What's in a List of Names? The Edomite Genealogy in Genesis 36

I invite you to read Genesis 36 and, as you do, to see if any part of it speaks to you spiritually or religiously.

Did you find a spiritual or religious connection with this text?

Some rabbinic commentators, in contemplating why this chapter goes into great detail about the genealogy of Esau, not seemingly relevant to the history of the Jewish people, come to the astonishing conclusion that this chapter must contain some of the deepest Kabbalistic mysteries in the Torah. We could undertake a many-part series of classes looking at this topic, but suffice it to give the example that the first king, Bela ben Beor, is likened to Balaam (same spelling except for the letter mem), the great prophet among the Gentiles like Moses in Israel, Moses being the good da'at/knowledge and Balaam the evil da'at/knowledge, knowing the one moment when G!d is angry each day and issuing curses that are powerful as a result - hence, son of Burning. But there was a tikkun by the seventh generation, with Bela becoming Baal Chanan ben Achbor - letters of Bela/Baal rearranged, and Chanan, meaning "gracious", indicating Chesed - and Achbor having the same letters as Beor but with the addition of a kaf for Chesed. 

Here is the Kedushat Levi discussing another interpretive reading, based on wording differences between Edom leaving the land and Israel leaving the land: "Both the Ari z’al and others preceding him, ‎including Rashi, stated that holiness is also known as ‎אחת‎, ‎‎'a state of unity.' Rashi points out that when the ‎descendants of Yaakov set out on their journey to Egypt and ‎their names had been listed individually, the Torah (Genesis ‎‎46,27) concluded the list with ‎כל הנפש‎, “the sum total of the ‎soul,” (singular) when referring to this family. On the other hand, ‎when the Torah reports Esau and his family leaving the Holy Land ‎in order to settle in the region of Seir, (Genesis 36,6) Esau’s ‎descendants are referred to as ‎נפשות‎, “souls” (pl.). Such nuances ‎in the Torah reveal to us that not all souls originate in the same ‎region of the diagram portraying the emanations.‎" (Kedushat Levi, Toldot 22)

Not convinced? I'm not sure I am, either - but this raises the important question of what to do with our sacred texts. There are parts of the Torah that are very meaningful - I think of the Ten Commandments, the Thirteen Attributes, the Exodus from Egypt we celebrate at Pesach, and Ve'ahavta Le'Reacha Kamocha/You shall love your neighbor as yourself. And then there are the parts we struggle with, to find meaning in - like this chapter - like the commandment to observe yibum and chalitzah (levirate marriage and the often degrading ceremony to get out of it) - like the commandments to wipe out the nations inhabiting the land of Israel when entering in. And I'm just speaking here of the Five Books - when we expand our gaze to the Tanach, the Mishnah, the Talmud - even other works in the broader Jewish canon - we expand both the list of things we find profoundly meaningful and the list of things we recoil in horror from (or at least roll our eyes at, or that make us yawn - as perhaps this chapter does). 

Is the Torah a smorgasbord, from which we can pick and choose those dishes we like? Or is it a prie-fixe menu, where we are served what we're served and expected to eat all of it, trusting that the parts we find distasteful will nourish us in ways we cannot understand? Are there herbs and spices - also known as hermeneutics, or interpretive principles, that we can apply to the dishes, er I mean texts, to make them more palatable, to bring out flavors we might not be able to detect without them? 

What does it even mean to have a sacred text? What role does it play in our lives? In the lives of the sacred communities of which we are a part? How can a community remain a sacred beloved community connecting its members to the Divine and to one another when its members have different - sometimes radically different relationships to the text? 

To wrestle with these questions is part of what it means to be of the house of Israel, the one who wrestles with G!d.

Questions for Reflection and Discussion

1. Which sections of the Torah do you eagerly await hearing each year, which make your heart sing and lift your spirit - and which sections do you dread, knowing that you find them difficult to find meaning in?

2. What is the role of sacred text in your own life? What metaphor would you use to describe that role?

3. What interpretive lens do you bring to the text? E.g., do you look for spiritual meaning? Religious commands? Expressions of Jewish peoplehood? Psychological insights? Modern scholarship? Midrash? Artistic inspiration?

4. Everyone has a letter in the Torah - do you know what yours is and why? What Torah in the broader sense do you have to add to the Torah of the Jewish people?

These are the notes, lightly revised, I used in teaching Genesis 36 in the 929 class at the South Philadelphia Shtiebel in March, 2022.

Kashrut, Kabbalah, Jokes, and Theology

In the summary of this past Shabbat that I posted last night, I included a joke that I came up with Friday night. A rabbi friend in the comments asked me to write more, and I did. (I'm not a C. S. Lewis fan, but is has been said that he wrote much better theology when he was telling stories than he did when he wrote straight theology - maybe my best theologizing comes through jokes!)

This past Shabbat, on Friday night, I noticed that Shir HaShirm/Song of Songs 4:13 contained the phrase “Pardes Rimonim im Pri Megadim” in it. Literally, this means “Orchard of Pomegranates with Luscious Fruit” – but it put me in mind of rabbinic works with those titles – Pardes Rimonim, a foundational kabbalistic text based on teachings of the Zohar, written by Rabbi Moshe Cordevero (16^th century Kabbalist and author of Tomer Devorah), and Pri Megadim, a widely-used commentary on the Shulchan Aruch by Rabbi Yosef Ben Meir Teomim, an 18^th-century Galitzianer rabbi. I immediately thought of a joke that this verse provides a biblical mandate to only teach the laws of kashrut in the context of Kabbalah and shared it with various people at shul the next day and posted it as part of a Facebook post on how I spent my Shabbat. A Renewal rabbi friend in Israel said to write more about it – “please” – and I realized that, although on the surface it is a joke, perhaps there is something deeper there.

 I am currently taking an in-depth course on issur v’heter, the laws of kashrut, focusing on the Shulchan Aruch and the Rama’s glosses with Shach and Taz, but bringing in other halachic sources as well, including the Pri Megadim, and it is because of this that I noticed the verse. The course, which is very well taught, is focusing only on the laws and the legal reasoning behind the various opinions, without any attempt to find a spiritual meaning in them. However, my way of being religious is to work to find spiritual meaning in all religious practices and I have been writing pieces in response to various laws of kashrut based on my meditations on them.

Certainly, this is not everyone’s approach. Traditionally, different Hebrew words are applied to different mitzvot, with the work chok applying to those mitzvot for which there is no reason given – the laws of kashrut fall into this category. While some mitzvot (such as the prohibition against killing) are seen as rational and universal, many of the so-called ritual mitzvot are not.

Yeshayahu Leibowitz famously went even further, teaching that there is no spiritual or ethical meaning in following any of the mitzvot and we must do so only to obey G!d, with any attempt to find spiritual or ethical meaning being akin to idolatry. However, others in the Jewish tradition, such as Maimonides, taught that even the chukkim have reasons, even if they are not readily apparent, and many have sought to find reasons for them, some ethical, some more spiritual than ethical.

It is this latter approach that speaks to me. For me, religious practice must be a way of connecting with G!d, of serving others, and/or of becoming my truer, more authentic self, made b’tzelem Elokim, in the image of G!d. “Do it because I/G!d said so!” does not work for me. Because of my approach, I have been able to find great depths of meaning in my religious practice which makes it a satisfying way of life that I believe draws me closer to G!d, others, and myself.

That being said, one danger of finding spiritual meaning in particular religious practices is that what is deeply meaningful to one person may not resonate with another person, and although I reject Yeshayahu Leibowitz’s approach, I do think there can be something idolatrous if one becomes too attached to one particular meaning. The Jewish tradition is much better, if not perfect, at embracing multiple interpretations of Torah (the seventy facets, PaRDeS – pshat/remez/drash/sod) than the Christian tradition – in the latter, I saw this at play in many liturgists’ views who were unable to see that a rite could be multivalent – but I think it’s important to keep in mind as each person grapples with their own religious practice and its meaning in one’s life.

I also have had the experience that often one cannot begin to fathom the meaning of a religious practice until one has been observing it for some time. This is especially true of liturgical prayer – one cannot really begin to appreciate the beauty and depth of a particular liturgical rite without immersing oneself in it for at least a year. (Having practiced several rites over my life, you can trust me when I tell you this is true.) I believe it is true of other religious practices as well. These practices have a formative effect on our character, and it is only with time that we can begin to appreciate how they have formed us. When the Jewish people where given the Torah at Mount Sinai, we responded “Naaseh v’nishma” – “We shall do and we shall listen” – because it is only in the doing that the full revelation takes place, and the doing must occur for the listening to be possible. And meanings change and transform over time – a practice that may have one meaning for me today may have a very different meaning five years from now.

Perhaps, keeping these things in mind, I will revise my joke – it’s not that the laws of kashrut  - and other areas of halachah - should be taught through the lens of Kabbalah – rather they should absolutely be LEARNED through the lens of Kabbalah – or Jewish spirituality more broadly. As each of us learns and practices the various mitzvot – and all of the mitzvot – may we be zocheh – may we merit – to find a profound depth of meaning in the mitzvah, one that draws us closer to G!d, to othe

Chayei Sarah: Sarah's Double Heartbreak

Despite being named Chayei Sarah, the Life of Sarah, this week’s Torah portion begins with the death of Sarah. Apart from a brief genealogical note separating the two, her death occurs immediately after the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac, at the end of last week’s parashah. Because it states that Abraham returns to the young men, in Genesis 22:19, at the end of the account of the Akedah, with no mention of Isaac, the classic rabbinic interpretation is that Isaac did not return with Abraham, but left separately. The rabbis then teach that, when Sarah saw Abraham returning without Isaac, she assumes that the sacrifice was made, that Isaac is dead, and therefore dies from the heartbreak.

I believe that there is another level to her heartbreak. In Genesis 21, in a fit of anger, she sends Hagar and Abraham’s son Ishmael away. We read in Genesis 21:11 that this greatly distressed Abraham – literally, “the matter was evil in Abraham’s eyes” and the fact that G!d sided with Sarah surely did not diminish his distress.

I think that, when Sarah experienced the heartbreak of seemingly having lost Isaac, a heartbreak that led to her death, she also had the heartbreaking realization that she had done to Abraham what she perceived he had done to her in depriving him of the presence of his son. The profound guilt and realization that she had caused profound pain to her husband contributed to the heaviness that led to her death.

May we have the wisdom to reflect on our actions in cheshbon hanefesh, accounting of the soul, in such a way that we are able to repair the deep pain we cause others as we experience the deep pain caused by others’ actions.