Komentarz do Rodzaju 29:10

ויגש יעקב ויגל JACOB STEPPED NEAR AND ROLLED [THE STONE]- as easily as one draws the stopper from the mouth of a bottle — thus showing you how strong he was. (Bereishit Rabbah 70:12)

ויגל את האבן, seeing he was a son of her father’s sister.

כאשר ראה יעקב את רחל, until he had met Rachel Yaakov had not been interested to get involved in the problem of rolling the rock off the top of the well. He had been afraid that if he helped the three shepherds would only be concerned with watering their own flocks without waiting around to assist any other shepherds.

ויהי כאשר ראה יעקב את רחל, It was when Jacob saw Rachel, etc. The reason that the Torah repeats three times that Laban was the brother of Jacob's mother is to emphasise that everything Jacob did was only because Laban was his mother's brother and he tried to honour his mother by carrying out her instructions. Another reason for the Torah to repeat this information was so that bystanders who observed Jacob- a recently arrived total stranger- doing Rachel such a great favour (removal of the stone on the well) would know that he was motivated only by family considerations. This is why Jacob spelled out his reasons and as soon as he laid eyes on Rachel he mentioned that she was the daughter of Laban who was his mother's brother. This is also why he displayed concern about the flocks of his uncle. When he kissed Rachel he did not repeat this statement since he had already made plain that Rachel was his cousin. Besides, the very fact that he started crying was explanation enough that he had come face to face with a relative.

ויהי...ויגל את האבן, either together with the other three shepherds on hand, or all by himself. In the event that he did it all by himself, G’d blessed him with extraordinary physical strength at that time.

את רחל בת לבן אחי אמו, “Rachel, daughter of Lavan, the brother of his mother.” The words “the brother of his mother,” appear three times in this verse. Apparently Rachel told Yaakov first that her father was a swindler, and that it would be a mistake on the part of Yaakov to live in his house. Yaakov replied to her that seeing that her father was a brother of his mother, he was aware, and would know how to protect himself against trickery on the part of her father.

... And it appears to me that they derived this from that which it is written,  vayigal, which is an expression of revealing (gilui), and not vayigalgel, which is an expression of rolling (gilgul). 

As one removes a פקק from a bottle opening... This means a cover from a bottle. Rashi is saying that Yaakov did not roll the stone [with difficullty] as the shepherds did, but [he removed it] with ease. Rashi deduced this because it is written ויגל, “he revealed,” and not ויגלל (“he rolled”).

ויגל, Hiphil, kommt nie wieder in dieser Wurzel vor und bezeichnet die Leichtigkeit, mit welcher er den schweren Stein vom Brunnen schaffte: "er ließ ihn hinabrollen".

When the Torah repeats that "Jacob watered the flocks of Laban," the message may be that he did this only because Laban was his mother's brother. Otherwise, -in line with what we learn in Avodah Zarah 67- there was no call to do favours to the Gentiles, seeing that we know from Proverbs 14,34: "(even) the kindness done for us by the Gentile nations are a form of sin."

In dieser Geschichte erfahren wir nun, was denn eigentlich Vater Jakob für den Bau seiner Zukunft mit hinaus genommen. Viel Geld hatte er nicht. Das Augenfälligste ist: er war stark, hatte Kraft. Wozu die anderen alle erst zusammenkommen mussten, das tat er allein, und zwar ohne Anstrengung, eine Kraft, die wir bei Jakob gar nicht erwartet hätten. Dieser starke gesunde Körper war für jetzt an materiellen Gütern sein einziger Reichtum. Ein gar nicht genug zu schätzender Schatz, der, wie er ein bedeutendes Angebinde für eine ganze Zukunft ist, so auch nur durch eine rein verlebte Vergangenheit erworben werden kann. Es ist der Grundstock zu dem עושר וכבוד, die die תורה mit ihrer Linken bietet. Zweitens ist es ein unerschütterlicher Rechtlich- keitssinn, der sich hier offenbarte. So wie Moses, der ja auch seine Zukunft am Brunnen fand, duldet ihn nicht die geringste Pflichtvergessenheit, die er wahrnimmt. Eine Pflichttreue, die er später ja selbst so glänzend in dem schwierigsten Dienstverhältnisse bewährt. Drittens eine arbeitsfreudige Geschicklichkeit und Tätigkeit, die rasch zugreift und nützt, wo es auch gar nicht seine Sache ist, die wir gar nicht von dem איש תם יושב אהלים erwartet hätten. Somit erscheint er als echtes Prototyp des Volkes, dessen Stammvater er werden sollte, und das bestimmt war, die verschiedensten, materiellsten und geistigsten Berufstätigkeiten in gleicher Würdigkeit und Ebenbürtigkeit zu repräsentieren. Der Stammvater hatte eine solche Vielseitigkeit, dass jeder seiner Söhne sagen konnte, er habe seine ihm eigentümliche Fähigkeit vom Vater geerbt, der sich im Lehr- Nähr- und Wehrstand gleich vollkommen bewegte. —

ויגש יעקב ויגל את האבן מעל פי הבאר, “Yaakov approached and rolled the rock from the top of the well.” Yaakov clearly displayed superior physical strength seeing that at least three shepherds had been unable to move that rock with their combined efforts. When you consider in addition that Yaakov must have been tired both from the long journey and from Torah study, which traditionally weakens a person physically, (compare Isaiah 28,29 where the word תושיה is applied to Torah seeing its study weakens the body of a person, Sanhedrin 26) his feat was even more remarkable. Yaakov had spent the last 14 years studying in the academy of Ever (even though this detail has not been recorded in the written Torah).
We find that when Yitzchak his father commanded Yaakov: “arise and go to Padan Aram and take for yourself from there a wife” (28,2), that he understood that the meaning of the word אשה also included another element, something Yitzchak had not spelled out to him. The hidden meaning of the word אשה was that it referred to Torah. King Solomon in Proverbs 31,10 already alluded to this meaning of the word אשה, when he headlined his last paragraph with the words אשת חיל מי ימצא, “who can find a woman of valour?” He described such a “woman” as עטרת בעלה “the crown of her husband” in Proverbs 12,4.
Our sages, when commenting on Deut. 33,4 where Moses described the Torah as מורשה קהלת יעקב, “as an inalienable possession handed down from generation to generation,” that the word ought not merely be read as מורשה, but as מאורשה, something a Jew is betrothed to. In other words, Torah is to us what a wife is to a husband. Keeping this thought in mind, Yaakov decided to fulfill the implied command of his father first and instead of proceeding directly to Lavan he stayed at the Yeshivah for 14 years. The number of years he must have stayed there can be arrived at by comparing the age at which he met Pharaoh (130), [he lived in Egypt for 17 years and died at 147 years of age.] When you deduct 22 years during which he had not seen Joseph who had been 17 years of age at the time of his abduction, this made Yaakov 91 years old at the time Joseph had been born. Joseph was born after Yaakov had stayed at Lavan’s for 14 years. This means he was 77 years of age when he came to Charan. Yitzchak dispensed the blessing when he was 123 years of age, i.e. when Yaakov was 63 years old (compare Rashi who said that when one approaches within 5 years of the age at which either parent died it is time to make arrangements concerning one’s own death. The Talmud Megillah 17 arrives at the same conclusion). All of this supports the view that the only way to account for an obvious discrepancy in dates supplied by the Torah is to conclude that Yaakov studied Torah for 14 years before arriving at Lavan’s house.

Dreimal wird in diesem Verse wiederholt, dass Laban Jakobs Mutterbruder gewesen. Denn in allem, was Jakob hier tat, wird er durch das Gedächtnis an seine Mutter geleitet, die ihm hier in ihrem nächsten Verwandten lebendig vor die Seele trat. Es heißt ja gleich, dass Jakob Rahel geküsst habe. Ohne diesen wiederholten Hinweis auf die Erinnerung an die Mutter hätten wir Jakobs ganzes Verfahren als Galanterie gegen ein schönes Mädchen auffassen können. So wird bei ähnlichem Begegnen Moses und der Töchter Jithros einer solchen Auffassung durch den auffallenden Wechsel der Sexualform vorgebeugt und die richtige gesichert, dass keine geschlechtliche Regung, sondern das lebhafte Rechtsgefühl ihn geleitet. ויבאו הרעים ויגרשום, die rohen Hirten vertrieben sie ohne Rücksicht auf ihr schwächeres Geschlecht, ויקם משה ויושען Moses rettete sie aus Rücksicht für ihr Geschlecht, weil sie die Schwachen waren, dann aber וישק את צאנם, war er ihnen gefällig nicht aus geschlechtlicher Rücksicht. So auch hier. Obgleich Rahel schön war, sah er nur die Verwandte in ihr. Das spricht sich auch durch sein Weinen aus, das sich kaum aus einem anderen Motibe wird erklären lassen. Wer weiß, wie lange Jakob gewandert war, ohne eine verwandte Seele zu sehen. Da tritt ihm mit einemmal in Rahel die Tochter eines Bruders seiner Mutter entgegen und ruft das Bild der Mutter überwältigend bis zu Tränen in ihm wach. Die Träne zeigt, wie der Kuss ein durchaus sittlicher war, ja selbst die Sorge für die Schafe glaubte er der Mutter zu leisten. — Rahel musste ihn ja für verrückt gehalten haben, indem er ihr küssend und weinend um den Hals fiel. Darum reißt er sich los und erklärt ihr den Grund seiner Rührung.