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Sefer Bereshis
Parashas Toldos
Bereshis: Chapter 25, verse 28
Rashi:
The
Torah tells us that Yitzchak favored Esav and Rivka favored Yaakov. The reason for Yitzchak's love of
Esav is that he ate from what Esav
trapped in hunting. Even though these words seem to logically explain
Yitzchak's love of Esav, Rashi
sees the words as a figure of speech and tells us that Esav
trapped and fooled his father into thinking that he was precise in his
service to G-d. Esav would ask his father how to
tithe salt and straw, causing his father to assume that
Esav was keeping commandments.
For
years I did not understand Yitzchak's love of Esav,
and I found it very hard to find logic in this particular commentary of Rashi. But now it seems to me that Rashi
is leading us to a proper outlook of serving G-d in Torah and mitzvos.
Yitzchak
knew that his son Yaakov would sit and study while Esav
was in the field. He knew that Esav was inclined
to violence and indulgence. But he believed that even behavior as dangerous
as this could be improved and eventually overcome if Esav
would stress certain mitzvos.
A
person who demands gratification from the many
offerings of the world, should first of all begin to put limits on himself.
Not everything that he wants should be on his menu. For instance, if he got
used to eating 2 pieces of steak a day, he should cut the amount down to
one-and-a-half. If he was going to the movies once a week, he should reduce
that to once a month. If his outlays on pleasurable
activities was $50 a day, he should start limiting the amount. In
this way there is hope that in the long run he can pull himself out of the
materialism that is pushing him to the brink.
Tithing
food is one of our mitzvos that protect us from
"overdoing" the pleasures of this world. If Esav
had been stringent in tithing, it would have been a good start in his
service of G-d. Yitzchak was fooled into thinking that Esav
was on the correct path, in spite of the material life that he lived. Esav even fooled him into believing that he tithed salt
and straw - a stringency that meant that every item that he owned was being
reduced.
Yitzchak
was placed on the alter to be sacrificed by his
father Avraham. He overcame the natural desire to
live in order to be a servant of G-d. He believed that the natural
inclinations that drive human beings could be overcome with serious
practice and years of hard spiritual work. Therefore he supported what he
saw were efforts by Esav to overcome the hidden
forces that drove him to improper behavior. I think that had Esav actually tithed everything, he could have
eventually turned into a fine man. In such a case Yitzchak's love for his
son would certainly be understood by all of us as logical.
Each
of us is required to serve our creator. And each one of us does things that
fall short of proper behavior. Our service should put special emphasis on
those mitzvos that help us out of our doldrums
and lead us to a better spiritual life. There are enough "mitzvah
opportunities" in the 613 commandments for each of us to improve
ourselves little by little with some serious and honest efforts in the
proper direction.
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