Parashat Vayeitzei – 5786

Separating Joys

A D’var Torah for Parashat Vayeitzei
By Rabbi Wendy Love Anderson

When Jacob finally marries his uncle Laban’s daughter in Parashat Vayeitzei, he discovers that he and Laban disagree about which daughter he is supposed to marry. But Jacob and Laban do agree that every wedding is a week-long affair; Jacob makes no objection to Laban’s suggestion that he wait to marry Rachel until “the week of this one” – Leah – is over. Apparently, the entire bridal week is spent feasting, judging by the later wedding precedents of Samson (Judg. 14:11) and Tobit (Tob. 11:18). An anonymous baraita in the Babylonian Talmud (Ketubot 7b) updates the practice for rabbinic norms: not only are there seven days of feasting, but also seven days of reciting the birkat hatanim – the grooms’ blessing. This blessing is the ancestor of our Sheva Berakhot, which can still be recited at a festive meal for seven days after certain Jewish weddings.

Why spend seven days in wedding mode? There are many possible resonances in the Torah, beginning with the seven-day week of creation in Genesis 1 and continuing through a series of seven-day festivals, mourning periods, and purification periods. Yerushalmi Ketubot (1:1) insists – with no obvious Scriptural basis – that “Moses established seven days of wedding-feast and seven days of mourning.” In other words, the seven days of Sheva Berakhot mirror the seven days of shiva, establishing fixed times for both grief and joy.

Yerushalmi Moed Katan (1:7) takes a different tack when it introduces the principle that one must not intermingle joy with joy (she-ein ma’arvin simhah besimhah), or in practical terms, that one should not schedule a wedding during a holiday. Rabbi Ila traces this teaching back to a passage in 2 Chron. 7:9 about Solomon and all Israel celebrating a seven-day festival for the dedication of the altar followed by the seven days of the Sukkot festival – both times associated with the experience of joy. But Rabbi Jacob bar Aha derives it from the verse in Parashat Vayeitzei about finishing Leah’s wedding-week before beginning Rachel’s. In both versions, it’s important to distinguish between two different, equally important joyous occasions – to finish one before starting another.

This insight seems to run counter to much of our busy lives. Whether we’re at an office lunch celebrating December birthdays or a synagogue kiddush celebrating two wedding anniversaries, a bris, and a graduation, we’re used to grouping our joys together. And there are times of year when our families rush from one child’s concert to another’s sports game, or from one awards ceremony to another. The more, the merrier, we might say, as we fill our phone storage with pictures, all the joys blurring together.

What would it look like if we took seriously the idea that we need to celebrate each joy fully by itself – to spend a week feasting for Leah’s wedding before we turn to Rachel’s? Could we slow our frenetic pace of accomplishment for long enough to enjoy each little triumph? Could we appreciate each holiday, each milestone, each accomplishment as it comes our way?

It’s challenging to commit to giving each joy its full due, and it’s easy to get caught up in a competition for who can collect the most joys. In the continuing narrative of Parashat Vayeitzei, Leah and Rachel, whose wedding-feasts remained separate, soon find themselves competing against one another for children, and these are anything but separate: no sooner is one birth announced than the next conception takes place. If our foremothers took time to appreciate the individual joy of each new life, it goes unmentioned in the Torah.

But even if we fail sometimes, it’s worth trying to keep our joys separate so that we can savor one before moving on to the next. Whether we’re celebrating a wedding, a birth, or something much smaller, we should seize every opportunity to celebrate one joy at a time. Parashat Vayeitzei reminds us that there are many joys in life, but the most fulfilling are often the ones that we keep separate.