Tyler’s Torah Thoughts for 28 Cheshvan, 5784
Parsha Toledot: (Genesis 25:19- 28:9)
First Portion: Genesis 25:19 – 26:5

New Parsha! This week we are studying “Toledot” which means “Descendants.” It’s the study of the lineage of Abraham; and the next generation of Jacob and Esau.

In the Chumash (book) I am reading – there is this quote:

“Connect to your lineage and discover the presence of your ancestors within you. You will receive the merit of all their efforts and be empowered to become full human, as best you can be.”

Fully human. We are called to embrace our human-ness.  This week, the themes are; struggle, pain, blessing children.

It is interesting to me; we just came out of the life of Sarah.  In the past, reading this, I have spent time focused on the men in this parsha.  But the descendant of Sarah? From a female perspective?  Rebecca. She’s the next woman in line.

Rebecca felt her twins struggling within her. From the Chumash:

“Esau would move when she passed houses of idol-worship, while Jacob would move when she passed houses of prayer.  Within you are two impulses which struggle with each other. One inclines towards the mundane while the other towards the Godly. It is your choice which impulse to follow.”

In addition, Rebecca’s pregnancy was extremely painful.  From the Chumash:

“Rebecca’s pregnancy was extremely painful, leading her to wonder why she wanted to have children.  Pain constricts your mind, eclipses all your concerns, makes you forgetful of your sacred mission in life. If pain presents itself, remember that it is only a transient “doorway” which you need to pass through.”

Connecting these two concepts?  We might understand WHY we might choose the mundane over the Godly.  There seems to be much more risk, trust, faith in choosing the Godly impulse in a given moment.  To engage our Jacob.  Esau seeks mundane – but also comfort. I am reflecting in my life how many times I made choices to AVOID pain instead of my Godly impulse. Pain = bad. When Pain REALLY = risk. Or at least opening ourselves up to pain = Risk.

The Godly choice produces scenarios for pain to enter. Suffering. I wrote about this previously:

It’s from the “Book of Awakening” by Mark Nepo.  And he writes this:

 “Suffering is caused by the contrast between what you mentally decided you wanted and the reality unfolding in front of you.”

When we make a Godly choice – we open ourselves up to the possibility that the reality unfolding in front of me may contrast with something we previously decided we wanted.  Letting go of past decisions and desires? That is what making the Godly choice puts us in touch with.

All of this to understand the “descendants.”  I am also reflecting on my own descendants today -as opposed to where we were two years ago when I wrote the commentary below.  We have (and continue to) navigated pain, struggle, and blessing together. I now see all of this is FOR THE PURPOSE of connecting me to my ancestors within me.  The Jacob and Esau within me. My mom/dad. Grandmothers and Grandfathers.  All of my current reality is connected to this.  And there is a lot of struggle. A lot of pain. A lot of blessing.

And this is the Jewish people, isn’t it? It is all of us.  I have written before – we talk a lot in our society about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  My therapist (who is AMAZING) talks with me about the concept of Post Traumatic Growth and Post Traumatic Resilience.

Today? I am reflecting on this idea of Post Traumatic Blessing.

It’s hard for me to write that. I know. I KNOW. Some will read that as “Post Traumatic Blessing – in other words you need to be GRATEFUL for your trauma – it was good for you. YOU DESERVED IT!”

If that is what you read when I write “Post Traumatic Blessing” please know, that is NOT what is in my head when I write it.

When I write “Post Traumatic Blessing” I mean this;

• The Trauma we’ve experienced. It was not OUR fault.
• The Trauma we’ve caused others? That IS our fault, even if it was unintentionally done.
• We do NOT have a time machine to go back to the past and undo that trauma in either direction (our trauma we’ve experienced and our trauma we’ve caused)
• In THIS moment. We have a choice. We can stay stuck in those moments of trauma that we’ve experienced, or we can take RESPONSIBILITY in this moment to heal that trauma. That we’ve experienced, and that we’ve caused.
• By taking the POWER and responsibility for healing? The descendants of Trauma turn to Resilience. Growth. BLESSING.

This is what I mean by Post Traumatic Blessing.

This is Toledot. This is our descendants. We have a choice. Engage our Godly soul. Or Engage the mundane.

What choice will we make?  Ok.  Let’s dig into the Torah (Genesis 25:19-21):

19And these are the generations of Isaac the son of Abraham; Abraham begot Isaac.

20And Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebecca the daughter of Bethuel the Aramean of Padan Aram, the sister of Laban the Aramean, to himself for a wife.

21And Isaac prayed to the Lord opposite his wife because she was barren, and the Lord accepted his prayer, and Rebecca his wife conceived.

Rebecca was barren.  Read below on what I’ve written about in the past about her being barren.  This connects her to Sarah, doesn’t it?  Let’s keep going:

22And the children struggled within her, and she said, “If [it be] so, why am I [like] this?” And she went to inquire of the Lord.

23And the Lord said to her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two kingdoms will separate from your innards, and one kingdom will become mightier than the other kingdom, and the elder will serve the younger.

24And her days to give birth were completed, and behold, there were twins in her womb.

This is a preview of what is to come. The two kingdoms are within us.  One side will become mightier than the other. The elder will serve the younger.

The elder will serve the younger.

I am chewing on this.  For 46 years, the elder Esau energy has been mightier within me.  Over the past 5 years, the Jacob energy has risen up within me.  It is currently overtaking the Esau energy within me. And I am starting to see how the Esau energy – the mundane – is NOW serving the Jacob energy – the Godly.  All within me.

What about you? Where are you with your energy? Is the elder serving the younger (Godly energy is sovereign within?) or is the younger serving the elder (Mundane energy is sovereign within?).

As an aside – for future exploration ands dialogue.  I am wondering – if you start from a young age to engage with the Godly parts of your soul, does the younger mundane energy rise up at some point in our lives and the younger mundane energy reigns supreme over the elder Godly energy?  Is that a possible reality? As kids, do we allow them to be kids and engage their mundane energy knowing that as they get older their younger Godly energy will overtake them and the elder will serve the younger?  Just a though.

Let’s keep going:

25And the first one emerged ruddy; he was completely like a coat of hair, and they named him Esau.

26And afterwards, his brother emerged, and his hand was grasping Esau’s heel, and he named him Jacob. Now Isaac was sixty years old when she gave birth to them.

27And the youths grew up, and Esau was a man who understood hunting, a man of the field, whereas Jacob was an innocent man, dwelling in tents.

28And Isaac loved Esau because [his] game was in his mouth, but Rebecca loved Jacob.

29Now Jacob cooked a pottage, and Esau came from the field, and he was faint.

30And Esau said to Jacob, “Pour into [me] some of this red, red [pottage], for I am faint”; he was therefore named Edom.

31And Jacob said, “Sell me as of this day your birthright.”

32Esau replied, “Behold, I am going to die; so why do I need this birthright?”

33And Jacob said, “Swear to me as of this day”; so he swore to him, and he sold his birthright to Jacob.

34And Jacob gave Esau bread and a pottage of lentils, and he ate and drank and arose and left, and Esau despised the birthright.

There is a lot here – and because of the length, I am going to skim some of my thoughts for you – mostly to come back to later:

• Esau (Mundane) energy = Hunting and being a “man of the field.”
• Jacob (Godly) energy = innocence and dwelling in tents (studying Torah)
• Isaac (the Miracle Masculine with an egg provided by Hashem) = masculine energy = loved Esau
• Rebecca (the barren woman who gave birth to twins) = feminine energy = loved Jacob
• At an old age, the power dynamics shift from Esau to Jacob – from Mundane to Godly
  • In order for the mundane to survive, Esau had to give his power away.
  • Mundane does NOT equal negative. It’s a choice – but not a right/wrong one.
  • This is freedom and liberation, isn’t it?

And let’s close with this (Genesis 26:1-5):

1And there was a famine in the land, aside from the first famine that had been in the days of Abraham, and Isaac went to Abimelech the king of the Philistines, to Gerar.

2And the Lord appeared to him, and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; dwell in the land that I will tell you.

3Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you, and I will bless you, for to you and to your seed will I give all these lands, and I will establish the oath that I swore to Abraham, your father.

4And I will multiply your seed like the stars of the heavens, and I will give your seed all these lands, and all the nations of the earth will bless themselves by your seed,

5Because Abraham hearkened to My voice, and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My instructions.”

Hashem gave Isaac a choice. Survive the famine in Egypt – or stay in the land and I will bless you. BECAUSE your father listened to me, and followed me.  This is why.

And I will close because of this.  My purpose as a dad? To pass blessing onto my children. If Abraham hearkened Hashem’s voice, kept Hashem’s charge, commandments, statutes and instructions?  That is my mission. That is my purpose. Because in the end, that works out well – NOT just for me. But for MY CHILDREN.

And I am ALSO left to reflect on – who in my traumatic ancestry did this for me to receive the blessings I have received?

Survive and follow the mundane. Or trust the Godly and stay.  That is the choice. At least for me. How about you?

And. We are entering the new moon transitioning us into Kislev.  Remember what I wrote yesterday.  This is the time to set our intents for the new cycle. Which do we intend to choose?  What will the descendants of our choices be? We won’t get this moment back. And. We will have new moments. So no pressure. What are our intents?

I’d love your thoughts.

Here is my commentary on this portion from the past two years:

Tyler’s Torah Thoughts for Heshvan 26, 5783

Wow. So reading this, I’m reflecting on the idea of time and space. The thoughts about Hashem not giving us what we want when we want it, and potentially being disappointed by that ring very true.

Many of you who know me know I am very time oriented. And my path has been shifting as late. You can ask me what time it is, and without looking at a watch, or my phone, my internal clock just “knows.”  It’s eerie sometimes.

I’ve come to realize how this has worked.  My brain will “microcalibrate” each time it sees a clock. It then measures the time since it last calibrated, and estimates a guess based on that data. It even does this when I’m sleeping. It’s rare that the alarm wakes me up. I’m up anywhere from 1-10 minutes before the alarm goes off.

This has served me well for a long time. But I’m also realizing it has limited me. My body reacts really negatively when it believes it’s “behind” where it is supposed to be.

A friend and I have been talking about these concepts. And I realized, what I don’t have is an internal compass.   I can’t tell you which direction in North.

Lately I’ve been working on recalibrating to direction. And the beauty of this is – it grounds me in the moment. I can see I’m facing the direction I want to go. I’m not worried about time or distance, because I’m where I am. But if my compass is set to take me away from where I want to go, I’ll likely make decisions that don’t bring me closer to my destination. Because that’s all I can really do. Moment by moment. Make decisions that are in line with the direction I want to go.

And I see this in the Torah portion today.

What are your thoughts?

Torah thoughts for Heshvan 25, 5782

New Parsha! This week we are studying “Toldot” which means “Descendants.” It’s the study of the lineage of Abraham; and the next generation of Jacob and Esau.

Todays portion covers the birth and early life of the two.

We first learn that Isaac and Rebekah have trouble conceiving. this is interesting given Abraham and Sarah’s struggles to conceive as well. Why do our early ancestors have difficult in conceiving children? This is what I’m chewing on.

The Talmud addresses this; “Rabbi Isaac said, ‘God yearns for the prayers of the righteous. That is why He initially caused them to be infertile, so that they would pray to Him for help.”

Some of you may not know; my ex-wife and I struggled to conceive at first. We wanted to wait to have children, but when we were ready to start, it was a long emotional process.

This idea (of Hashem desiring our prayers so we would ask him for help), brings me comfort (not saying I’m righteous here) because I connect with Abraham and Isaac here on the struggle to have children. But once Eliana (which in Hebrew means “my God has answered me”) came along, Hashem blessed us with five additional daughters!

One of my takeaways from all of this is the concept of patience. Hashem doesn’t always give us what we desire or need right when we want it. There is a drive for us to seek Him with our entire hearts before He blesses us. What is it today we are waiting on? How are we asking Hashem for help? Do we believe He cares? These are questions I reflect on here.

For me, I continue to wait on Hashem for employment to further provide for our family. Although it is difficult at times to be patient, and fears and anxiety creep up all the time, I’m the end, I know Hashem has never let our family down. He has always taken care of us; even if we don’t see it at first. He provided my ex-wife with a job to support us, and to free me up to stay home and take care of the kids while they were doing remote school. But now they are back in school, I am trusting He will provide for us further.

Moving on in the Parsha, we next learn that Rebekah experienced great pain in pregnancy. She went to an academy to speak to Hashem about it. She hears (through Devine inspiration) that she has twins! Hashem has told Rebekah that there will always be conflict between them; and one kingdom with become mightier than the other kingdom. “The elder will serve the younger.

Rabbi Meir Rubashkin and I have been studying the Tanya, which is an early formative work on Chassidic Philosophy. It’s been such a great learning opportunity to study something really complex and really meaningful. The reason I bring this up is the idea of Tanya speaks of us actually having two souls; the animal soul and the godly soul. The animal soul isn’t bad; it just is. It can certainly do good. But that’s an aside.

This past month, we’ve been talking about how spiritually we (as people) are a city with two kings fighting to rule over us; our Godly soul and our Animal Soul. In a sense, within each of us is an Esau and a Jacob.

We ALSO have within us two inclinations; the Yezter Ha’Rah (the evil inclination) and the Yetzer Ha’Tov (the inclination to do good). We are born with the Yetzer Ha’Rah, and therefore inside of us, that inclination is older than the Yetzer Ha’Tov which we get when we become older (around Bar/Bat Mitzvah age). So there is some comfort here when Hashem tells Sarah the elder will serve the Younger.

In the end, we have a choice; but the purpose and end is for the younger to win! That should give us great comfort in our daily struggle between the forces within us. And we can also take comfort that the struggle and conflict is part of the design; we don’t have to “win” right now necessarily. We get to make a choice each moment of each day the direction we will go. Even if yesterday I made some choices that I regret or embarrassed by, that is no longer real today as Hashem is recreating each moment. For the next 60 seconds, I have the freedom to choose where to engage; whether my Godly soul and Yetzer Ha’Tov or whether my Yetzer Ha’Rah inclines me to work against my Godly soul.

Ok. That may be a little too out there and maybe a smidge personal – if it isn’t clear and you don’t understand, PLEASE ask questions – even if it’s through DM. I’m no expert here; so I can try and explain more. I’m ALSO open to being corrected in my (limited) understanding by those who understand this far better than I (like Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Gershon Klein).

The story of Jacob and Esau isn’t something external to us (in my opinion) it’s a battle within us.

Ok. Moving forward; once the twins are born, we fast forward to them being older. We learn about the differences between the two.

We learn that Esau does not want to serve Hashem (as his birthright connects him to) as he’d rather be out doing other things; so when Jacob (who wants the birthright and responsibility to serve Hashem) sees an opportunity, he provides a way for the transfer of the birthright. I remember reading this as a child and thinking “what a jerk an opportunist!” But as I chew on it now, I think there is compassion.

We know from the Torah Esau despised his birthright (verse 34). Jacob gave Esau a plausible way to let it go; by selling the birthright in order to survive. Esau’s animal soul acted according to its design; it wanted to survive – which is a good thing. Jacob gave Esau an out; because Jacob’s godly soul desires the birthright, while at the same time not causing Esau to be “irresponsible” In not fulfilling the birthright. I chew on the question “would there have been a better way for this birthright to transfer?” I’m not sure there would be. If Esau just gave it away, I think that would have been worse for Esau; irresponsible, lazy, etc. But he sold it for survival. There is some compassion here on Jacob’s part. At least I think there is.

Again, if this is something that was going to be important to Esau, he could have easily said “look, I made that exchange under duress, and you took advantage of me.” I think that would have been a very reasonable response. But Esau didn’t want it.

The portion ends today with a famine. Isaac was trying to take care of his family by going to King Abimelech when Hashem intervenes and tells him not to go to Egypt. He instead repeats the promises He made to Abraham so that Isaac understands what is at stake and will happen. He tells Isaac that is because of His dad’s faithfulness He is doing all of this.

As a dad, I’m reflecting on this. Wow. What an amazing thing for Hashem to tell someone. I’m not the kind of man today who likely would have Hashem telling my kids that He would bless them because of my faith. But what an aspirational goal to have! To not be told by Hashem “good job.” But INSTEAD have Him tell Eliana, Samara, Johana, Natana, Talyah, and Aviyah; “your mom and dad? They did a good job. They were righteous and their faith drives my desire to bless you and all your descendants.” Talk about a positive affirmation!

I think this morning the idea of Hashem blessing our children because of our faith is really prominent.

On one hand, I look in the mirror and say “dang. My kids are doomed because I’ve made a ton of mistakes.” On the other, I remind myself “all the mistakes yesterday? They are no longer real. You have the ability today to choose Me over yourself. To live according to your godly soul and Yetzer Ha’Tov or engage your Yetzer Ha’Rah. You are free today to make this choice. You aren’t bound by your past.”

Right now, the past and future aren’t real. They are just data inside the brains Hashem has given us. They are memories in this very moment of our lives. That’s it. They impact us for sure, in a very real way. But if we really focus, we understand our brains are processing information now. In this moment. And we are free to choose what to do with the moment. And make decisions that go beyond ourselves so that the creator of this universe tells our children; “all the blessings you are receiving are because of your parents.”

And, the deeper issue I’m chewing on? All of MY blessings are the result of the faithfulness of my parents. And their parents, etc. which is a little more difficult to accept, to be honest. But that’s another story for another time.

Ok. Whew. This felt a little vulnerable today. I’m sorry if that’s too intense.

I’d love your thoughts and comments.