Tol’dot: A Hidden Collaboration

The following essay is a highly revised version of the d’var Torah I posted in 2023, adding more supporting commentary.

The Zohar on Parasha Tol’dot (135a) explains that the full wisdom of Gd is in seeing something joyful in all passages of the Torah. In fact, it goes on to give evidence that the story of Yaacov “stealing” Eisav’s blessing was more positive than it first appears. I believe that the Torah hid how Yitzchak and Rivkah were working together on giving blessings for their two sons in order to show us just how powerful they were together as a couple. 

Additionally, the Talmud (Bava Metzia 42a) teaches that blessing is only found in a matter hidden from the eye. The idea being that once you see something and quantify it, it is already a set matter and any prayer that uses the name of Gd takes His name in vain (sort of like Schrödinger’s cat being observed). In the case of Yaacov’s blessing, it initially needs to be hidden from Eisav. I will explain my theory of why Yitzchak, in fact, schemed together with Rivkah to give Yaacov the first-born’s blessing in the way they did, and that it was for Eisav’s benefit as well. 

Yitzchak and Rivkah are meticulous people and reflect the sefirah of strength (Gevurah). They demonstrate success every time they do something together. The Zohar (140a-142a) describes how the Shekhinah was always with Yitzchak. He could see Her continuously, and it says that Rivkah would see Her as well. The Shekhinah allowed them both to see more than simply what meets the eye, but also to have a deeper, intuitive understanding of matters. As Yitchak’s name (based on the word “laughter”) suggests, he had a special way of staying joyful, which allowed the Shekhinah to rest upon him continuously. Maybe the Shekhinah was a catalyst for elevating the couple’s communication with each other. 

Miracles are rekindled when they both go into Sarah’s tent, and Rivkah conceives once they are acting together through Yitzchak’s prayer for her. When Yitzchak lies about Rivkah being his sister, they are saved because the king happens to see them together. The Torah literally says, “Yitzchak was fondling his wife Rivkah” (Genesis 26:8). The Hebrew here is a play on Yitzchak’s name as “laugh” and “fondle” share a common Hebrew root, but the underlying implication is that there is still joy and intimacy in this marriage. 

Rivkah and Yitzchak had a responsibility to educate Yaacov and Eisav. For one, Yaacov needed to learn more empathy and take on more of Eisav’s good characteristics. Based upon the story of the lentil stew, where Yaacov’s lack of empathy is on full display, maybe Eisav only cared about being first born out of ego and Yaacov wanted it out of intrinsic desire. He feels a desire for this patriarchal blessing because it is his destiny, so he takes on the part he needs to play.

Kabbalistically, Yaacov represents the sefirah of Tiferet, the divine emanation of beauty from harmony. He needed to have a more multidimensional/balanced personality to be the father of 12 different tribes with different dominant characteristics: one inclined for justice; another more for manual labor; another certain sacred activities; another for sailing, etc… At first, both Yaacov and Eisav sound one-dimensional as characters. The Torah says about Yaacov and Eisav that one is for the fields and one is a  “dweller-in-tents” (prefers to be indoors). Yaacov needed to build himself up to be able to also emulate the most praiseworthy middot (traits) of his brother Eisav.

They probably didn’t want to embarrass Yaacov by saying that he needed to develop his character. It was important not to embarrass him, as it is always important for one not to embarrass one’s fellow. A midrash teaches that Avraham preferred to be thrown in an oven rather than causing someone embarrassment. On the other hand, those spiritually elevated at this point in their lives, like Yitzchak and Rivkah, were willing to sacrifice their own honor.

Rivkah has Yaacov go out to get game and also dress like Eisav to “impersonate” him. This is “walking around in his shoes” as the English expression suggests, a process of developing empathy for his brother, something which he previously lacked. The Zohar (142b) explains that Eisav’s clothing that Yaacov wore was actually stolen from Nimrod, a king we first hear about in Genesis 10:8, who inherited it all the way back from Adam haRishon (the original man). By now wearing this outfit, Yaacov could better impersonate his divine attribute of Tiferet (beauty). The Zohar says that he embodied the supernatural beauty of mystery and emitted an aroma – which Eisav didn’t do when he wore it. 

The Zohar (138b) explains that Yitzchak knew that Eisav could not rule over Yaacov. Therefore, Yaacov needed to take on the positive characteristics of the snake (from the garden of Eden) and therefore learn to be more clever than Eisav. According to the Zohar (142a), when Yaacov walked into Yitzchak’s room disguised as Eisav, Yitzchak saw the Shekhinah resting on Yaacov. Yitzchak knew that Yaacov was ready for his blessing. The Torah explicitly says that Yaacov does all these steps to be like Eisav, such as “So he went, and he took, and he brought” (27:14). He put on Eisav’s best clothes – the best attributes! Why?! His father with his bad eyesight is going to be inspecting his “clothes”? When Rivkah gave him the outfit, she also saw the Shekhinah resting on Yaacov.

Rivkah is so confident in Gd and her husband that she says “the curse is on me” (27:13). Does she say this so that Yaacov does not feel guilty? But there are no obvious curses on her later in the story (unlike with Rachel and the teraphim, where Yaacov makes an open-ended curse and she does indeed die). I believe that if Yaacov later seems to be punished measure-for-measure by being tricked into marrying Leah instead of Rachel, it is a manifestation of his guilt for being deceitful, because in his mind he deceived his father. So perhaps after his blessing, his parents should have communicated a little more with him. 

When Yitzchak gives the blessing, if you pay close attention to everything he says, the goals are to make Yaacov question himself, bring out the good attributes of Eisav in Yaacov, and have empathy. This seems to hint at the fact that Rivkah and Yitzchak are both privy to this so-called “deception”, and that it is a pedagogical device intended to teach Yaacov that he could outsmart “evil.”

The first thing Yitzchak says when Yaacov shows up in disguise is, “How is it that you have found [it] so quickly, my son?” (27:20). He says this first because he is trying to bring out bitachon (reliance on Gd) in him. To be in a state of bitachon is a prerequisite for any blessing. He wants Yaakov to see his own capability because Gd is helping him now, and in fact, Yaakov responds correctly that it was thanks to Gd.

To bless someone, you need to see him/her as a new person. But before that, the person needs to see him/herself as a new person. Even though Yitzchak says that he did not recognize Yaacov, it is just to say that he is already transforming from the person he originally was to the personification of the kabbalistic meaning of Yaacov.

The Torah continues: “‘Please come closer, so that I may feel you, my son, whether you are really my son Eisav or not.’ So Yaacov drew near to Yitzchak his father, and he felt him, and he said, ‘The voice is the voice of Yaacov, but the hands are the hands of Eisav.’ And he did not recognize him because his hands were hairy like the hands of his brother Eisav, and he blessed him” (27:21-23). His father sees the newfound multidimensionality of his son and encourages him to embrace it as well.

Yitzchak says, “Are you [indeed] my son Eisav?” and Yaacov responds, “I am” (27:25). It is to get Yaacov to ask himself if he has reached the level of compassion he needs – a level which we only achieve when we can imagine ourselves as someone else.

Yitzchak continues, “Behold, the fragrance of my son is like the fragrance of a field, which the Lord has blessed!” (21:27). He smelled the special outfit. Notice that he doesn’t say the fragrance of Eisav, but rather, of the field – a general characteristic that was previously missing in Yaacov.

When Yitzchak continues to speak, it sounds a lot like what Gd had told Rivkah near the beginning of the parasha, that there will be two kingdoms, and the younger would serve the older, who will be mightier. It is difficult to believe that the one time Rivkah spoke with Gd, she would not have told her husband about the experience and what Gd said. 

Yaacov now has a multidimensionality and complexity that will later give him the strength to wrestle with an angel and overcome his other future challenges. When the Torah says Yitzchak loved Eisav and Rivkah, Yaacov, I think it refers to which parent worked more on each child’s development. Some parents can relate more to one child than another and therefore give more. Yitzchak also saw all the potential Eisav had in him, the way he saw all the potential Rivkah had.

The Zohar (138a) gives a metaphorical description that it was like Rivkah’s “heart” was struggling with her “liver”, in that the liver is bigger, but subservient to the heart. In discussing this with my friend Audrey Fellous, she reminded me that the liver processes what is good and what is not needed in the body, acting as a filter. This made me think that someone like Eisav, who knew what was not good, had the potential to refine what is good from what is not. Maybe with the right wife (as suggested by his parents’ dissatisfaction with his marital choices), he would have been able to do this. My friend Laurence Muller pointed out that before Yaacov’s blessing, Eisav’s parents didn’t send him to find a wife, even though he had married women who displeased them. Perhaps they felt he had more learning at home to do. After the blessing, he married Ishamel’s daughter which seems like Eisav was trying to appease his parents.  

Yaacov will also go on to willingly work fourteen years in the fields to be able to marry Rachel, which is very romantic, but he isn’t very harmonious with her. For example, he scolds her when she complains that she is barren. Blessing someone, and blessing with someone, means understanding the person’s needs, seeing them not only as what they are, but as they can be, if only they fulfill their true potential and reveal their deep selves. This starts with expressing bitachon – not just having faith but expressing it with the choices and actions taken, and all actions matter: what we wear, where we go, what we do, etc… And the person that gives the blessing needs to see the recipient as receiving the blessing as a transformed person.

Also, bitachon gave Yitzchak and Rivkah the potential to be not just a romantic couple, but to also become loving parents. Yaacov had it in him to be not only the man of the tents, but the father of all the Tribes of Israel; a man who not only dwells, but also goes out there (Vayeitzei) to find himself and fulfill his destiny.

Am Yisrael chai and peace for all the world!

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