The Judah Moment
by Marc Gafni
Back in 1893 there was a reading contest in London. People gathered to hear Shakespearean actors read Psalm 23, “The Lord is My Shepherd,” competing for the substantial prize to be awarded for the best recitation.
As the evening progressed, it seemed fairly clear that a young actor from the English countryside was going to win. He had read well and projected properly, moving his audience with his diction and nuance. The applause following his last reading made it clear that he was the audience’s favorite. As the final candidate stepped down, and the judges were preparing to award the prize to the young actor from the English countryside, a small, slightly-stooped old man appeared at the back of the auditorium, approached the judges and said,
“Excuse me. If you wouldn’t mind, I would also like an opportunity to read the psalm.”
The man spoke with a bit of an accent, wore a strange dark hat, and for a while the judges debated whether to let this old man partake in their competition. Eventually politeness won over xenophobia and they allowed him a platform. The old man made his way up to the podium, settled himself, cleared his throat a few times, and in a soft, ever-so-gentle voice he began to read:
“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He maketh me lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me to still waters…”
And as the frail old man read this calming psalm about the safety and reassurance of being in God’s presence, the auditorium fell quiet, so quiet the silence was palpable. People found themselves leaning forward in their seats, bathing in the words: “Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I shall fear no evil, for thou art with me…” By the time the old man had finished his bewitching recital, the auditorium was filled with the silence of the world before creation.
A minute went by and another minute, until someone hit their hands together. Here and there some hesitant scattered applause began, and then the room burst out in a thunderous ovation. Huge spontaneous applause rang out that pulled people to their feet and left them clapping and clapping for what seemed like an eternity until only exhaustion allowed it to subside.
The prize was nevertheless awarded to the young actor from the countryside – a technicality allowed the judges to disqualify the old man – but no one was convinced, especially the young actor himself. As the audience filed out, the young actor threw away his winning bouquet and ran after the old man.
“Please. Please tell me. I have studied acting for my entire life and learned all sorts of reading skills, and yet there is no comparing my presentation to yours. I know you were the true winner tonight. But, forgive me – you don’t have a better voice than me, you don’t read as fluently, your accent is strange. So how did you do it? What is it you know that I don’t?”
And the old man with the gentlest smile and the sweetest eyes and the holiest, holiest of faces looked at the young man and he said to him,
“My dear young man, the difference between you and me…is that I know the shepherd. I know the shepherd.”
What did the old man know? What was the nature of his knowing? As he himself acknowledged, technique did not lead him to touch the hearts of hundreds, nor could intellectual theology have helped him transform a psalm into a spell. The old man knew God the shepherd in an instinctive, emotional, even familial way. It was this inner certainty, this core certainty of his place within the divine flock, which allowed him to talk about a sacred friend and protector rather than read words on a page.
The Biblical Certainty Moment
Theoretically at least, we all know the Shepherd. In the biblical tradition, every morning begins with a proclamation of this certainty. Before the start of the day, I say the prayer Modeh Ani Lefanecha and in so doing make the ultimate statement of certainty. Modeh ani lefanecha – I give thanks before You – I give thanks in Your presence – is a clear and strong statement of divine relationship. In it one speaks directly to the divine, acknowledging the daily presence of the *Spirit in our lives, the divine role in creation, and the divine aspect of ourselves created in the image of God. Emerging from the nightmares of ‘Maybe’, the darkness of ‘So what’, I begin the day with the certainty of ‘Before you, I give thanks’*.
This certainty is not intellectual; it is instinctive and emotional. It is not a schematic knowledge of the way of the world; it is a deep internal understanding of the way of the divine within. Core certainty of being is to know the shepherd. (how do these sentences follow?**) Gone are the medieval days when we could employ Aristotelian physics to offer rational proofs for the existence of God. In a post-Kantian world, the easy certainties of the medieval schoolmen are simply not (enough*) available to us.a (Our generation seeks a new formulation, or perhaps an old formulation, renewed.)* I believe the certainty to which modeh ani refers is an inner experiential certainty of the kind best revealed in the conclusion to the biblical Book of Job.
Job is a good man to whom terrible things happen for no clear reason: his wealth, children, and health are wiped out in five swift brutal blows. For over thirty chapters Job engages in sharp and painful theological dialogue with his so-called friends. They claim that God must be punishing Job for sins, whilst Job insists on his innocence. After the to and fro of accusation and self-justification yields no answers, God intercedes, speaking to Job directly in two overwhelming monologues.
When Job finally responds to the voice from the whirlwind, it is not to the theological content of God’s speech, but rather to the affirmation of God’s presence. “I had heard of You, but now my eye has seen You.” (Job 42:5) Job’s response does not emerge from new understandings derived from God’s words; he gains no certainty about theology, nor about cosmic morality. Rather, Job finds peace in the direct experience of God. Whether or not his suffering was unjust, at least Job now knows there is a God who controls the world and takes note of what he says. God has found Job valuable enough to engage with him in direct undeniable communication. Unsure of the future and of God’s intentions, Job nevertheless now knows that he is anchored in divine reality, and that his life has meaning to the maker of the world.
It is this internal, personal, experiential knowledge that provides core certainty of being. More than being sure of my social identity, beyond understanding the psychological nature of my personality, core certainty of being speaks to the divine image within, affirming the value and dignity of my very existence.
For the Zohar – the magnum opus of the Kabbalistic* biblical mystical tradition – core certainty of being is the knowledge that, no matter what, God loves us. ‘It all depends on love,’ an epigram1 by the Zohar’s major personae, Shimon Bar Yochai, is understood by the Kabalistic masters as being the most important statement in the whole of the mystical tradition.2
It is more than a co-incidence of the spirit that at roughly the same time3 as Shimon Bar Yochai, another Jewish teacher, later to be known as Jesus of Nazareth, is also teaching a message of love. Now I know that to many this message of love will seem to be a uniquely Christian idea.4 But, in the spirit of dialogue and deep love for my Christian brothers and sisters, I would like to distinguish between the Jewish understanding of the idea that God loves us and its important adaptation and transformation in Christianity.
In classical Christianity, love is based primarily on grace. That means that, despite the fact that I am not worthy, God loves me anyway. Biblical consciousness as understood by the Jewish tradition says something entirely different.5 The fact that God loves me no matter what is the surest indication that I am worthy. God’s love is where I experience the infinite adequacy, dignity and beauty of myself. It is not sufficient to know that I am adequate and dignified. I need to know that I am beautiful, that God yearns for me as I yearn for God. God loves me because I am lovable.
ften we misread the bible and misunderstand religion. We think that God only loves us when we are as good as we think we ought be. Clearly biblical thinking demands that we strive to be good. When we are unsuccessful there may well be consequences. There is no action in this world which does not beget some consequence in its wake. That is how we know that our actions are significant and that our choices matter. Yet we are always loved. We are loved because God forgives. We are loved because we are always capable of growth and transformation. Indeed if I understand, as Moses Cordevero did in his classic 16th century work the Palm of Devorah, that ontology and metaphysics are the source of moral imperatives — then the very possibility of human growth is also the divine call to growth.** Most importantly, however we are loved because we are enough. God teaches us our enoughness.
There is a secret wound lurking inside all of us. It is the fear that we are somehow not enough. We secretly feel that if people really knew all of our imperfections they would not love us. Much of western religion, in a distortion of the tradition, has reinforced this feeling – Indeed you are not enough; so aren’t you lucky that God is so wonderful that he loves you anyway…even though you are not enough. This is a love that creates radical dependency and emasculates a human being. Biblical consciousness begins with the statement — You are enough. You could be more. God is the force within that invites you to be more, as well as the cosmological embrace that loves you as you are.6 This is the essential core certainty of being which I will be referring to in different forms throughout the book. Even as we strive to grow we need to realize in the depths of our souls that we are enough.
A powerful Midrash captures the dialectic of growing from a place of ‘enoughness’.
God is described by the biblical text as Shadai. In the talmudic and particularly kabbalistic unpacking of the biblical text every name of God represents a particular human experience of the divine. Unpacking the dimension of divinity implicit in the name Shadai- the Midrash explains, ‘Who said to his world “Enough”.’
Two moments dance together in the midrashic Epigram. The implicit question of course is to whom does God say enough? Perhaps ‘his world’ implies the physical and spiritual structure of the cosmos which is an emanation, or at least a reflection, of divinity? In this read God says Enough to himself – ‘I will create until a particular point, say enough, and then turn to the human being to join me as my partner in completing the work of creation.’ In the kabbalistic understanding of this reading, human partnership in creation is accomplished primarily through human spiritual growth and transformation. Human growth is essential (and human growth implies human imperfection – for growth can only begin with inadequacy**). In the poetic description of the Midrashic literature: “Every creature has an angel hovering above whispering in its ear “Grow. Grow!”
And yet a second reading suggests itself as well. God says enough to the world in the sense of -‘Know that you are enough’. Even without dramatic change and growth you are enough exactly as you are. It is a holy paradox of reality that only when we know that we are enough can we grow to be more!7
Cheap Grace
To experience our own ‘enoughness’ is no small achievement. Indeed Dietrich Bonhoefer, the German priest who was killed by the Nazis, seems to have been right when he said, “There is no cheap grace.”
Thus for one to wake up each morning and acknowledge such a relationship of ‘enoughness’ with self, refracted through the prism of divinity, while rubbing sleep from his eyes, would seem to be too easy. Modeh ani lefanecha, a daily prayer with pretensions to the final certainty of Job, would seem to be either glib or arrogant. A close examination of this prayer however, will reveal that Modeh ani is not just the literary creation of a contented Rabbi. It is a direct reference to a particular moment of certainty in Biblical history.
Careful investigation will show that this expression of certainty does not emerge from a moment of easy faith, of happy embrace. On the contrary, this prayer is the liturgical encapsulation of a fragile moment of certainty that is hard won, emerging from confusion and distortion: a moment whose power is far-reaching, tragically fleeting and yet ultimately transforming. We will see that rather than a quiet statement of the obvious; this core certainty prayer reverberates with the pain and struggle necessary for transcendence.
The classic commentaries on the Liturgy record no source for the Modeh Ani prayer. It has found its way into the consciousness of a people without leaving behind any trace of its origin. Here we seek to unpack her source and to begin our quest for the certainty of being which is our birthright.
Modeh ani emerges from the words of Leah, wife of Jacob, on the occasion of the birth of her fourth son, Judah.
In the language of the Talmud when seeking to elucidate an unclear idea:
“Ta-Shma. Come, Let us learn.”
At this point our study shifts to the classic mode of the ancient study hall.
We will tell the story of the text and by working with the story seek to arrive at new understandings. (more than understandings**!)
(I have included the text for those who,,,)
The Birth of Judah- Modeh Ani
Genesis 29:
9 While [Jacob] was still speaking with them, Rachel came with her father’s flock; for she was a shepherdess. And when Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of his uncle Laban, and the flock of his uncle Laban, Jacob went up and rolled the stone off the mouth of the well, and watered the flock of his uncle Laban. Then Jacob kissed Rachel, and broke into tears. Jacob told Rachel that he was her father’s kinsman that he was Rebecca’s son, and she ran and told her father. On hearing the news of his sister’s son Jacob, Laban ran to greet him; he embraced him and kissed him, and took him into his house. He told Laban all that had happened,
14 and Laban said to him, “You are truly my bone and flesh.” When he had stayed with him a month’s time, Laban said to Jacob, “Just because you are a kinsman, should you serve me for nothing? Tell me, what shall your wages be?” Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the older one was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah had weak eyes; Rachel was shapely and beautiful. Jacob loved Rachel; so he answered, “I will serve you seven years for your younger daughter Rachel.” Laban said, “Better that I give her to you than that I should give her to an outsider. Stay with me.” So Jacob served seven years for Rachel and they seemed to him but a few days because of his love for her.
21 Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife, for my time is fulfilled, that I may cohabit with her.” And Laban gathered all the people of the place and made a feast. When evening came, he took his daughter Leah and brought her to him; and he cohabited with her. – Laban had given his maidservant Zilpah to his daughter Leah as her maid. – When morning came, there was Leah! So he said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? I was in your service for Rachel! Why did you deceive me?” Laban said, “It is not the practice in our place to marry off the younger before the older. Wait until the bridal week of this one is over and we will give you that one too, provided you serve me another seven years.” Jacob did so; he waited out the bridal week of the one, and then he gave him his daughter Rachel as wife. – Laban had given his maidservant Bilhah to his daughter Rachel as her maid. – And Jacob cohabited with Rachel also; indeed, he loved Rachel more than Leah. And he served him another seven years.
31 The Lord saw that Leah was hated, and opened her womb, but Rachel was barren. Leah conceived and gave birth to a son. She called his name Reuven, saying: “God has seen my suffering, and now my husband will love me.” She conceived again and gave birth to a son, and said: “God has heard that I am hated and has given me this [son] as well,” and she called his name Simeon. She conceived again and gave birth to a son, and said: “This time my husband will accompany me, for I have born him three sons,” and she therefore called his name Levi.
35 She conceived again and gave birth to a son, and she said: “This time I thank God – ha pa’am odeh et hashem.” and therefore she called his name Judah…”
Notice how, on the birth of her fourth son Judah, Leah says “hapaam odeh et hashem – this time, I thank God.” Odeh from the biblical text and Modeh Ani from the liturgy mean the same thing – I acknowledge, I thank. When I wake up in the morning and say Modeh ani, I am conceptually, linguistically, and experientially reformulating Leah’s acknowledgment of and thanks to God upon the birth of Judah.
Why is this moment so transcendent that it merits the immortality of a daily prayer? Leah is popularly seen as the lesser of the two sisters,8 the matriarch that most of us find difficult to remember – so why do we find ourselves repeating her words every morning? Modeh Ani is one of the first prayers a parent teaches a child . What is the secret of this chant? Words in Jewish meditative text always have a story. To understand the psycho-spiritual moment that the Modeh Ani words invite us into we need first to unpack the story of the words. We must explore the story of Leah: a heroic journey from confusion into core certainty and then back again.
Who is Leah?
Jacob arrives at Laban’s home and, as a prototype for love at first sight, falls immediately in love with Rachel, Leah’s younger sister. He agrees to work for seven years in return for Rachel’s hand in marriage. This handsome romantic stranger appears out of nowhere exhibiting superhuman powers of strength, not to mention charm, and falls in love – not with Leah – but with her younger sister. Leah is painfully peripheral. The text even tells us that Rachel is deemed the beauty of the family, while Leah merely ‘has soft eyes’ (footnote that this could be the tear stained face of leah*). Leah is on the outside.
However, when the seven years are over and Jacob has completed his labor of love, Laban deceives Jacob and marries him to soft-eyed Leah. (the wedding night finds Leah hiding beneath a heavy veil beside her unsuspecting groom*) In the gloom of a night-wedding Leah stands heavily veiled next to the unsuspecting Jacob under the wedding canopy. It is not until the following morning that Jacob realizes he has been duped: he has married Leah instead of Rachel. When Jacob protests, Laban gives him Rachel as well, on the grounds that Jacob will work an additional seven years.
Although Leah is usually viewed as but a pawn in the manipulations of her father Laban, a close textual reading9 paints a more complex picture of the event. The simple fact is that Laban could not have deceived Jacob on his wedding night without the full complicity and cooperation of Leah. Indeed according to the implied assumptions of one Midrash10 it is clear that Leah is fully complicit in defrauding not only Jacob but her sister Rachel as well.
Another Midrash11 suggests that, after a few years in Laban’s service, Jacob began to understand the way his uncle’s mind worked. He indeed suspected that Laban would attempt to trick him into marrying Leah instead of Rachel. In order to pre-empt him, Jacob taught Rachel a set of signs so she would be able to signal to him that it was indeed her under the wedding canopy, thus preventing Laban from exchanging her with Leah. A wise move; but Jacob had not taken into account one possibility – that Rachel would give the signs to Leah.12
The usual focus of commentary is on Rachel’s noble empathy. She cannot bear to see her sister’s sadness, and therefore gives her the signs. But what about Leah? When she heard that her younger sister was engaged, did Leah respond with magnanimity? How does an older sister respond to the engagement of her younger sister? Does Leah celebrate her sister’s happiness while privately nursing her own disappointment? Did she dance for her sister’s joy, or did she walk around Rachel with a tragic air of devastation? Imagine that very time Rachel wants to experience her joy she runs into the tear stained face of Leah, who robs of her of her ability to rejoice. We can picture the younger sister – who cannot bear to witness Leah’s parade of pain any longer – giving over the secret signs. We appreciate the pathos and nobility of Rachel- who in giving her sister those signs, moves beyond herself, to feel the pain of her sister. We are, however, startled by Leah’s need to take (them —)*to what should not be hers.
That evening Leah stands under the wedding canopy facing Jacob in the darkness. Jacob tries to make out her face, but the veil does its job too well. Jacob does not panic, but smoothly signals to the woman opposite him, and she fluently responds. All has gone according to Jacob’s plan; the marriage proceeds. (but the veil must at some point lift)* The Midrash13 offers a dramatic description of how Jacob confronts Leah the following morning. The early rays of sunlight begin to filter through the tent walls, and Jacob gradually begins to make out the face of his beloved. (The veil of darkness lifted, he sees…the soft eyes of Leah*) But it is Leah! Jacob, outraged, cries out: ‘All night I called out ‘Rachel, Rachel’, and you answered!'(Indeed, leah…)* That is, Leah did not remain the silent pawn – she complicitly* answered to the name of her sister, playing an active role in the deception. After the wedding ceremony, Leah took care to make sure the deception was not revealed until too late.
Leah is Us
It is not for *nothing that we asked earlier: “Who is Leah?” The ultimate issue in every person’s life is ‘who am I’. It is this core uncertainty about identity that Leah is desperately attempting to resolve by marrying Jacob. When Laban substitutes Leah for Rachel Leah still has ways of letting Jacob know that he is being deceived. (Leah had ample opportunity to reveal to Jacob that he was being deceived*) But she chooses instead to participate fully in the deception. She shows no reluctance, because her father’s actions suit her own designs. She wants to marry Jacob. Moreover she feels she must marry Jacob. It is through Jacob that she thinks she will finally touch a sense of inner certainty.
The human being can never achieve any sense of fulfillment until essential uncertainty is satisfactorily resolved. The magic of Hebrew language is such that the etymology*s for the words Uncertainty – safek, and Satisfaction – sippuk, is identical. (a sentence about the connection — our uncertainty must be dispelled for us to know the taste of satisfaction)* The resolution of personal Safek is difficult. We often avoid the necessary effort and pain required to answer the question of identity by consciously or subconsciously forging a pseudo-identity. It was Jung who said that all neurosis stems from the refusal to *suffer legitimate suffering. He refers to the effort and investment which are indispensable tools in knowing our true selves. This is the subtext of our drama.
The safek – uncertainty – of ‘Who is Leah?’ will now be answered, ‘Jacob’s wife.’ Jacob becomes the resolution of her safek and the exclusive source of her sippuk – satisfaction. For this certainty, this opportunity to fill the void within her, she is willing to betray even her own sister. When we feel essentially unloved, uncertain about our core value, we are willing to do almost anything to (touch the sippuk satisfaction of feeling loved*) feel loved – to resolve the core Safek of our identity.
Leah feels ugly. Rachel the text describes as beautiful. Leah however, well “she has ‘soft eyes’14.” She feels like she is not enough. She feels that she needs to find fulfillment or completion outside of herself, and that the person who can provide this for her is Jacob. Leah “pathologically”* needs Jacob in order to fulfill the Leah which she experiences as being so deeply lacking. Leah refuses her true destiny of marrying Esau, Jacob’s twin brother, who is, according to the Midrash, ‘fit to her’, because she is fundamentally disconnected from her identity.15 (So she is desperately trying to fit in to a form and face and destiny that is not hers)
Though perhaps not to the same extremity, we all know what it is to feel ‘not enough’. How many times have we met someone on a first date and pretended to be someone else? – Found things hilarious which generally speaking would only raise half a smile? – Found ourselves feigning absolute fascination about a subject we barely find interesting? Or before a job interview, have we ever done research about the interviewer, about the company, and presented ourselves as the perfect candidate? And not only to get the job but to feel like we fit in sufficiently to be able to extract a sense of personal identity from our work! Yet all the while we feel like a ‘mis-fit’, * with a lurking *dis-ease that perhaps ‘they’ will reveal that I am really inadequate for the job.
(what does this add?)
T. S. Eliot captures the feeling of living without a personal center of gravity or gravitas.
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpieces filled with straw. Alas
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, Shade without color
Paralyzes force, Gesture without motion
(when we try to fit in to a *form or destiny not our own, we are paradoxically left hollow, a shape without form*)
We have all of us at one time or another tried to attain things or people by pretending to be someone other than our true selves. The motivation is always a hunger, a neediness which moves us to sate our hunger with nourishment foreign to our souls. We all recognize the hollow men and the stuffed men. We have all of us, on some level, married Jacob in the darkness.
The Downward Spiral
Of course, the painful truth is that when we look to ‘have’ somebody to fill a hole in our own identity, we never really ‘have him’…even if we’re married to him. Jacob is Leah’s husband – but Leah feels unloved and cries out,” The Lord has heard that I am hated.” Jacob is her husband – but he does not take walks with her at night. “This time my husband will accompany me,” says Leah in a pathos filled cry of longing for Jacob. Jacob is Leah’s husband and the father of her three children – but there is no intimacy, no love. Jacob has not chosen her, and so Leah has nobody. She has him yet she has nothing.
But she needs Jacob! She is convinced that only Jacob will make her complete, that only Jacob can establish the certainty of her identity. If the marriage ceremony was not enough, then Leah needs to seek other ways to get Jacob. The downward spiral begins, ‘If only I could do this…then I would have him.’
Manipulation always creates the need for the next manipulation, using someone always creates the need to use someone else. And so she uses her children. From the moment her children are born, she begins to treat them not as people that need to be loved unconditionally, but as vehicles to attain the attention she so desperately craves from her husband. With each child the spiral plunges deeper into unrealistic fixation.
For the book of Genesis the answer to Shakespeare’s query, “What’s in a name”16 is…everything. In the naming of Reuven for example, we understand that from Leah’s perspective – Reuben exists in order to improve Leah’s relationship with Jacob. She calls him Rueben, explaining the name to mean, “God has seen my suffering, and now my husband will love me.” Reuven will be valued by his mother only to the extent to which he brings about intimacy between his parents. This, for Leah, is the reason for Reuven’s being: this is his purpose. When he ‘fails’ to affect a change in his father’s attitude to his mother, he fails his mother. He has lost his value to her; he has lost her love. We will study later how this dynamic unfolds in the pathos of Reuven’s perpetual search for his mother’s love. His life, we will see, is riddled with insecurity and uncertainties.
In traumatic relationships, unless we do something to break the patterns, the pain does not go away, but is rather passed down the line. What did Laban call Leah’s younger sister? He called her Rachel. Rachel’s job in Laban’s house was to take care of the rechalim – the sheep. The modern connotation of calling a daughter ‘my little lamb’ comes from this text. However when all of your wealth is bound up with herds, with goats and with sheep, what does it suggest when you name your daughter ‘sheep’? You may as well name your daughter ‘Merchandise’. If this is what he called Rachel, who is the beloved daughter, we can suppose Laban related no better to Leah. Indeed in Hebrew the name Leah is etymologically related to ox17. And thus Leah relates to her children as her father related to her. Laban’s identity in the text is bound up with his commercial personae- particularly with his flocks of sheep; Leah’s identity is bound up with being Mrs. Jacob. (Just like so many of us, she is the inheritor of a tradition of using)* – however use their children as pawns in their own attempts at identity formation.b
Repeating patterns of her own childhood, she uses her children as objects to fulfill her own unrealized dreams. In the process, the children are short-changed because they are denied the unconditional love that they need to develop as full human beings with inner certainty about their worth.
How often do we manipulate our children, using them to fulfill dreams that we have not yet been able to fulfill? It doesn’t work. It shouldn’t work. We can never use someone else to obtain something which is not ours, because ultimately even if we obtain it we don’t own it. Yet patterns can be broken because the human being is free. Leah can still find inner peace (and satisfaction*) in her self-love in the presence of God. This finally is what Leah understands when it is time for Judah to be born – Judah, the fourth child.
The Judah Moment
When her first two children are born Leah speaks of her pain, her hurt, her feelings of rejection by her husband: At the birth of Rueben, “God has seen my suffering.” At the birth of Simeon, “God has heard that I am hated.” When her third child, Levi is born, once again she hopes that his birth will precipitate genuine intimacy and love in her relationship with her husband: “This time my husband will accompany me,” she plaintively cries out. But at the birth of Judah we hear a different song entirely: “ha paam odeh et hashem” – this time I thank God.
We hear nothing of pain, no mention of loneliness. Jacob is not even mentioned for good or for bad: only gratitude rings out. When Leah gives birth to her fourth child she says, “ha paam odeh et hashem.” And so she calls her son Judah, in Hebrew – Yehudah – ‘gratitude, acknowledgment‘. Gratitude is not obeisance. I am grateful for your gift for it teaches me that I am worthy of receiving. Leah has been able to move beyond her dependency on Jacob, and stand up in God’s presence as a dignified human being. The fundamental safek Leah had about herself has been resolved.
No longer dependent upon anyone, perhaps for the first time Leah feels her own adequacy, her ‘enoughness‘ – her sippuk. She says, “hapaam – this time.” She does not deny her past, she does not pretend it did not exist, but she celebrates that ‘this time’ she has moved on. ‘This time’ I value myself. ‘This time’ I know who I am. ‘This time’ I don’t feel I need another to fulfill myself. “This time, I thank God.” She has gained a core certainty of her identity, of her value, of her dignity.
Unlike Leah’s first three children, Judah is born with no conditions attached. Leah is able to accept and love Judah unconditionally, and it is this love which imparts to Judah a sense of certainty about himself and his place in the world.
Faith in the Nursing Mother
A friend of mine, a prominent scholar in medieval philosophy and mystical thought, once traveled from New York to visit Reb Menashe, a Jerusalem mystic. I accompanied him.
“What does emunah – faith – mean to you?” Reb Menashe asked the scholar.
The scholar reviewed various positions on the matter of faith, from Medieval to Chassidic. Reb Menashe listened patiently and then responded:
“It is so much simpler than that,” he said, “Emunah is the feeling that the baby has that its mother will not drop himc.”
A child wrapped in the cradling arms of his or her mother conveys the most powerful yet gentle image of certainty. The mother, merely by being present, confers unconditional love to the child. The nursing mother, in Hebrew called the omen, gives the child a sense of safety and clarity.d As Reb Menashe was aware, the word emunah – faith – plays on the word omen – nursing mother.e Listening carefully to the nuance in the Hebrew language, we can thus appreciate that ‘faith’ is infused with connotations of the babe in its mother’s arms. Conversely, we can also see how the act of nursing a newborn child contains with in it echoes of God’s relationship with humankind. This is the experience of Leah nursing her baby Judah.18
With this perspective on faith and on a mother’s love, we can begin to approach an understanding of how Leah’s praise to God became the matrix of our morning prayer (mantra*) of core certainty. I believe that Leah is able to experience herself in God’s reassuring loving presence because for the first time in her life she gives that very same experience to someone else. In experiencing for the first time her desire and ability to be unconditionally present for her son, she understands this experience to be a reflection of God’s unconditional presence for her. Just as she is the omen, the nursing mother, to Judah, God is the omen to her. (and so it is with all of our highest moments, when we touch the God in ourselves, touch the way God must feel)**
This proposition is more than a psychological theory about a woman projecting her emotions onto her God. To appreciate the profound mystical depths of Leah’s experience we need to examine the case of Noah as explored by Rabbi Mordechai Lainier of Ishbitz, a radical Hassidic19 teacher of the nineteenth century, in his stunning work, Mei Shiloach.
Let’s learn.
The murmuring of God and the Flood Myth20
God has flooded the earth, killing all living creatures apart from those saved in Noah’s Ark: namely Noah, his family, and one pair of all the world’s animals. After the flood is over and Noah and his family are on dry land, the text relates:
God said to his heart: I will no longer curse the earth on account of human beings…I will never again smite all living beings as I have done. (Genesis 8:21-22)
Classical biblical exegetes pose the obvious question: ‘Does Noah hear this? Is Noah aware of what God says when He talks to Himself?’ Or to give the question its full theological weight: ‘Can a human being ever know what God is thinking or feeling?’
Nachmanides and Seforno, two of the most important commentaries on the biblical text,21 answer the question decisively in the negative: ‘No, Noah does not hear what God says in his heart.’ Thus they reinterpret the text, each in his own way. But the Ishbitzer Rebbe22 flies in the face of classical commentary and answers the question with a quiet ‘yes’. ‘Yes, Noah in fact did hear the whisperings of the divine heart.’
The Ishbitzer (as he is popularly referred to in Hasidic circles) explains that when Noah leaves the ark he feels overcome by a sense of awe and creature-consciousness. Walking through a green land slowly beginning to return to life, he intuits that the great destruction of the flood was the result of humanity’s unrestrained drive for expansion. He experiences a great desire for boundaries, limits, and self-restraint. The Ishbitzer teaches that Noah then understands his feelings are but a reflection of the divine intent. If he feels a deep need for restraint and limitation, it must be because God, as it were, is similarly experiencing a desire for self- restraint and limitation. By listening to his own thoughts, Noah is able to ‘eavesdrop’ on God’s internal conversation. In a paradigm shifting understanding, the Rebbe of Ishbitz teaches that if I listen to the murmuring of my soul, I am in effect listening to the murmuring of the sacred God. (Mei Hashiloah, volume one, p. 19, column 2)
In many mystical works the proof text cited for this thought is in Job 19:26: “From my flesh I vision God23.” The mystics explain this seeming paradox – seeing through flesh – by saying that perception of God is not a process of external observation, not a seeing from afar; rather, perception of God is an internal experience. Through my experience I see God. By listening carefully to the inner process of my being, I am able to understand the divinity within me and have some limited grasp of the divine itself. I ‘resonate’ with the divine.
And so the Ishbitzer teaches that by listening to the desires in his own heart, Noah was able to understand the desires in the heart of God. This deep intuitive dynamic connection with the divine through careful observation of one’s own self is an ultimate source of certainty. This is the psycho-spiritual understanding of the verse “Through my flesh I vision God24.” I need to trust the deepest knowings of my heart. If I listen, my heart will be my guide — teaching me the certain secrets of my path.
Returning to Leah, we can now say – Leah understood that her newfound ability to love Judah unconditionally was a resonance of God’s unconditional love for her.
Why is the birth of Judah unique- what triggers this new experience that she was unable to access at the birth of her first three children? The implied answer of one Midrash25 is a radical surprise. According to the tradition Jacob had four wives. Each wife expected to have three children who together would be the twelve tribes of Israel. When Leah had a fourth child her understandings of the nature of her family and her role in it were momentarily suspended in her experience of surprise. In this moment she was opened up to new and higher understandings.
Through the prism of the certainty of her feelings of unconditional love and caring for her newborn son, Leah experienced the inner certainty of being unconditionally valued and loved by God. It was from this core certainty of being that Leah could joyfully proclaim “Hapaam odeh at hashem – this time I praise God,” a song of delight and certainty whose music we hear and echo every morning: “Modeh ani lefanecha…I affirm my self in your presence26.”
The Judah reverberations
Leah experiences the existential-religious moment of feeling safe in God’s hands, of being loved by God, with her newborn baby in her arms. The unconditional love Leah is able to impart to the baby Judah provides him with a sense of certainty about himself, his value, and his place in the world. This sense of core certainty is the greatest gift that a parent can give a child, because it prepares the child to live and operate in a radically uncertain world. This love is the basis of the Judah Moment.
The Judah Moment is the acknowledgment of core certainty of being and its application. Leah does not only understand her own core certainty of being, she is also able to pass this certainty on to her child Judah. In this sense the Judah Moment can be seen as both the formative breakthrough moment and its reverberations. To fully unpack this idea further we need only draw a brief comparison between the lives of Judah and Leah’s first son, Reuven.
Parents often find that their children incarnate, in sometimes exaggerated form, both their splendor and their pathologies. Such is the case with Leah and her children Rueben and Judah.
As the firstborn of Jacob and Leah, Reuven would traditionally inherit leadership of the tribe. Instead, Reuven loses himself and his birthright in the mire of his own confusion. Jacob finally describes him as unstable and awards the leadership to Judah.f What happened to Reuven, and why? Two key incidents in Reuven’s life will illustrate his confusion of direction and his inability to match his good intentions with appropriate actions.
In Genesis 37 the brothers see Joseph coming from afar and plot to murder him. Reuven suggests to his brothers a different course of action, with the text making his intentions very clear: “‘Shed no blood! Cast him into that pit out in the wilderness, but do not touch him yourselves’ – intending to save him from them and restore him to his father27.” Reuven succeeds in convincing his brothers not to kill Joseph, planning to rescue him later. But while the brothers sit down to eat, Reuven seems to disappear, returning only after the brothers have already sold Joseph into slavery. The pressing textual issue – Where did Reuben go?
The Midrashg suggests that, after convincing his brothers not to kill Joseph, Reuven went to pray and to fast for an earlier sin. Instead of finishing the job and actually bringing Joseph out of the pit, his mind flitted to a different, less pressing matter. What is the earlier sin that in the Midrashic reading distracts Reuven from following through on his intention to save Joseph? When Rachel died, Rueben had hoped that now his father Jacob would finally honor and love his mother Leah. He waits expectantly for his father to move his bed into the tent of his mother Leah. As is often the case, in the intimate complexity of family dynamics, Reuven has internalized his mother’s neediness. He has absorbed her experience of dependency on Jacob. Jacob however, upon Rachel’s death, moves his bed into the tent of Rachel’s maidservant Bilhah. Leah’s reaction to this ultimate degradation is not recorded in the text. Her son Reuven however explodes in rage.
To understand the intensity of his reaction we need only remember that his primal experience of himself, from the moment of his birth, is as a means to win Jacob for his mother Leah. The name his mother gave him, translated from the Hebrew “see that I have a son,” is explained by the verse as welling out of her neediness for Jacob. She thinks that her son will be her bridge into her husband’s heart. This becomes Reuven’s internal raison de etre even if he never thinks of himself consciously in precisely those terms. When Jacob moves his bed to Bilhah’s tent, preferring even the maidservant of Rachel over his mother Leah, Reuven according to an ambiguous biblical passage28 – “confuses the bed of his father”. One understanding- his primal rage explodes through his having sexual relations – presumably nonconsensual relations – with Bilhah, his father’s wife. He rapes – psychodramatically or literally – his father’s wife. A second reading – no less provocative in the ancient near east is that he bursts in to his father’s bedchamber and moves his father’s bed into his mother Leah’s tent.
According to the midrashic reading, Reuven- – after moving to save Joseph by convincing his brothers to let him die in a pit instead of killing him themselves- gets somehow distracted by the memory of the sin of ‘confusing his fathers bed’. Instead of returning to the pit to extricate Joseph as he has originally intended, he suddenly decides to undertake a fast of penance to repent the sin of violating his father’s bed. By the time he returns to the pit Joseph has been sold to Egypt. The Midrash is suggesting a core lack of focus – of confusion in Reuven’s personality. The source of the confusion according to the subtly implied midrashic suggestion is Reuven’s essential lack of self. The deepest circuitry of his soul is wired in a way that his primal sense of self is that of an instrument in the winning of Jacob for his mother. Rachel is then the ultimate spoiler of his self-fulfillment.
In this context his primal rage is not surprising. Rage of such power and violence only explodes when the false self we have internalized to obscure our essential sense of inadequacy, is threatened. Our authentic self is by definition never so vulnerable to external undermining. It is thus not at all surprising that his internal dynamic subconsciously prevents him from saving Joseph. Joseph after all is the son of Rachel. Joseph perpetuates in the second generation — through his father’s overt favoring of him over the sons of Leah — Jacob’s favoring of Rachel at the expense of Leah.
In practical terms, his behavior reflects a deep inner confusion, expressing itself in an inability to focus; at worst, a near-fatal lack of responsibility. His confusion is essential, for Reuven lacks the interiority of personhood. It seems that Reuven is unable to value his own intuitions, unable or at some level unwilling to bring about that which he knows would bring him deepest satisfaction – sippuk. He wants to save Joseph, and yet he does not.
Reuben’s inability to reach sippuk has its roots in a lack of inner certainty about his own value and worth. And this safek, this distance from himself, must be linked to the primal distance, which separated him from both his mother and his father. As we have seen, the child Reuven is a tragic figure, trapped in the mire of his mother’s non-relationship with his father. Not only is Leah dry of the unconditional love needed to nourish her son’s core certainty and personality, but also Jacob is unable to offer a sense of comfort or certainty to his son. For Reuven himself was born from that fateful* night of false certainty – born of a union in which the father actually thought he was with a different woman.
On Jacob’s first wedding night he thought he was in the arms of his beloved Rachel when in fact he was with Leah. According to one reading of the text Reuven was conceived of this union. While the Talmud encourages an enormously broad range of sexual expression in marriage this kind of union is disallowed.h One cannot be with one woman while thinking about another. It degrades the sexual act from an expression of ‘I-Thou’- a merging of two people and their dreams, to ‘I-it’ – one person using another in an act of unredeemed passion.
– – –
Parents spend their entire lives saving so that their child can go to the best college or university, whilst in our heart of hearts we know that by the time our babies reaches 18 it almost doesn’t matter where they study. They may get a slightly better job, or a slightly better insurance policy. They may even make a little bit more money. But ultimately, in forming the core psychological personality of the child, we know that college is nearly irrelevant. High school is important, grade school more so. Pre-school, of infinite value. The first year of life: critical. The early childhood years form the personality with which the child begins life, and from which the child needs to emerge and to grow.
I am reminded of my own early childhood.
My Polish parents barely survived Hitler’s Europe. My mother’s significant other was always Hitler. You would think he lived next door. My basic goal growing up was to make it worthwhile for her to have survived its terror. When we were good she told us, “It was worth surviving.” When we were ‘bad’ she told us, at high decibels levels, that we were not worth surviving for. We existed for her only as pawns in her continuing war on Nazi Germany. In some mysterious way, which only a child of the kingdom of the night can understand, my mistakes counted as points against her in her ongoing battle to survive Hitler. My point is not to take my mother to task. God Forbid. She is a fabulous woman and I am proud that she is my mother. And yet, growing up in this way, I lacked the certainty that I was good, valuable or in any way enough in the world. I felt empty. Some people try and cover up the emptiness by marrying Jacob in the darkness, by stealing the husband of a friend or a sister; others become Rabbis, or depend on some other title before their name in order to cover up the same emptiness. If I don’t believe that I am enough then I will make believe that I am by dressing up in names or relationships that aren’t truly mine.
Thus the journey of my life has been about coming to know that I matter; that I am special, above and beyond what I do or accomplish in the world. To know that this is true is to be able to receive God’s love – or anyone’s love for that matter. I can only receive love if I believe that I am lovable. It took me till my early thirties to understand that this is so. At that time I stopped lecturing on the classic Jewish theological issues and began teaching classes on topics like laughter, tears, loneliness and uncertainty. It was only after I experienced the core certainty that I was loved by God that I felt ready to teach from my heart and be a spiritual guide instead of a good lecturer. It was only around that time that people began to look to me for guidance and not only for information.
Returning to Reuben
As is evident from the story of Rueben, from my story – and I use my story in the Jobian sense of “Through my flesh I vision God” – early childhood is a significant though not exclusive crucible of personality formation. This we instinctively know and has been massively confirmed by the modern psychological research of Bowlbly, Klein and their numerous inheritors. The mystical tradition goes even further back identifying the crucibles of personality formation: to the relationship between husband and wife at the moment of the child’s conception. The mystics say the clarity between the parents, the love that exists between them at the moment of conception, can have a significant effect on the child that emerges. Confusion about the identity of the partner at that moment results in a child lacking clarity and certainty about himself. Indeed, we see that inconsistency, indecision, and uncertainty become prominent features of Reuven’s personality.
Later in their lives, when Reuven and Judah are both called to action in a moment of crisis, their respective character traits come into sharp focus. In Genesis 42, Jacob’s sons have been told by the Egyptian viceroy (Joseph in disguise) that they can only return to Egypt to buy much-needed grain if Benjamin returns with them. Reuven and Judah try to persuade Jacob to allow them to take Benjamin on their return journey, but Jacob has a premonition of danger and refuses. Attempting to change his father’s mind, Reuven says: “You may kill my two sons if I fail to bring him back to you. Put him in my care and I will return him to youi.” Jacob is not impressed. Concerned about the life of his son Benjamin, Jacob is not reassured by the option of also murdering two of his grandchildren.
Just as his mother used him to gain the approval of Jacob, so Reuven shows himself willing literally to sacrifice his two children to a similar end. So unsure is he of himself, so uncertain of his own worth and strength, that Reuven is unable to feel himself sufficient to shoulder the burden of responsibility. Personal responsibility can only flow from a sense of personal worth. He needs to augment his worth through others, and so offers the lives of his own children by way of guarantee of his own actions. From Laban to Leah, from Leah to Reuven, and now from Reuven to his sons: the pain is passed on. Moreover it becomes clear in this story that the inability to resolve the core uncertainty of our own identity results in moral evil.29
Immediately after Reuven’s offer, Judah also tries to convince his father, providing the ultimate contrast: “I will personally guarantee him; you may demand him of me. If I do not bring him back to you and stand him before you then I will have sinned to you for all time.” (Genesis 43:9) Sure of himself, certain of his own worth, Judah needs no intermediaries. Judah may not be certain of the outcome of their journey down to Egypt, but he is certain of himself. Jacob agrees.
Judah takes personal responsibility and Reuven does not. Reuven falls short because he lacks the core certainty of self on which to base this personal responsibility. If he does not fully trust or rely upon himself, how can he expect others to do the same? Unstable Reuven never inherits the leader’s mantle. By contrast, Judah ‘the lion’ merits and inherits. It is certainly not a coincidence of lineage that King David, and therefore the messiah, are descended from Judah. Judah is the progenitor of messiah because redemption emerges from the inner certainty about the value of one’s being.
This is the gift of Leah, the mother, to Judah the son. Messianism suggests the text, is when parents love their children unconditionally, and thereby invest them with a sense of self, which fosters personal integrity and responsibility. The impact of this gift of self is felt by the child throughout his or her life. The child then passes on this gift of inner certainty of self to his or her children. The dynamic of ever ascending goodness and integrity which results is what talmudic understanding, rooted in the Genesis narrative, terms “the age of the Messiah.”
What’s in a name?
‘Certainty‘ in Hebrew can be expressed by two words: bitachon – which also has connotations of ‘security’ and trust, and a post-biblical word – vaddai. This word does not appear in the bible, its roots however can be found in biblical text, for vaddai may be etymologically related to Yehudah – the Hebrew name for Judah. Growing from his mother’s thankful exclamation upon his birth “Hapaam odeh et hashem – this time I thank God,” the word Judah indicates a sense of gratitude. But at the same time it provides the linguistic foundation for the Hebrew word for ‘certainty‘- vaddai. Seforno, a biblical scholar in Renaissance Italy, closes the circle of understanding when he points out that the name Yehuda, in Hebrew, is a particular form of the name of God.j What Seforno’s elliptical comment suggests is that certainty about divinity may express itself not in certainty of creed and dogma, not in belief about the nature of things out there, but in the experience of the absolute certainty about ones own uniqueness, value and dignity. The name Judah, forged as it was in the crucible of what we have termed the Judah moment- the pivoting point at which both Leah and Judah access their core certainty of being-is ipso facto the name of God.
The meditation, “Modeh ani lefanecha – I give thanks before You,” and the child who inspired its creation, Judah, become synonymous. We understand that the core certainty expressed in the prayer is how biblical consciousness calls on the individual to experience himself in the presence of God. This is precisely Leah’s experience of self at the time of Judah’s birth. This prayer of divine connection becomes even more inextricably entwined with the biblical character as we recall the aforementioned observation of Seforno, that Yehudah, Judah, also contains within it the name of God.
With the tools of understanding we have developed thus far we can now re-read the morning prayer of Modeh.
The key to our re-reading is the word ‘Jew’. Where does the word ‘Jew’ come from? The Hebrew for ‘Jew’, is Yehudi. Yehudi means simply to be of the tribe of Judah. To be a Jew is to be ‘Judah-ish’, or ‘Judean’, or Jewish. The word ‘Jew’ is a linguistic and spiritual meeting-place for connotations of gratitude, of certainty, and of divinity. All these associations meet in the morning when the Jew says Modeh ani lefanecha. Modeh, which echoes Leah’s odeh, which leads to her naming Judah, the first Yehudi – the first Jew. To say Modeh ani lefanecha is to proclaim with certainty and gratitude, “Yehudi ani lefanecha – I am a Jew in your presence.” To be a Jew is to be a person who experiences daily the core certainty of personally living in God’s presence. And in this sense of course being Jewish is not limited to Jews To say Modeh Ani is to affirm that God knows my name. Modeh Ani- I affirm my Ani – my I – Lefaanecha – and in doing so I am before you – lefaanecha, I am in your presence. The classical understanding of the Modeh Ani prayer being an expression of gratitude – modeh in this reading being translated as grateful, is in fact but a corollary of this idea. To experience gratitude towards another is indeed to be in the presence of – to be in relationship with – that other.
There is no cheap grace and no free lunches. To say Modeh Ani from the deepest place is not an easy spiritual-psychological affirmation. As we have learned, built into this daily proclamation of core certainty are the tears of Leah, mother of Judah. “Modeh ani lefanecha” resounds with the bitter lessons of a woman who succeeded in scraping herself up from emptiness to great heights. Thus, in proclaiming core certainty every morning, as well as fully appreciating the warm delight of feeling oneself in God’s cradling arms, each day the Jew also remembers the dangers of inner safek and the emotional distance we must sometimes travel in order to reach the certainty of the Judah Moment. This is the essence of ‘Jewish’- Yehuda spirituality.
FOOTNOTES; 1-29
1. The phrase “It depends on Love’ signals a major motif in the Idra Raba section of the Zohar. Zohar vol. Three, 127b. For an excellent analysis of some of the main themes in Idra Raba see Yehuda Libes, The Messiah of the Zohar, pp 65-157 in The Messianic Idea in Israel, Israel Academy of Sciences
2. See for example Netivot Shalom Vol. 2 in the section on ‘Sefirat HaOmer’, the ritual counting of the Omer.
3. Jesus lives and walks in Israel approximately 150 years before Shimon Bar Yochai
For a brief elaboration of this idea in a different context see the beginning of chapter five, the Path of Friendship.
5. On the distinction between grace and Justice and the priority of the latter see Kalonymous Kalman Schapira; The Holy Fire, in his commentary to Parshat Nachamu.
6. This idea was most powerfully expressed in the tradition in an argument between the Rabbis recorded in Talmud Kiddushin 36A. Because of its importance I will cite it in its entirety (Translation mg).
“-You are children to the Lord you God “( Deuteronomy chapter 14 verse 1)
This means that at the time when you act in the manner of children you are called ‘children’.
But when you do not act in the manner of children you are not called children.
These are the words of R. Yehuda. R Meir disagrees and says in either event you are called children
for it is stated “they are foolish children ” (Jeremiah 4:22)
and it says; “children in who there is no loyalty” (Deuteronomy 32:20)
and it says; “the seed of evildoers ,children who act corruptly” (Isaiah 1:4)
and it says; “instead of that which was said to them you are not my people – it shall be said to them you are the sons of the living god” (Hosea 2:1).
The point of the passage is that in all these cases the people are called God’s children – even when they sin.
The Talmud then proceeds to analyze R. Meir’s unusual method and apparent need to prove his point from so man y sources.
‘Why did R. Meir continue?” it says, “didn’t he already prove his point that we are god’s children even when we sin from the verse in Jeremiah?
The Talmud answers:
“For you will say that when they act foolishly they are called children
but when they do not act loyally they are not called children
come and learn this is not so
for it says; “children in whom there is no loyalty” and if you will say that when they have no loyalty
they are called children
but when they worship idols they are not called children
come and see that this is not so
for it says “a seed of evil doers, children that act corruptly”
but if you say they are only called corrupt children but they will never again be called full children
come and learn that this is not so for it says
instead of that which was said to them, ” you are not my people,” it shall be said to them,’ you are the sons of the living god.”
The point is simple — we are lovable – no matter what.
A closer reading of the Hebrew text reveals a second layer of meaning. The Hebrew words for ‘instead’ is ‘Bemkom’. (give whole line context**) However with slightly different vowalization, it literally means “in the place.” The implication is that from the very place of your failing wells the source of your potential greatness. I hope to elaborate on the relationship between pathology and holiness hinted at here in my commentary to the Hasidic work Mei Hashiloach.
(It is important to point out that a complete reading of Biblical text suggests that God may be angry with us — and in extreme cases even hate us – at the same time he loves us. Indeed this is the implied biblical reading which underlies the classic statement of the love/hate paradox found in chapter 32 of The Tanya —the mystical magnum opus of Schneur Zalman of Liadi — the first master of Chabad Chasidism.
Does God love one who has committed great evil? If the answer is yes, which I think it is, then it is surely only in the context of hating the evil we have done.)
7. Whenever the divine name Shadai appears in the book of Genesis it appears in the context of God’s blessing for growth. See for example 17:1, 28:3, 35:11, 44:14. God is saying “You are enough — now grow even more”. I would argue that this existential tension lies at the core of the ontological paradox of free will in determinism — especially as it appears in the writings of Morechai Lainer of Ishbitz and Tdadok Hacohen from Lublin. In both of their writings there is a radical affirmation of determinism as being the essential posture of faith and an inescapable corollary of acosmism. To suggest anything short of “wherever I have been I needed to be” and “whatever I have done — I ultimately could not have done otherwise” is for this pair of mystics theologians- rank heresy. At the same time in an almost inexplicable theological paradox they affirm that we must engage in spiritual worth, reach towards growth and transformation and assume radical responsibility not only for our action but also for a sophisticated and nuanced understanding of our actions. Determinism implicitly affirms that we are enough as we are — the imperative to growth suggests that we are in some sense deficient and thus must strive to be more.
8. See Zohar, which understands Jacobs’s essential connection to be with Leah. This connection though requires a process of working through — on the parts of both Jacob and Leah – in order for it to reach fruition. Leah must divest herself of Lillith’s shadow and Jacob must integrate shadow to become Israel. For a fuller treatment all of the major primary sources in the Zohar and Lurianic Kabbalah see Mordechai Gafni and Ohad Ezrahi in our forthcoming book on Lillith.
9. see the commentaries of the classical biblical interpreters Rashi and the Ramban adloc. Although neither are explicit, both imply a degree of complicity on Leah’s part.
10. Midrash Tanchuma Yashan Vayetze 11-
“On that night Leah acted the part of Rachel.
As soon as he arose in the morning “behold it was Leah”
He said to her: daughter of a deceiver why have you tricked me,
Said she to him And why did you deceive your father
When he said to you, Are you my firstborn Esau?
You did say to him, I am Esau your firstborn!
Yet you say to me, Why have you tricked me?
And did not your father say of you, your brother came with trickery!?”
11. Talmud Tractate Megilah 13a
12. There is an interesting aside to this story which teaches us a simple truth of living. It is not always possible to respond to deception with deception. Attempting to deceive the deceiver has a way of backfiring on us. In the words of Polonius in Hamlet, what tangled webs we weave when we do but practice to deceive. The signs which Jacob gives Rachel to prevent his deception turn out to be the very method by which he is deceived.
13. Cite source
14. The text says, “Leah’s eyes are Racot”. Racot literally can be taken as soft or weak. Chaim Ben Atar interprets the verse however to mean that there was something ugly about Leah. “She was not beautiful and moreover there was in her eyes a dimension of Kiur – ugliness.” Orach Chaim adloc chapter 29 verse 17.
15. “Leah was fit to marry none other than Esau.” This Midrashic text is sensitive to the affinity between Leah and Esau. Midrash Tanchuma Vayetze – for a more nuanced treatment of the affinity between Leah and Esav and its implications based on Midrashic and Kabbalistic traditions see Gafni and Ezrahi – Lillith and Sacred Erotic Feminism. Hebrew, Modan Press 2000
“Romeo and Juliet 2:2;43 “What’s in a name?
That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet.”
16. Cite source
17. See Numbers 11:12. Moses – overwhelmed by the burden of leadership exclaims to God: “Have I conceived this people that you should say to me, ‘Carry them in your bosom as a nursing mother carries the suckling child’.” Although on first reading Omen refers to Moses — a more careful perusal suggests that God is intended as well. First Moses is acting only as an emissary of God. (see Exodus chapter 4 and R. Joseph Soloveitchik Yemei Zicharom the first essay on Shlichut — the idea of messengership) Further Moses at the end of his speech (verse 15)in a sui generis reference, refers to God in the feminine.
For the notion of Emunah deriving from Omen see Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt in his Biblical Commentary Ohev Yisrael. He suggests two possible understandings of Emunah.
1) Emunah as core certainty — ‘Believing in a thing that it will certainly be so.’
2) Emunah deriving from the word Omen indicating the actualizing of a reality – ‘drawing it down —making it so though the Emunah’.
My understanding of Omen differs in that Omen is understood to be the experience of core certainty which a mother gives to a child enabling his self-actualization. In essence my understanding conflates both interpretations of the Opter Rebbe into one.
19. Hasidism is a popular movement of mystical pietism of which arose in Europe towards the end of the 18th century.
20. I use the word myth not to undermine the historicity but to highlight the symbolic archetypal nature of the story.
21. See their commentaries on the flood story adloc
22. disciple of Rebbe Menachem-Mendel of Kotzk
23. see for example Schneur Zalman of Liadi in his ‘Tanya’ chapter 2
24. This notion of “Through my flesh I vision God” is in my understanding, one of the most important contributions of post-Lurianic thought to a contemporary psychology of Judaism. Chassidut interpreted the verse to mean that my deepest desires and intuitions should no longer be understood as being in essential conflict with divine service through commandments On the contrary my core intuitions and primal desires after going through a process of what the Rebbe of Ishpitz called Birrur – a kind of therapeutic cleansing – become my primary guides in living. They serve in the nomenclature of one Chasidic master as a kind of intimate personal prophecy. [Kalonymous Kalman of piacezna in his important essay mevo shearim sec. 1 chapters 1-4]
According to Schapira this turning to inner self as the major guide in spiritual living is a modern development and is part of the process of continuous revelation which marks the unfolding of the spirit in History. R. Schapira is a historically sensitive thinker who explicitly embraces the notion of a progressive revelation in history. This allows him to see thought – particularly Jewish thought – as constantly unfolding and deepening. The battle with our physical bodies and with our primal desires is for the Piacezna a relic of a bygone age. Clearly for Schapira, self-control and halachic observance are still the order of the day. Never the less our relationship to our bodies and to our primal energies must now be one of a student to the master. Our bodies and desires are the highest potential sources of divine light and guidance. For Schapira this shift in the relationship to the body is a primary innovation/revelation of Chasidic, particularly Beshtian thought. This notion in the Baal Shem Tov is expressed in Schneur Zalman of Liadi’s thought – a primary influence on Schapira- by his frequent citing of the Kabalistic epigram – ‘Higher is the source of the vessels than the source of the light’. The epigram which affirms the ontological superiority of the physical (vessels) is suggesting in Kabalistic nomenclature that the inner sparks which sustain the physical are sourced in higher levels of divinity than the sparks which sustain ostensibly spiritual reality. One primary source for this paradigm shift is the Lurianic myth itself which clearly affirms that vessels — that is physical reality, are merely ossified light- implying of course the kind of continuum between matter and energy which would, hundreds of years later, be suggested by new physics and relativity theorists. (See also Eliezer Schweid’s From Destruction to Redemption for a partial analysis of this strain in the Schapiras thought)
25. See Midrash cite — cited in Rashi ad loc
26. This essay uncovers the textual reading of the Judah Archetype so essential for the radical philosophy of Ishbitz. The weltanschauung of Ishbitz is based on the personae of Judah, who is seen to model a spiritual type who achieved an inner sense of certainty based on his unmediated accessing of the divine will – even if that access moves him to break the boundaries of normative revelation. I suggest an argument – which I will unpack more fully in my doctoral thesis – that Lainer of Ishbitz bases his thought on the reading of Judah unpacked in this and subsequent chapters of this book.** For Ishbitz Judah has managed to access his internal God voice specifically as a function of his holy audacity rooted in a sense of core certainty of value and being. The technical term for holy audacity in Ishbitz text is Tekufot. This word, which appears often in the Zohar, connotes the holy audacity which allows one to act courageously – an audacity which for the Zohar and Ishbitz emerges from a core certainty of connection and even participation in divinity. Fascinatingly the authoritative Aramaic commentary on the bible by the Talmudic Sage Onkelos translated the biblical phrase ‘mothers bosom’ (Numbers 11) with the Aramaic version of the word Tekufot – Holy audacity. Apparently Ishbitz and Onkelos both view holy audacity and its source in core personal certainty, as being rooted in the primary experience of the feminine divine which is mediated by mother or as in the Numbers text, by the leader (Moses) playing the role of mother. ‘Ve Dai Le Mavin’
27. Genesis 37:22
28. in chapter 35 of the book of Genesis
29. This will be the theme of the first part of chapter two.
FOOTNOTES; a-j
a. See C.S. Lewis, Discarded Image, where he describes the great medieval religious philosophers and their certainty about God and world. The name of the book attests, even if that is not the intention of the author, to the irrelevancy of such dogmatic certainty in a post Kantian world. A fascinating important if little noticed attempt to reclaim the discarded image for modernity is made by Joseph Solovietchik in what may be his most important philosophical work- “You shall search from there”. He suggests retaining the medieval certainty by transposing it form on ontological to experiential categories.
b. For a more extensive treatment of Labans usage of his daughters in his relationship with Jacob see Volume two of this study.
c. This description, of course, echoes precisely the words of the Psalmist who imagined himself “like a suckling at his mothers breast.” (Psalms 131:2)
d. As psychologist Bowlby points out in Separation and Loss, parents, merely by being present in a caring way in the first months of life, parents give the child the certainty necessary to carry them through life.
e. See Numbers 11:12. Moses – overwhelmed by the burden of leadership exclaims to God ‘Have I conceived this people – that you should say to me carry them in your bosom as a nursing mother carries the suckling child’. Although on first reading Omen refers to Moses – a more careful perusal suggests that God is intended as well. First Moses is acting only as an emissary of God (see Exodus chapter 4 and Joseph Soloveitchik, Days of Memory, , essay on on “Shlichut” – ‘messengership’) Further Moses at the end of his speech (verse 15)in a sui generis reference, refers to God in the feminine.
For the notion of Emunah deriving from Omen see Abrahman Joshua Heschel of Apt in his Biblical Commentary ‘Ohev Yisrael’. – He suggest two possible understandings of Emunah. 1) emunah as core certainty – “believing in a thing that it will certainly be so” 2) Emunah deriving from the word Omen indicating the actualizing of a reality – ‘drawing it down —making it so though the Emunah’.
My understanding of Omen differs in that Omen is understood to be the experience of core certainty which a mother gives to a child enabling his self actualization. In essence my understands conflates both interpretations of the Opter Rebbe into one.
f. Genesis 49:4.
g. quoted by Rashi to passage 37:29. cite midrash in full different versions
h. Nedarim 20A. The Talmud argues that even to think of one woman while with another is prohibited.
i. Using children to cover up our own holes in the book of Genesis excludes one from the covenant. Lot is the other figure in Genesis who tries to fulfill his ethical responsibility by offering his children to be killed. (See Genesis, Chapter 18). In the book of Genesis, a lack of understanding personal responsibility disqualifies one from receiving the patriarchal blessing of succession. Lot, therefore, cannot succeed Abraham, and Reuben cannot succeed Jacob.
j. See the comment of Rabbi Ovadiah Seforno to Genesis 29:35
-Marc Gafni
