we are. If we want to be truly authentic and real people and serve Hashem in the correct way.
[00:11:27] The things that we say and the, uh, talk that we talk have to be real and, you know, be the essence of who we really are.
[00:11:37] The next idea I want to share with you today takes us to the story of Esav selling his firstborn. Right?
[00:11:44] The Torah tells us Vyakov Nasan Le Eisav Lechem and Nazir Adoshim Vayocha vayesht, Vayokam Vayelech Vayeva as Esavichaira Jacob gave Asav bread, lentils, stew, and he ate and drank, got up and left.
[00:11:58] Thus, Asa spurned the birthright. He demeaned it.
[00:12:04] Now, the verse over here gives a certain insight into human nature.
[00:12:12] We know Esav, he again, he wasn't doing what he's supposed to be doing. He came in, he was hungry.
[00:12:19] He saw this pot of lentil soup. He was hungry and wanted it. Now, what was the reason why Yaakov made it? It was for the mourning, the meal that's given to a mourner after someone passes. That's why the lentils, the round food.
[00:12:34] The midrash tells us that he asked, what's this food for? Yaakov told him was for the, you know, the meal for his father that Avram Abraham had passed away.
[00:12:45] And Esav, uh, he, you know, he sort of said, oh, if Avram Abraham passed away, such a righteous person at, you, uh, know, he passed away, you know, what. What good is it all? He was so righteous. And he still died.
[00:13:02] A great tzadik like Avramavinu. And he passed away, then there's no justice. There's no justice in the world. If there was a God, he would allowed Avraham Avinu Abraham to live forever.
[00:13:14] He never would have let him die.
[00:13:16] And that was his reasoning.
[00:13:18] To sell the bechaira, to sell the firstborn. Right?
[00:13:22] So it's an interesting, you know, idea here.
[00:13:26] Esav was the classic Russia. He was. He was the evil person.
[00:13:32] And when it came to being hungry, he wanted his soup.
[00:13:36] But at the same time, he had to make a reason before he sold his firstborn right to Yaakov. He could have just, sure, I'm hungry. I'll sell it to you. No problem. Like, uh, you know, if a person doesn't believe in anything, you know, if a person doesn't believe in Hashem or doesn't believe in the next world. So you tell a guy, I'll give you 100 bucks to sell, uh, your afterlife. It should be no problem. It shouldn't even be a hesitation. It's a $300. But we see that Esav had to make a reason why he questioned Yaakov. He questioned him. He'd just take it and take the sale. He questioned him, who is this for? And he said, oh, it's for Avram. Um, oh, what a great tzadik. And he died. It must be. He had to come to that conclusion. That was part of the process until he was able to sell the firstborn. Right.
[00:14:26] He needed some type of justification for himself before he did that. So we see even for Esav, who was a Russia, who was an evil person, he still needed some type of, you know, justification to get him to push him over the edge, to do this act.
[00:14:46] And I think this comes a very powerful lesson for ourselves.
[00:14:50] How often do we make rationales for the things that we do are really, you know, they're just reasons for us to do what we want to do. It's a permission structure for us to just live freely and not listen to the rules. Right? That's human nature. We sometimes make questions for ourselves in order for us to do what we want to do. There's a famous Gemara, the Gemara tells us. Talmud tells us, you know, that when someone does something wrong, it becomes permissible. So the Gerard says, what do you mean it becomes permissible? So the Gemara says a famous line that once someone does something, once it becomes like it's permissible. The point is we find a reasoning for things to do the things we want to do. And I think the lesson we could take out of this is that we need to be careful with and be honest with ourselves and the rationales that we give ourselves for the things that we do or don't do, to really be truly honest, to make sure that we're not, you know, making excuses for ourselves to do something that maybe is not the right thing to do, to give ourselves excuses or passes for things when we really shouldn't be. And that's a lesson we see from Esav, how even he had to make a reason. Maybe if he wouldn't have made that reason, he would have made the right decision. Right. If he would have been honest with himself, he wouldn't have gone over to sell the bechaira. He wouldn't have sell the firstborn. Right. He still would. He would have maybe done the right thing. And I think this is a very beautiful idea we see from next week's Parasha. The last idea I want to share with you today takes us to the blessings of Yitzchak, that when Yitzchak is going to pass on, he's getting older, he wants to bless his sons, and he wants to bless Esav.
[00:16:34] But Rivkah, uh, sees she has prophecy that she knows that that's incorrect. And she encourages Yaakov Jacob to go in and be disguised as Esav to get the blessings.
[00:16:48] And the Parsha tells us how when Yaakov goes in to get the blessings from Yitzchak, he says, akolko, Yaakov, e' e daime de Esav. The voice is Yaakov, but the hands are of Esav. And the Midrashim tell us that when Yaakov was in there, he smells the smell of Ganedin, of heaven, and he gives Yaakov the blessing. And after Yaakov leaves Yitzchak, Esav comes in to be blessed. He comes from the field because his father had sent him out originally to get food. Before he's going to bless him, he needs to have a meal. And Esav went out to prepare this meal. And he comes in with the meal that he's prepared.
[00:17:29] He doesn't know that Yaakov was taking the blessings already.
[00:17:32] And he comes in, and Yitzchak senses that, and he comes in and the posse tells us. He says, who is this? And he says, when Yitzchak finds out that he gave the blessings to Yaakov and not Esav, he has a great trembling. He trembled greatly. He was extremely fearful. And the Midrashim tells us that when Esav came into the room, he felt the opening of Gehennim. He felt that purgatory hell had opened up under Esav. He felt that he sensed this smell or this, you know, again, it's Kabbalistical. It's, you know, higher than my pay grade. He had this certain sense that he realized what was going on. He realized that Yaakov was truly the righteous son he had this recognition that Esav had been tricking him the whole time.
[00:18:26] And now he had to come to reality to face that, you know, not decision, but the fact that he had made a mistake.
[00:18:37] Now, it's very interesting if you think about it for a second.
[00:18:41] Each one of the avos, each one of our forefathers had different strengths.
[00:18:46] Avraham excelled in kindness, Chesed.
[00:18:49] Yaakov excelled in Torah study. But what was the specialty of Yitzchak? It's called gevurah strength.
[00:18:59] And what does it mean? Gevurah? Gevurah. There's different aspects of it, but gevurah means is that Yitzchak never had any fear. He always realized that he was exactly where he needed to be. And this is the will of Hashem. And you think about it for a second, we know that Avraham was about to slaughter his son Yitzchak. Yitzchak was 40 years old. He wasn't a little child.
[00:19:22] And he went along willingly with his father to do this mitzvah.
[00:19:28] And at no point in the story of the Akedah is any fear expressed by Yitzhak.
[00:19:36] He had no fear. He realized this is what Hashem wants, and that was it.
[00:19:42] Even when he saw his father holding the knife over him, he didn't fear nothing. He wanted to do what G D wanted, and that was it.
[00:19:51] But over here now, when Yitzchak realizes that he had blessed Yaakov and that his son Esav wasn't so righteous, it says that he had a great trembling.
[00:20:06] He had harada, gedoila, admi, oyd, which he had this fearfulness.
[00:20:13] What's going on over here?
[00:20:15] What's the fearfulness here?
[00:20:17] The commentaries tell us that this fearfulness was the recognition that he had made a mistake. His entire life. He thought Esav was righteous, and he really wasn't. He was tricked. And that caused a certain moment of trepidation within himself.
[00:20:34] Now, this really brings to a bigger discussion and lesson, because, you know, if this was Yitzchak Isaac, who in his life he never feared, and at this moment, when he realized he made a mistake, he had this certain moment of recognition, you know, all the more so for us now. But the question is, like, you know, we're human beings.
[00:20:54] We make mistakes. That's who we are. And actually, that's how Hashem set it up. That's how God set it up for us. And we become stronger from our mistakes.
[00:21:04] But I think we can learn from this, is that there's a few points.
[00:21:07] Number one, if we know where we're going and what we're trying to do.
[00:21:14] So then, you know, the number one, the mistakes we got we're going to make are going to be less.
[00:21:20] And even if we make a mistake, we're going to get back up and use it as a springboard to improve ourselves and to be better.
[00:21:29] Number two, I saw brought down that, and, you know, I could relate to this as well through the experiences, you know, of me dealing with people in general is that most of the time when people talk about regrets in their life, they don't have the regrets about things they did and didn't work out. The regrets are for things they didn't try. They didn't try to do things they should have tried. They didn't live up to their full potential because maybe they didn't do certain things that they should have or they could have. It's not the regret, uh, that they tried something and they made the mistake. That's not where people are looking back and say, I should have, because you did your part.
[00:22:10] So the lesson we could take out of this is that when it comes to making decisions in life and reaching our potential, we don't want to be looking back and say, I should have done it.
[00:22:22] We won't look back and say, oh, I did it and I made a mistake.
[00:22:27] You'll never look back at something and say, I tried. You never want to go back and say, I could have tried.
[00:22:34] So the lesson here is to give it your best shot, to not be afraid. To have your sense of purpose and mission and goals of where you want to be and where you want to get to. And God willing, when you have that picture in your mind, you're going to get there. The mistakes are going to be less. And the times that you do fall down, you'll use it as a springboard to get back up and to get to your true potential. So with that, I'm going to vision for today's podcast. I hope you enjoyed. If you have any questions, comments, or would like to reach out, feel free to send me an email at Rabbi schlomakonkohn@gmail um com. Have a great day.
