Gen. 32:4 - 36:43
PrĂ©cis: As he nears his return to his homeland, Jacob sent (vayishlach) messengers to Esau to ascertain Esau’s state of mind after their 20-year separation. While he awaits a reply, Jacob encounters an “adversary” (most assume an angel) with whom Jacob wrestles through the night. As dawn breaks, the adversary announces that Jacob’s name is to be changed to Israel: “He who wrestles with God.” On the following day, Esau approaches, and despite Jacob’s fears, there is a happy reunion.
We then read the story of how a local prince rapes Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, and then asks to marry her. Jacob agrees on condition that all of the men of the city are circumcised. While the men are recovering, Jacob’s sons Simon and Levi attack the city and kill all of the inhabitants in revenge for the insult to their sister. Jacob soon travels to Beth-el (the site of his ladder dream), and on the way, Rachel gives birth to Benjamin and dies in childbirth. Thereafter, Isaac’s death is noted, as is his burial by Esau and Jacob. The parasha ends with a genealogy of Esau and his descendants.
Gen. 32:27 – “Send me away (shalheni) because the dawn is breaking.”
Rabbi David Hoffman, writing in JTS Parashah Commentary (12/4/14) , cites Rabbi Sholom Noach Berezovsky (z'l), the Slonimer Rebbe, who suggested that this week’s reading emphasized this idea of a unique personal mission, represented by Jacob. Jacob wrestles and his assailant cries out in the words of this week’s verse above.
Why does the adversary demand to be sent away now that dawn is breaking? The Rabbis suggest a dialogue between Jacob and his foe. Jacob demands to know, “Why must you run away at daybreak? Are you a thief or are you a kidnapper who fears the dawn?”
At this moment, the adversary confesses his angelic nature, and Jacob demands a blessing. The Slonimer Rebbe builds on this Talmudic midrash. This angel, like other celestial beings, was created by the Divine and tasked with a particular mission; the angel becomes worthy of singing to God only after the mission is accomplished. This angel’s task was to test Jacob, and to try to keep him from meeting Esau to make peace with his brother and fully commit to his (Jacob’s) allegiance to God. As daybreak approached, the angel realized he had completed his mission and could now come before God and sing a song of praise to Him.
But the Slonimer Rebbe next makes an audacious claim: what is true for angels is true for human beings. Each of us – every human being – has a role to play in the world as an agent of God. We each have an individual mission which each of us alone can accomplish. Each of us is therefore unique and irreplaceable.
I add that our individual mission may be difficult to understand, just as Jacob’s wrestling was difficult. But one way in which we may uncover our individual mission is to grasp that it is part of a greater whole. As Rabbi Sacks (z’l) notes in his final work, Morality: Restoring the Common Good in Divided Times:
“Societal freedom cannot be sustained by market economics and liberal
democratic politics alone. It needs a third element: morality, a concern for
the welfare of others, an active commitment to justice and compassion,
a willingness to ask not just what is good for me but what is good for ‘all of
Us together.’ It is about ‘Us,’ not ‘Me;’ about ‘We,’ not ‘I.’”
