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Dvar Torah - Parashat Vaishlah – Rav Erez Levi
The Face
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In this week's Parasha, the conflict between Esav and Yaakov reaches its highpoint.
Esav meets his brother Yaakov with "four hundred men." Yaakov, on the other hand,
is afraid and readies himself with prayer, presents to appease Esav, and preparations
for war.
Instead of fighting his brother, Yaakov fights an angel – the angelic guardian of
Esav, who in the end blesses Yaakov and then changes his name to Yisrael. The virtual
triumph of Yaakov over Esav's angel was the decisive factor that finalized the brothers'
battle, which at the end did not take place.
Our generation can learn much from the relationship between Esav and Yaakov. The
entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be clarified by this relationship. To do
this we need to continue reading the Parasha.
There is a strange verse in Bereshit 36:6:
"וַיִּקַּח עֵשָׂו אֶת נָשָׁיו וְאֶת בָּנָיו וְאֶת בְּנֹתָיו וְאֶת כָּל נַפְשׁוֹת
בֵּיתוֹ וְאֶת מִקְנֵהוּ וְאֶת כָּל בְּהֶמְתּוֹ וְאֵת כָּל קִנְיָנוֹ אֲשֶׁר רָכַשׁ
בְּאֶרֶץ כְּנָעַן וַיֵּלֶךְ אֶל אֶרֶץ מִפְּנֵי יַעֲקֹב אָחִיו "
"And Esav took his wives, and his sons, and his daughters, and all the souls of
his house, and his cattle, and all his beasts, and all his possessions, which he
had gathered in the land of Canaan; and went into a land away from his brother Jacob."
First, we need to understand why the Torah gave such a lengthy description. A verse
saying that Esav took his family and possessions would have sufficed. Why so much
detail?
Secondly, and perhaps most important, it is not clear why Esav is the one who flees
and not Yaakov. Esav was physically stronger and had a more powerful army Moreover
it was Esav who bought land in Eretz
Canaan, while Yaakov bought land outside Eretz
Canaan. It would seem that Esav has more rights to the land.
The next question is what was Esav's destination? The Torah writes that Esav "went
to the land…" Rashi explains this by saying that Esav went to the first
place that
he found, he didn't know where
to go and was simply fleeing out of fear from Yaakov.
Can this be true?
We can answer all of these
questions by following a simply rule that our Sages gave
us: "Esav hates Yaakov". This is a law of nature and cannot be changed – we, Jews,
are not loved. To counter balance this, Rivkah received a prophesy regarding her
sons that "… the elder shall serve the younger" but only on the condition that Yaakov-the
younger, will be sure of his righteousness. When Esav is sure that his father's blessing belongs to him and Yaakov doubts his rights, Esav remains in the land and
Yaakov goes to exile. However, when Yaakov returns to this land with the certainty
that it belong to him because of Hashem's promise, then Esav sees Yaakov's face,
and does not ask questions, just flees. That is the strength of the assurance and
confidence in Yaakov's face.
In the verse above, the word מפני can be translated also as fleeing from Yaakov's
face. Yaakov's determined face will be enough to cause them to flee.
This is true in our days, we do not have to deal with all the nations of the world
and the Palestinians. We simply need to educate and strengthen Yaakov and the conflict
will disappear. If the nation of Israel will be convinced and confident that this
is our land by virtue of the Torah, then we will
see our enemies take all their
belongings and flee from "his brother's face" "מפני יעקב אחיו". Am Yisrael's determined
face will be enough to cause them to flee.
We therefore must raise and educate our children about the absolute certainty of
our Emunah and our right to the land. Esav noticed this determination in Yaakov's
face, this "eye of the tiger" stemming from pure Emunah and he flees the battle.
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