"Come and learn what Lavan the Aramean sought to do to our father, Yaakov. For Pharaoh issued his edict against only the males, but Lavan sought to uproot us all…” The Pesach Haggadah
Reading through the parshios
in which Lavan is mentioned, most specifically Parshas Vayetzei, it is somewhat
obscure to see how Lavan is such an evil character as to be referenced as the start
of the oppression that occurred in Egypt. In fact, one might ask (and some
have) a similar question about both Ishmael and Esau, particularly the latter.
In the text, the details of the lives of these reshayim (Heb. wicked ones) are
rather mundane. Ishmael is a boy who Sarah accuses of “playing” with her son,
which the midrash tells us means a host of misbehaviors. Esau appears as an
impulsive youth who is outwitted by his brother into selling his birthright and
later as a man cheated of his father’s blessing. Lavan could be seen as a
father who went to great effort to protect his daughter Leah from being shamed
by her younger sister marrying first and who worked hard at keeping his
son-in-law employed and his extended family together. The Midrashim, of course,
go into far greater detail about exactly what their real actions and
motivations were.
On the opposite end of the
spectrum, the patriarchs and matriarchs, whom we elevate and admire, are often
written about in such a way as to leave questions on their behavior. Why was
Sarah so unkind to Hagar? How could Yitzchak have been so oblivious to Esav’s
behavior? Why did Rachel steal her father’s teraphim (household idols)?
Rachel’s theft is a fairly
well-known story. Yaakov is done with working for Lavan. His family is almost
complete, as all his children except Binyamin have been born. Hashem has told
him that it is time to return to the Holy Land. As he takes his caravan and
heads for home, Lavan comes galloping after him demanding to know why he has
left with no notice as he would have sent him off with great fanfare. At the
end of his great pronouncement of shock and disappointment, Lavan also asks why
they have taken his idols (Bereishis 31:23-30). Yaakov, who knows nothing about
it, tells him to search the caravan. Rachel sits upon the idols and claims that
she cannot rise for the ways of women are upon her. Yaakov vouches his family’s
innocence and declares that “anyone with whom you find your gods shall not
remain alive!” (Bereishis 31:32). One is so surprised that Rachel would steal her
father’s idols and, in the way of the “reader-in-the-know,” is horrified by
Yaakov’s declaration that curses Rachel that one does not necessarily recall
the beginning of the perek 31, which reveals a great deal about the dynamics of
Lavan and his daughters…even as it remains subtle within the text.
Reading backward through the perek, one
comes to Leah and Rachel’s response to Yaakov’s recommendation that they leave
Lavan’s house: “Then Rachel and Leah answered him, saying, ‘Have we still a share and an
inheritance of our father’s house? Surely, he regards us as outsiders, now that
he has sold us and has used up our purchase price. Truly, all the wealth that
God has taken away from our father belongs to us and to our children. Now then,
do just as God has told you’” (31:14-16). These verses seem innocuous enough but
read them again more carefully. Why did they refer to themselves as having been
sold? Because everything about the family dynamic hearkens back to Lavan’s
deceitful nature. Lavan keenly remembered that Eliezer had brought fine jewelry
for Rivka, and felt he had a precedent for gaining from his daughters’ marriages.
In the era of the patriarchs it was the normal way of the world for a man to
pay the bridegroom’s family a dowry, a bride-price that paid them for taking
over her care and maintenance. When Yaakov came to them and was so obviously
enamored of Rachel, Lavan did not enter into the usual bargaining of a shidduch.
In fact, not only did Lavan not provide a dowry for either of his daughters,
but he also took advantage of Yaakov and contracted him to work seven years –
each – for his wives. Lavan’s daughters were keenly aware that their husband
did 14 years of labor for them, that their husband paid for them in as much, and then spent six more years in their father’s
employ.
Whereas some commentaries postulate that Rachel stole the idols to try to
protect her father from himself, there is a sense here that there was a lot of
family tension, more even than would be expected after the switching of the
bride situation.
Another interesting dynamic in this perek is the placement of Yaakov’s
family in the larger scheme of Lavan’s household. Up until this point in the
parsha, one might have had the impression that Lavan’s sole familial interest was
his daughters. Not only is Rachel the one tending the sheep when Yaakov first
arrives, but Lavan takes great interest in Yaakov’s business. Who, then, are
the kinsmen who are noted for camping with Lavan after tracking Yaakov down
(31:25)? This goes back to the beginning of perek 31, where it is noted: “Now
he [Yaakov] heard the things that Lavan’s sons were saying: ‘Yaakov has taken
all that was our father’s, and from that which was our father’s he has built up
all this wealth’” (31:1). Suddenly there are sons… suddenly there are brothers.
These brothers, however, seem to place no value on their relationship to Rachel
and Leah. They have their father’s character and are aggrieved by Yaakov’s
success because they see it as a direct threat to their inheritance.
The more you pull apart the text, the more nuanced the details of Lavan and
his family. Lavan’s was not a household that fostered love and family
closeness. It seems, rather, that this was a household built on greed and
selfishness, on a sense of what is owned and what one is entitled to. Rachel
and Leah, like their aunt before them, are exceptions to those norms.
Why aren’t the falsehoods and deviousness of Lavan more plainly spelled out
in the Torah? Perhaps this is a lesson about judging ourselves verses judging
others. The Torah is a guidebook for the Jewish people, and Sefer Bereishis is
the history of Bnei Yisrael specifically. It doesn’t matter, really, what it
was that Lavan or Esav or Ishmael did that cut themselves off from being part
of this future nation; it only matters that we know that their lives and the
lives of their descendants are on a different track. We do not need to judge
others. We do, however, need to judge ourselves, and this is why the Torah describes
the lives of the forefather/foremothers with what may be a more honest tone. This
is not to say that the Torah is dishonest in its discussion of the reshayim,
but that the text follows our conscientious laws of avoiding speaking
negatively about others without reason. The patriarchs and matriarch are our
ancestors and our role models and so their challenges and mistakes are the
situations from which we must learn. We must understand their fallibilities in
order to overcome similar faults in our own selves and thus live the full
spiritual lives that is our inheritance from them.
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