November 30, 2007 - VaYeshev-REVAMPING THE DREAM - (20th of Kislev, 5768 )

The Shabbat before Ziva and I left for Israel, I spoke about Parashat Vayishlach and the stages of Jacob’s life. As a young man, Jacob fled his home in fear for his life. Having cheated his brother, Esau, he ran to his mother’s birth place and virtually indentured himself to his uncle, Laban. After making both Laban and himself very rich, and having married both Leah, who I described as the Torah’s Ugly Betty, and Rachel, the woman of his dreams, Jacob returns to the land of Canaan, the Promised Land, the land God had covenanted with Jacob that he should inherit, and having made something of a cold peace with his brother, he settled down to raise his family and to live out the rest of his life.

One might have thought that Jacob had it made. All that he had ever hoped for was now his: Rachel, many sons…in fact, there were 12 of them…an abundance of possessions and the favor of God. Nonetheless, Jacob lacked karma when it came to raising his family. With incredible stupidity and a callousness that bordered on familial blindness, he broke the cardinal rule of rearing children: he openly showed his favor for one child over the rest. Because of his intense love for Joseph, foreshadowed negatively by the way he treated Leah, virtually ignoring her and shutting her out, lost as Jacob was in his adoration of Rachel, he wrecked the peace and harmony of his family and doomed his own dreams.

Last service, I cited Daniel J. Levinson’s book, The Seasons of a Man’s Life. Although it is well over twenty years old, it is still worth a read because of the insights it gives into the progression of men’s lives, and, I suspect, women’s lives, as well. Levinson spends a great deal of time speaking about dreams…how people lay out their life paths and what effects doing this come about if the dreams come to fruition or if they are thwarted. He makes a connection between the failure of one’s dreams and early, devastating impacts such as chemical- or gambling- addiction, disease and even premature death. He points out that those who are unable to accept the defeat of their heart’s desires and desperately hold on to what will and can never be, do so at risk to their health and their lives. In contrast, those are able to redirect their energies and re-focus their goals and their directions often are able to salvage for themselves measures of satisfaction and happiness and, in many cases, usefulness.

In Jacob’s case, we see a man whose goals vanish with the death of his beloved Rachel and the staged death, but true disappearance, of his favored son, Joseph. Jacob somehow is able to hang onto a thread of what he had by turning his remaining affection to Rachel’s last son, Benjamin. It is as though Jacob’s life and existence dangle on the welfare of this remaining remembrance of his beloved. It is this knowledge which Joseph, now in Egypt and ensconced as Pharaoh’s Viceroy, plays upon to lure his brothers into their confessions and to the eventual reconciliation and reunification of the family with him. Somehow, even in the face of the loss of his first and true love, Jacob comes to the end of his life with most of what he recklessly nearly destroyed. Indeed, Jacob could and does say that he is truly blessed by his faith and by the fact that, though he is filled with human imperfections, he nonetheless, succeeds. God keeps the promises that the Lord made, and the tribes, sprung from the loins of this patriarch, will survive Egyptian slavery and will return to settle the land of the covenant.

How true is all this business of having a life dream and of having to clarify and modify it due to the exigencies of our existence? I believe that there is great credence in this theory. Those who ambitions are cut short often do become embittered and turn that venom of disappointment, all their positive energies turned negative, upon themselves and their families. It is those who realize their failure and then work to modify their life paths that can enrich their remaining years and still make valuable contributions to themselves, their families and their societies. It is, of course, not always an easy thing to do…to turn away from a goal which beckons with such obsessive power, which may compel and consume one’s life’s focus to that point. I knew and was friends with not a few good folks whose military careers were cut short when they were passed over for the next rank. The ones who coped best were often those who “went laterally” with their gifts. Several chaplains I knew developed their talents in the fields of counseling and hospital ministry, tracks which did not lead to higher rank, but which did prepare them for ministry in the civilian world. Others went back to school and re-trained, as it were. Knowing that their years in the military were now numbered and that they would need to continue making a living after their forced “retirement” from service, they began the process of preparing for “the life after.”

I also witnessed several people who literally self destructed when their pass-overs occurred, unprepared as they were for this shock and being unable to reconcile their loss of status as a part of system that was truly “up or out,” as a hierarchy. But the point here is that just because one dream ends, there are still gifts we possess in our lives that we can appreciate and can build on. Jacob went on with his life. I am certain that there wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t think of Rachel and Joseph; but he was still the head of his family and there were decisions that had to be made…and there was Benjamin upon whom Jacob redirected much of that passionate love.

Redirection, rethinking one’s place in the world, re-creating new goals, developing new or latent talents…it all sounds like mid-life crisis, and, indeed, in a way, it is. And it can be a most healthy, psychological process because these stages, these crises, these failures in life often help us to prepare for the next stages of our lives. Staying stuck is neither wise, nor healthy. There simply are times when we need to move on, and with the help of our families, our friends, our partners and our God, we do not need to stay stuck in our lives, but can fashion new directions for ourselves or for those we care about who themselves suffer defeats in their lives.

Jacob stands as a model of those who suffer grievous, life changing; goal destroying losses, yet manage to move on with their lives. One can hardly say that his was a life without pain and sorrow. Yet, Jacob stands as the most real of our patriarchs, perhaps because he is so flawed. Yet who among us could call his life a failure?