Parashat Toldot (Engl.)

B"H

Our forefather Yitzchak got married at the age of 40 but was only granted having children at the age of 60. For twenty years, Rivka (Rebekka) was barren. However, for all those years, Rivka and Yitzchak never lost hope and kept on praying for children. Finally their wish came true and they had twins. Esau and Jacob (Esav and Yaakov).

G-d gives men free choice deciding whether one wants to be good or evil. Serving G-d or not serving Him. Yaakov chose to be good and G-f fearing whereas Esav was just the opposite. The Torah calls Esav a cunning hunter. Not only that he hunted animals but also men. He even understood how to entrap and deceive his father with his mouth.

One day Esav came home while Yaakov was cooking a lentil dish. Both brothers were then 15 years old (Seder HaDorot).
In the Torah it says that Esav asked his brother to give him something to eat "from this red". Rahsi interprets the "red" as lentils which we eat until today as a sign of mourning. The Gemara in the Talmud Tractate Bava Batra 16b teaches us that Avraham had died on that day. This is why Yaakov prepared the mourner's meal. Esav had spent the day hunting in the fields and was not mourning at all.

Rabbi Yochanan says in the same Gemara that Esav had commited five sins on that day: he had relations with an engaged maiden, he murdered, denied the existence of G-d, denied the resurrection of the dead and did not care about his birthright. After Avraham had died, Esav revealed his true face.

Different Midrashim (Megaleh Amukot, Yalkut Shimoni and Pirkei Rabbi Eliezer) tell us that when Esav was in the fields that day, he had killed Nimrod. Nimrod was a hunter as well and used to wear the clothes of Adam (which G-d had made for him). Esav was jealous. He stabbed Nimrod and stole the clothes from him.

Is says in the Torah that Esav was tired. Tired from what ? Tired from killing, explains Rashi. Rabbi Yosef Soloveitchik sees Esav as desperately tired and hungry.
So hungry that he did not care about birthright or anything else. Just getting food now.

The Megaleh Amukot looks a little deeper into the matter and sees Yaakov and Esav as Abel (Hevel) and Kain. Rivka and Yitzchak are reincarnations (Gilgulim) of Eve (Chava) and Adam.

The Zohar calls Esav a highwayman who robbed and murdered people, while all the time pretending to his father that he was performing prayers. However, the Midrash Rabbah finds also a good character trait in Esav. No one honoured his father as much as Esav. All the time when he served Yitzchak he wore his best clothes.

Later on, the Parasha is telling us about the famous scene with the blessing. Yitzchak intended to bless the first - born Esav but Yaakov stole the blessing. Yaakov did this because Rivka told him so. She had Ruach HaKodesh and knew that Yaakov was destined to be one of the forefathers and not evil Esav (Sefat Emet).

There are two chassidic teachings (Sefat Emet and Baer Moshe) why Yitzchak wanted to give the blessing to Esav. Of course, he knew that his son was evil. However, through this blessing he wanted him to get closer to G-d's holiness. Maybe Esav would then change his ways and repent. But Rivka just knew that Esav would never change.

On the other hand, if Esav did not care about his birthright in the first place, why was his father's blessing so important to him ? Answers Rabbi Aharon Kotler: Of course, Esav believed in G-d despite all his idol - worship. He followed the evil path and simply did not care about G-d. But as he believed in G-d, he understood the importance of the blessing.


SHABBAT SHALOM


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Rashi: Rabbi Shlomo Itzchaki, 1040 - 1105. Famous Talmud and Torah commentator. Lived in France.

Pirkei Rabbi Eliezer: a Midrash from the Tanna Rabbi Eliezer ben Horcanus.

Megaleh Amukot: Rabbi Natan Shapira (Spira). Born 1585 in Poland and died 1633 in Cracow / Poland. He was a Kabbalist and chief rabbi of Cracow.

Yalkut Shimoni: Commentary on the Bible (Tanach), published in 1521 but compiled in the early 13th century.

Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik: born in 1903 in Russia, died in 1993 in Boston. American orthod. rabbi, Talmudist and moder Jewish philosopher

The Sefat Emet - Rabbi Yehuda Aryeh Leib of Ger. He was the second Gerrer Rebbe. Born in Warsaw, Poland in 1847, died in Ger, in Poland 1905.

Rabbi Aharon Kotler: 1891 - 1962, prominent leader of orthod. Judaism in Lithuania and later in the USA, where he built one of the first American yeshivas. Born in Svislovitz / Poland, he later studied in the Slabodka yeshiva under Rabbi Nosson Zvi Finkel. During World War II, he went to the US. Many of his former students died in the Holocaust. Rabbi Kotler died 1962 in New York.