Dvar Torah on Parshat Toledot

In this week's parsha we read of the relationship between Yitzchak and his wife Rivkah and their sons Yaakov and Esav. Esav is, marginally, the older of the fraternal twins, and as such is, technically, Yitzchak's legal heir. Although Yaakov is the good guy and Esav the bad guy - he is seen by the Rabbis as the progenitor of the violent and aggressive Romans and, later, Christians, Yitzchak loves Esav. This love is apparently, if briefly, explained in the Torah by the fact that Esav, a hunter, fed his father the meat from the animals which he hunted. It is to him, therefore, that Yitzchak wants to give his blessing. Yaakov, aided by his mother, who loves him and not Esav, must resort to trickery to wrest the blessing from his older but undeserving brother.A classic question about this rather unhealthy situation is why Yitzchak loved the wicked Esav? Why could he not see that Yaakov was the worthy son, and that Esav was a violent sinner? Was a little venison the real reason for Yitzchak's decision to give his blessing to the older, but evil brother? There is a suggestive verse, at the point in the parsha just before Yitzchak states that he wants to bless Esav, and at which point Yaakov, together with his mother Rivkah, plot to rob the blessing from him. We are told that "When Yitzchak was old his eyes were too weak to see, and he called Esav, his oldest son..." The Rabbis, in a Midrash quoted by Rashi, attempt to find meaning in Yitzchak's blindness, and its connection to his decision to bless Esav rather than the more deserving Yaakov. One explanation of his blindness is that, years earlier, at the Akedah (the binding of Yitzchak by his father Avraham), as Avraham was about to sacrifice his son to God, the heavens opened, and the young Yitzchak looked up and saw the angels crying at the prospect of his death. Some of their tears fell into his eyes, weakening them. According to this Midrash, Yitzchak's blindness is rooted in the experience of the Akedah - his father's attempt to, at God's command, sacrifice him. I would posit that this experience, which affected, according to the Rabbis, Yitzchak's sight, is the explanation behind his treatment of his two sons. The binding and would-be sacrifice of Yitzchak is an extreme expression of what is known as midat hadin - the attribute or measure of stern justice. God, in this mode, has the right to demand absolute obedience and loyalty from mankind. It is in this mode that he demands from Avraham an ultimate act of obedience, the slaughter of his beloved son, in the name of God.Yitzchak, blinded by the tears of the angels, is traumatized, and locked into seeing the world the way he experienced it on that awesome day - through the lens of midat hadin - the attribute of stern justice. This world view makes it impossible for him to really see his sons. He is locked into a legalistic view, which says that Esav, as the oldest, must be blessed. Esav has been, technically speaking, an obedient son, has given his father food, and therefore deserves, has earned, has in a sense purchased, the quid pro quo of his father's blessing. Yitzchak, blinded by the experience of the Akedah, can not see beyond these superficial and misleading facts to the deeper truth, and does not know who his sons really are. The tragic consequences of Yitzchak's narrow, strict vision are obvious. Blind to Esav's faults, and apparently not that interested in the younger Yaakov, Yitzchak's behavior to his children leads to mutual hatred between them, which the Rabbis see as a model for Roman and Christian anti-Semitism. This, perhaps, is an unintended result of the binding, and blinding, of Yitzchak. The trauma of that experience made him an unfit parent, a parent blinded by his own frightening interaction with the stern God, unable to see who his children really were, and unable, therefore, to give them what they needed.This suggests the possibility of a similar dynamic, between all parents and their children, in which a strict adherence to midat hadin, to the concerns of a legalistic, formalized right and wrong, make it impossible for parents to see the real worth, or, alternatively, the real weaknesses, of their children. This legalistic point of view, which focuses on things like the technicality of who is born first, or the business-like relationship between a successful son who serves (makes proud with his worldly success) his needy father, rather than more subtle, inward issues, can lead parents to misjudge, and therefore mishandle, their children. In the parent-child relationship, as in other relationships, the challenge is to get beyond the superficial transactions of giving and taking, succeeded and failing, performing and not performing, to a deeper, less judgmental, and more loving relationship. Shabbat Shalom,Shimon Felix