Parashat Toledot – 5786

A D’var Torah for Parashat Toledot

By Rabbi Inna Serebro-Litvak

Aa -pchee (I sneeze)  “Bless you” – you say.

Oh, thank you! Thank you for your blessings! I feel very blessed!

To say “Bless you” after someone sneezes has become an integral part of our everyday speech and when we say it, we don’t even realize that we are “bestowing” a blessing over someone.

One of the reasons Americans say “bless you” is because people used to believe a sneeze caused someone to expel their soul out of their body, and so “God bless you” or “Bless you” was used as a protection against the devil snatching your soul.

One thing is certain – the word “blessing” holds a great power!

According to Merriam-Webster.com, “blessing is defined as a) the act or words of one that blesses and b) approval or encouragement.”

When we offer a blessing, we are essentially boosting up the person to whom we are speaking. When we bless our children on Erev Shabbat, we are asking that they find well-being, wholeness and peace in the week ahead and in their lives. When we tell someone they are a blessing in our lives, we are indicating our appreciation.

As clergy, I get to bless couples at wedding ceremonies, B’nai mitzvah students at services, babies and toddlers at their baby naming, and recently a group of seven people, who converted to Judaism.

But there are many more times, of course, that we recite blessings, berakhot. In Judaism we recite berakhot before performing rituals, such as reading from the Torah or lighting Shabbat candles, as well as before we do mundane things, such as eating, drinking etc., using words to elevate our actions. According to Babylonian Talmud Menahot 43b, “each person is obligated to recite 100 blessings each day” and thus feel connected to God through these expressions of blessing and gratitude.

In Parashat Toledot, we encounter the power of a berakha as the words which a parent says to a child – these words signify a thing that is promised and cannot be revoked. From their time in the womb, Esau and Jacob were constantly competing, as it says in the Torah – they “wrestled’ in the womb. Later, the brothers competed for land, position, status and ultimately for their father’s blessing and love. Esau and Jacob were twins but they had different skills, talents and strengths. As their personalities developed, Isaac and Rebecca related to each of their sons accordingly.  Rebecca favored Jacob and Isaac – Esau. That for sure, caused more rivalry!

And since Isaac favored Esau, it made sense that he considered to turn to Esau, his favorite son and the first born. Isaac’s instructions to Esau indicated that should Esau succeed in bringing his father a tasty meal, he would be rewarded with Isaac’s blessings. Of course, Esau hurried to hunt and cook and return to his father. Esau had his eye on the ultimate prize–his father’s blessing – the acknowledgment that he, Esau, was more beloved than Jacob.

Yet Rebecca had a different plan in mind. She intervened and instructed Jacob to fulfill Isaac’s request resulting in Jacob “stealing” Esau’s blessing. Following his mother’s instructions, Jacob passed himself off as Esau and received Isaac’s blessing:

“See, my son’s scent is like the scent of the field blessed by Adonai.
God give you of heaven’s dew, of earth’s bounty; abundant grain and new wine.
Let peoples serve you and nations bow down to you.
Be a ruler to your brothers, and let your mother’s sons bow down to you.
May those who curse you be cursed;
May those who bless you be blessed.” (Genesis 27:27-29)

When Esau approached Isaac with the food he had prepared, he was rebuffed by Isaac, “Who then hunted game and brought it to me and I ate of it all before you came? I blessed him — and blessed he will remain!” (Genesis 27:33)

Can you imagine how Esau felt at that moment?! He pleaded with his dad: “Bless me! Me too, Father!”

Jacob’s cheating actions led him to receive the blessing which was promised to his older brother; Esau’s future was determined to be without his father’s blessing. Despite losing his blessing to his brother, Esau continued to plead: he still needed the reassurance that his father loved him as well.

Isaac and Rebecca reinforced the differences between their sons and fostered the competition between them. Both Esau and Jacob craved their parents’ love and support and would do truly anything to get the cherished blessing. Cheating and deceiving helped Jacob to receive the blessing, but his and Rebecca’s actions created a narrative of pain and distrust.

Ultimately, this also led to the years of animosity between Jacob and Esau and disrupted the family.

If Rebecca and Isaac had lived in a different time and if the father’s blessing had not been a guarantee of inheritance and future well-being, the story of Jacob and Esau might have ended differently.

Today, we understand that we do not have to limit our words of blessing and that we can and should celebrate the strengths and talents of all of our loved ones. Blessings have the power to sanctify and to enhance our daily activities. Blessings have the potential to give us a sense of holiness and awe. When we say the words of blessing for another or tell our loved ones they are blessings, we reinforce our feelings and our actions. We say “you matter,” “you are cherished,” or “you bring joy and love into my world.”

Be who you are –
and may you be blessed
in all that you are.
(Marcia Falk)