Uncle Lavan: The First Palestinian Activist?

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The Haggadah has two villains. The first, Pharaoh, enslaved our ancestors, tried to exterminate us by slaughtering all the male children, ridiculed our God, resisted our emancipation, and pursued us even after we were liberated, with the intention of annihilating us. The enmity of the author of the Haggadah to him seems more than justified.

Yet, says the Haggadah, the second villain was worse, for he desired to uproot the very basis of our existence.

צא ולמד, מה ביקש לבן הארמי לעשות ליעקב אבינו, שפרעה לא גזר אלא על הזכרים, ולבן ביקש לעקור את הכל

Go learn what Lavan the Aramean sought to do to our father Jacob, for Pharaoh only issued a decree against the male children, but Lavan wanted to uproot everything.

Is this condemnation justified? Remember who Lavan is. Like our father Jacob, he is Terach’s great-grandson, and thus Jacob’s second cousin, as well as his father-in-law, twice. He is our mother Rivkah’s brother, and thus, our uncle as well. And just like our father Isaac, he is grandfather to the tribes of Israel. At family weddings, he was probably at the same table as Uncle Eisav and Great-Uncle Yishmael.

And what are the sins of this “villain,” who is connected to us in so many ways, whose matching DNA would be all over any 23-and-me search conducted by descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? When Eliezer arrives on his matchmaking mission, Lavan greets him, embraces him, and blesses the union of Rivkah and Isaac. Later, he provides shelter, employment and wives to the fugitive Jacob. Jacob becomes wealthy in his employ. Yes, he is furious when Jacob sneaks away with his daughters and grandchildren like a thief in the night and Lavan does angrily pursue him, but after some threatening words from God enjoining him against doing harm to Jacob, he proposes an eternal peace treaty, swearing by the gods of Avraham and Nachor to preserve cordial relations.

Worse than Pharaoh? Really? Why? How?

Let’s go back to the text of the Haggadah, derived from the brief history recited by a pilgrim bringing first fruits to the temple:

ארמי אובד אבי וירד מצרימה

The translation presented some difficulty to commentators, not least because it seems to contradict, or at least be inconsistent with, the facts as related in the Bible. If it means, “My father was a wandering Aramean who descended to Egypt,” perhaps it refers to Abraham, a wandering Aramean who eventually descended to Egypt and developed into a large nation. But Abraham really never spent much time in Egypt, and he left well before any nation development or slavery. So, perhaps it means my father Jacob was a wandering Aramean who descended to Egypt and developed into a large nation, but that too seems ahistorical, as Jacob wasn’t much of a wanderer. Or, continuing the Lavan theme, as suggested by the context, perhaps it means that “Lavan (an Aramean) betrayed or deceived my father, and he descended to Egypt.” But when Jacob left Lavan, he returned to Canaan to confront Eisav. He didn’t descend to Egypt until decades later.

Rabbi Azriel Hildesheimer offers a brilliant and incisive interpretation on the latter reading: what was Lavan’s betrayal or deception? He withheld Rachel, and compelled Jacob to marry the eldest daughter, Leah. Had he not done so, it is likely that Joseph, and not Reuven, would have been the bechor, the first-born. If Joseph had been the first-born, his dreams of leadership would not have incurred such jealousy and resentment, and the brothers would not have schemed and conspired to sell him into slavery, the original sin that inexorably led to centuries of servitude.

But for Lavan, we never would have descended to Egypt. The whole story traces back to Lavan’s deception.

That explains the text “Arami oved avi” but it doesn’t get us any closer to answering our original question. In what way did Lavan seek to uproot everything, to undermine the very basis of our existence? Where is his evil? Why is he so dangerous?

For that, we need to turn to the words of Lavan himself, when he catches up to the escaping Jacob. Lavan tells Jacob that it is within his power to kill him for running away with his daughters and grandchildren, but that God had interceded on Jacob’s behalf and warned Lavan against doing any harm. So, as we noted, Lavan proposes peaceful co-existence, a modified two-state solution.

Pay attention to the words of Lavan, because they have a contemporary resonance:

ויען לבן ויאמר אל-יעקב הבנות בנתי והבנים בני והצאן צאני וכל אשר-אתה ראה לי-הוא; ולבנתי מה-אעשה לאלה היום או לבניהם אשר ילדו. ועתה לכה נכרתה ברית אני ואתה והיה לעד ביני ובינך

Lavan responded: the daughters are my daughters, and the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine; and what could I do to my daughters or their children? And now let us enter into a covenant you and I and it will be a witness between me and you.

Lavan knew that the land had been promised to the descendants of Terach’s family, even though his own branch of the family had stopped on the way and settled in Aram, forfeiting any claim to Canaan. His children though would indeed inherit the land. His daughters. His grandchildren. His flocks. All that Jacob sees–in Lavan’s view, it all belongs to Lavan. And if Jacob is prepared to accept those terms and acknowledge that Lavan’s claim to the children, the property, and the land is superior, then, and only then, can they have a covenant of peace.

Nothing has changed. When dealing with Lavan, all negotiations must begin–and end–with an acknowledgement that we are strangers on a land belonging to someone else.

And that is why the author of the Haggadah believed that Lavan wanted to uproot everything, deny us our patrimony, negate our existence and our birthright.

Sound familiar?

Just in case there is any doubt, note that the Hebrew text is in the present progressive tense–arami oved avi–suggesting that this is a continuing, continuous process of treachery and betrayal. And it immediately follows the passage in which we say that our enemies arise to destroy us in every generation:

בכל דור ודור עומדים עלינו לכלותינו, והקדוש ברוך הוא מצילנו מידם

Finally, this all sheds some illumination on why the author of the Haggadah chose as the central text the brief account of Jewish history recited by the pilgrim bringing first fruits–bikkurim–to Jerusalem, rather than the Biblical account of the exodus. He wanted to emphasize the inevitable end of the process that began with the redemption from slavery in Egypt: the children of Jacob, known as Israel, in possession of the land promised to them, expressing their thanks to God.

What could be more fitting as a response to Lavan’s persistent attempt to uproot everything, to deny us our inheritance and our destiny?

Chag sameach.