Musar su Genesi 31:78

Adam ruined this state of affairs by interfering with the סוד היין, the mystical properties of the grapes. [I suppose that this is based on the tree of knowledge having been a grape bearing tree. Ed.] He followed an evil path by squeezing a cluster of grapes (and consuming its juice). Had he not done so, that "wine" would have remained in the state of what our sages call the יין המשומר בענביו, "the wine that remained preserved within its grapes (compare Berachot 34).” In that event he would have been like "the cistern that does not lose a single drop” [hyperbole for total recall, see Avot 2,11. Ed.]. He would have retained all the holiness that had been his when he was created. When Adam sinned, he did not only lose some of his former glory, fall from a "high roof" (to the ground), but he fell into a "very deep pit" (below the ground). This was a בור רק, an empty pit [allusion to the pit Joseph had been thrown in. Genesis 37,24], since it did not even contain the ingredients for the survival of the species. The species was wiped out at the time of the deluge as a direct consequence of Adam having polluted that "drop of sacred semen," and made it "evil smelling." Due to G–d's personal intervention, Noach was saved seeing he was righteous, and the righteous are the foundation of the universe. The present universe was founded by him as a result.

וישלח יעקב ויקרא לרחל וללאה. We learn from here that when the head of the household wants something from its member, he should not go about this in an autocratic manner even though he has the right to impose his will. He should endeavor to win over the members of his household to the course of action he has decided upon. It is always better to have the willing support of one's family than to have them merely obey one's orders.

To answer all this, it would seem that Jacob knew that obviously Lavan would not agree to give him his daughter without receiving a great gift, as it is written (Ibid. 31:15): "Does he [Lavan] not regard us [his daughters] as strangers"? [see Rashi] And it is known that our father Jacob became impoverished by Elifaz [the son of Esav] on the way. If so, he would certainly have to do slave labor for him in order to marry his daughter, as Isaac had commanded him, and as, indeed, occurred in the end. And Jacob was afraid to go down to him and to remain there. For he knew that Lavan was a deceiver, and that he would also want to drive him from the world, as the Torah testifies about him at the end, that he pursued him and desired to kill him, lest the G-d of Abraham aided and rescued him (viz. Ibid. 31:42). And [he knew that] his house, too, was full of idols and that he could not withstand such impurity without the merit of the holiness of Torah, and that in the house of Lavan it would not be possible for him to cleave to Torah.

Therefore, anticipating this, he fled to Shem and Ever and studied Torah there with great diligence for fourteen years. For all of these years he did not once lay down to sleep a full sleep, as Scripture testifies about him (Ibid. 28:11): "And he slept in that place," as Rashi explains there. And, with such learning, though he remained in the house of Lavan afterwards for several years, nothing could harm him. [According to our words, the figure of fourteen years is very apt. For since they were meant to offset the years that he would have to remain in the house of Lavan, and it is known that this would be fourteen years, Jacob knowing that he could not return to his house so long as Joseph had not been born, he [Joseph] being as "flame" and Esav as "straw" [see Ovadiah 1:18], and as it is written (Bereshith 30:25): "And it was, when Rachel bore Joseph, that Jacob said to Lavan: "Send me away, etc.'", (as Rashi explains), and it is known that Joseph was in the fourteenth year, as it is written (Ibid. 31:41): "I served you fourteen years for your two daughters, etc." — therefore, Jacob first learned Torah fourteen years without interruption, so that the merit of these fourteen years would stand for him in the house of Lavan, as mentioned above.]

כי דרך נשים. Nachmanides points out that in earlier days menstruating women were quarantined to the point where one did not even talk to them. The experts in those days were aware that the breath emanating from these women was harmful. Nachmanides mentions that he was going to report on scientific experiments conducted which prove such a theory. The Talmud also reports such an isolation of menstruating women. Rabbi Yochanan says that it is forbidden to walk behind such a woman, to step on the dust she walked on, and to make use of what she has handled during her period. This is why Rachel said to her father that actually she ought to be getting up and kiss his hands; she warned him not even to walk about within her tent since the dust that she had walked on might prove harmful to him. Laban remained silent and did not respond because one did not speak to women whom one knew to be menstruating. Thus far Nachmanides.

[And his friend will only lose because of this. For it is known that one who robs his friend is only a fool and an evildoer. For his grant will not increase beyond what was decreed for him on Rosh Hashanah, because of his theft. For in exchange for taking the grant that came or that was destined to come to the hand of his friend, there will be taken from him the grant that was decreed for him on Rosh Hashanah. And the end of the matter will be that the money of [i.e., attained by] the wrong will consume also the "surviving remnant," the "kosher" grant that had already been allotted him. As Chazal have said (Succah 29b): "Because of four things a man's property goes lost," one of them being because he divests himself of his own yoke and places it on his friend. And so we find in Derech Eretz Zuta, Chapter 3: "If you have taken what is not yours, yours will be taken from you." And he will remain only with the bartering of a kosher grant for one that is forbidden. For he will be destined to give din and accounting for every [misappropriated] p'rutah [small coin]. As Chazal have said (Bava Kamma 119a): "If one steals from his friend the worth of a p'rutah, it is as if he has taken his soul." And he also constrains the Holy One Blessed be He to return the theft to its owner. As Chazal have said (Sanhedrin 8a): "The Holy One Blessed be He says to the wicked: 'It is not enough that you steal, but you also constrain Me to return the theft to its owner." And all of these things are intimated in our holy Torah, in Parshath Vayetze, where it is written (Bereshith 32:11-12): "And the angel of the L-rd said to me in a dream: 'Yaakov, … lift up your eyes and see all the rams that go up on the sheep — ringstraked, speckled and grizzled" (As Rashi explains there, the angels would bring them from the flock assigned to the sons of Lavan to that assigned to Yaakov. And lest you ask, how am I permitted to take from the grant of Lavan and give it to you? The angel, therefore, concludes: "For I have seen all that Lavan does to you," that he has changed your wage ten times and taken your grant; therefore I am returning it to you.)]

Aba Chilkiya did not even return the greetings of Torah scholars in order to not be idle from the work he was doing for another (Taanit 23b). Yaakov, our forefather, peace be unto him, states explicitly, "in the day heat consumed me, and the frost by night, and my sleep departed from my eyes" (Bereishis 31:40).

For after a person has truly understood the obligation of Cleanliness and its necessity, having already attained Watchfulness and Zeal by engaging in the means they are acquired and distancing from their detriments, behold, he will no longer have any more obstructions preventing him from attaining Cleanliness except knowledge of the fine details of the Mitzvot in order to guard himself in all of them.

Also, since one is prone to forgetfulness in these fine details, he will need diligent study in the books explaining these fine details to renew remembrance of them in his mind. Then certainly, he will be roused to fulfill them.

The Tziyoni explains it thus: Numbers 22,24, describes the she-ass of Bileam being hemmed in through גדר מזה וגדר מזה, "a fence on one side and a fence on the other side." Rashi describes these fences as ordinary fences. The Kabbalists, however, believe that the wicked also experience migration of their souls, re-incarnations, etc. They base this on both Jacob and Laban building a גל, stone heap, when they part from one another the last time in Genesis 31,52. The word עד used there is an allusion to עדות השם נאמנה, that the testimony of G–d is true, and that יד העדים תהיה בו בראשונה that "the witnesses have to be the first to carry out the judgment by their own hands" (Deut. 17,7). We have the example of the weasel and the pit in Taanit 8.[The story about the weasel and the pit: A young man had rescued a maiden from a pit, and they had promised to be married to each other, and had selected witnesses to confirm their agreement, namely the pit, and a weasel which happened to be passing at that moment. After a while, the young man forgot about his promise and married another woman and had children by her. His oldest son died by falling into a pit, whereas the second one was torn to shreds by a weasel. At that point the young man realized why this tragedy had befallen him and he returned to the girl whom he had promised to wed.] So far the Tziyoni. He means to say that Jacob and Laban concluded a covenant not to cross that pile of stones with hostile intentions towards the other, and that they would consider that pile of stones as witness to their covenant. The stone fence that the she-ass became aware of, was that very יגר שהדותא, as Laban had called that stone-heap in Genesis 31,47. The she-ass squeezed the leg of Bileam, the re-incarnation of Laban, since the "hands of the witnesses have to be the first ones to execute the judgment" if someone violated the covenant. According to Sanhedrin 105a, בעור, Bileam's father is not really Bileam's father but "בן" in that context means that he was also identical with כושן רשעתיים, who in turn is identical with לבן הארמי. Incidentally, the first letters of these names spell כלב, dog. בעור, is supposed to allude to the fact that that man בא על הבעיר, had sexual relations with a beast. He was also called כושן רשעתיים, to indicate he had committed two wrongs against Israel; one in the time of Jacob, the other during the reign of the Judges. What was his real name? לבן הארמי. So far the quote from Sanhedrin 105a. The Talmud then considers Bileam identical with (or rather a re-incarnation of) Laban. The other comments all pertain to the characteristics of Bileam, who had been accused on the same folio of having used his she-ass as his sexual outlet. When Rashi writes on that folio that the word בעור refers to Bileam's father, this is clearly some printer's error, since the same line of Rashi concludes by calling כושן רשעתיים as identical with Laban. The Targum Yonathan also hints in Deut.26,5: ארמי אובד אבי וירד מצרימה, "my father was a wandering Arami who descended to Egypt," that the meaning is that Bileam and Laban were identical, i.e. one was the re-incarnation of the other. It means that because of two wrongs committed by Laban, Jacob, i.e. the Jewish people, wound up in exile in Egypt. The two wrongs were that at first Laban tried to destroy Jacob and his family; later, having moved to Egypt, he became an advisor to Pharaoh advising him on how to harm the Jewish people. Sanhedrin there explains that Pharaoh had three such advisors, namely Yitro, Bileam and Job. Bileam was the one who advised killing Moses outright as a baby, since one could not be sure he would not be the saviour of the Jews. The Targum Yonathan spells this out on Numbers 22,5. From all the foregoing, we see that the entire family of Jacob originated with Bileam (the latter having been Laban the father of all of Jacob's wives). This lineage was reinforced further through Balak who as king of Moab was also the ancestor of Ruth who became the great grandmother of King David, who embodies everything that Israel is proud of and looks up to including the Messiah.

The Tziyoni explains it thus: Numbers 22,24, describes the she-ass of Bileam being hemmed in through גדר מזה וגדר מזה, "a fence on one side and a fence on the other side." Rashi describes these fences as ordinary fences. The Kabbalists, however, believe that the wicked also experience migration of their souls, re-incarnations, etc. They base this on both Jacob and Laban building a גל, stone heap, when they part from one another the last time in Genesis 31,52. The word עד used there is an allusion to עדות השם נאמנה, that the testimony of G–d is true, and that יד העדים תהיה בו בראשונה that "the witnesses have to be the first to carry out the judgment by their own hands" (Deut. 17,7). We have the example of the weasel and the pit in Taanit 8.[The story about the weasel and the pit: A young man had rescued a maiden from a pit, and they had promised to be married to each other, and had selected witnesses to confirm their agreement, namely the pit, and a weasel which happened to be passing at that moment. After a while, the young man forgot about his promise and married another woman and had children by her. His oldest son died by falling into a pit, whereas the second one was torn to shreds by a weasel. At that point the young man realized why this tragedy had befallen him and he returned to the girl whom he had promised to wed.] So far the Tziyoni. He means to say that Jacob and Laban concluded a covenant not to cross that pile of stones with hostile intentions towards the other, and that they would consider that pile of stones as witness to their covenant. The stone fence that the she-ass became aware of, was that very יגר שהדותא, as Laban had called that stone-heap in Genesis 31,47. The she-ass squeezed the leg of Bileam, the re-incarnation of Laban, since the "hands of the witnesses have to be the first ones to execute the judgment" if someone violated the covenant. According to Sanhedrin 105a, בעור, Bileam's father is not really Bileam's father but "בן" in that context means that he was also identical with כושן רשעתיים, who in turn is identical with לבן הארמי. Incidentally, the first letters of these names spell כלב, dog. בעור, is supposed to allude to the fact that that man בא על הבעיר, had sexual relations with a beast. He was also called כושן רשעתיים, to indicate he had committed two wrongs against Israel; one in the time of Jacob, the other during the reign of the Judges. What was his real name? לבן הארמי. So far the quote from Sanhedrin 105a. The Talmud then considers Bileam identical with (or rather a re-incarnation of) Laban. The other comments all pertain to the characteristics of Bileam, who had been accused on the same folio of having used his she-ass as his sexual outlet. When Rashi writes on that folio that the word בעור refers to Bileam's father, this is clearly some printer's error, since the same line of Rashi concludes by calling כושן רשעתיים as identical with Laban. The Targum Yonathan also hints in Deut.26,5: ארמי אובד אבי וירד מצרימה, "my father was a wandering Arami who descended to Egypt," that the meaning is that Bileam and Laban were identical, i.e. one was the re-incarnation of the other. It means that because of two wrongs committed by Laban, Jacob, i.e. the Jewish people, wound up in exile in Egypt. The two wrongs were that at first Laban tried to destroy Jacob and his family; later, having moved to Egypt, he became an advisor to Pharaoh advising him on how to harm the Jewish people. Sanhedrin there explains that Pharaoh had three such advisors, namely Yitro, Bileam and Job. Bileam was the one who advised killing Moses outright as a baby, since one could not be sure he would not be the saviour of the Jews. The Targum Yonathan spells this out on Numbers 22,5. From all the foregoing, we see that the entire family of Jacob originated with Bileam (the latter having been Laban the father of all of Jacob's wives). This lineage was reinforced further through Balak who as king of Moab was also the ancestor of Ruth who became the great grandmother of King David, who embodies everything that Israel is proud of and looks up to including the Messiah.

מיכאל represents the attribute of Mercy, uniquely associated with Abraham who is known as an exponent of G–d's kindness, חסד, as we know from Michah 7,20 "who gives kindness to Abraham". גבריאל is the angel in charge of גבורה, the attribute of justice, something Isaac was the prime exponent of, as we know from Genesis 31,42. נוריאל also known as אוריאל to Kabbalists, is in charge of the emanation תפארת which combines the attributes of חסד and גבורה. He is called אור-יאל, inasmuch as he represents חסד, i.e. אור, and נור-יאל, inasmuch as he represents the aspect of גבורה. This latter is an attribute in which G–d appears as a consuming fire, therefore the אור of חסד is turned into נור. There are those who understand the letter א in the acronym ארגמ"ן as an allusion to the dual name of that angel. At any rate, the five letters in that acronym symbolize four camps or armies; רפאל, as the angel in charge of the emanation מלכות, which "receives" from the three aforementioned ones, [seeing that מלכות is the "lowest” of the emanations, the one closest to our physical domain, the word "receives" may mean that it is the recipient of the input of the higher emanations. Ed.]. So much for the meaning of ארגמ"ן.

Rabbi Elazar fell upon his face, whereupon he beheld the image of his father. Rabbi Elazar told him, “I asked who the angels were and they answered me that they were Avraham and Yitzchak… In other words, the souls of Avraham and Yitzchak came to lead the way for Yaakov as he fled from Lavan the Aramean. And even though Yitzchak was still alive at the time, nevertheless, at the time that he was bound upon the altar his soul left him and ascended to Heaven where it became attached to the soul of Avraham. Then the two of them together went before Yaakov. This is the meaning of the verse, “The God of my father, the God of Avraham and the fear of Yitzchak, was with me” (Bereishis 31:42). Rabbi Shimon then explained that Yaakov was not the only one to be joined by the souls of the righteous. In fact, they come to every God-fearing person to save him from thoughts of sin and needless to say from actual sin. But if a man entertains wicked thoughts, whether in town, in the field or at home, a malignant spirit called ChNYH comes to him. It is appointed over all those who entertain wicked or foreign thoughts while traveling. This malignant spirit clings to the person and does not separate from him until it has led him into a serious transgression. This imparts a blemish to his soul, on account of our many sins, as a result of which he will be filled with regret until the end of his days. Nevertheless, it is a loss than cannot be made good. Know, therefore, that wherever you go you will be joined by emissaries who will further your thoughts, whether for bad or for good.

Laban became aware of this, and this is why he protested in 31,43: הבנות בנותי, והבנים בני והצאן צאני וכל אשר אתה רואה לי הוא. "The daughters are mine, the sons are mine, the flocks are mine; all that you see around is mine!" I have already mentioned that we are called צאן while we are in exile. We also have scriptural proof for this from Psalms 44,23 נחשבנו כצאן טבחה, "We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered." When we are on a high spiritual level, however, we are referred to as אדם, as we have shown. There is a difference, however, between אדם when referred to as a male, and between אדם when referred to as female. When G–d first created the human species, the Torah says of G–d's work זכר ונקבה בראם, ויקרא את שמם אדם. "He created them male and female, and He named them Adam" (Genesis 5,2). All the redemptions which we have experienced in the past have always been associated with the female element inherent in אדם; this is why our gratitude was always expressed by שירה חדשה, "a new song (feminine term) instead of as שיר חדש. When the redemption of the future materializes, however, we shall give thanks to the Lord with a שיר חדש, acknowledging the additional dimension of that redemption.