This week's parashah begins with the verse:
va-yeitzei Ya'akov mi-b'eir sheva va-yeilekh haranah:
"And Ya'akov went out of Be'er Sheva, and he went to Charan."
My great-grandfather, Rabbi Dovid Deutsch, who was the Chief Rabbi of Balashe Dyarmat in Hungary until he died in the Holocaust al kiddush ha-Shem comments on what Rashi says about this verse.
Rashi is troubled about why the verse had to say that Ya'akov left Be'er Sheva when what was really important was that Ya'akov went to Charan. Rashi's explanation is that the word "va-yeitzei" comes to teach us that when a tzaddik, a righteous person, leaves a place he also leaves behind a void,
yataza tzaddik min ha-ir, panah hodah, panah zivah, panah hadarah
When a tzaddik leaves the city, its splendor leaves, its luster leaves, and its beauty leaves.
My great-grandfather comments that Rashi gives this explanation because
ein vai ela lashon tza'ar
The sound of "vai" in the word "va-yeitzei" is an expression of pain. That's why Rashi emphasizes the loss felt in Be'er Sheva when Ya'akov left for Charan. But my great-grandfather asks if "vai" is an expression of pain, where is the pain in "va-yeilekh haranah"? Just as Ya'akov left a void behind him in Be'er Sheva, didn't he fill a void in Charan by bringing it splendor, luster and beauty? So why does the verse use an expression of pain when it mentions that Ya'akov went to Charan?
My great-grandfather answers this question by referring us to a Mishnah in Pirkei Avot. This is what the Mishnah says:
Rabbi Jose ben Kisma said: I was once walking on the road, when a man met me and greeted me, and I returned his greeting. He said to me: "Rabbi, from what place are you?' I said to him: "I come from a great city of Sages and scribes." He said to me: "If you will dwell with us in our place, I will give you a thousand thousands golden denars and precious stones and pearls." I said to him: "Were you to give me all the silver and gold and precious stones and pearls in the world, I would not dwell anywhere but in a place of Torah."
And we also are told in Pirkei Avoy
k'neih l'kha haver
"Get yourself a companion." What kind of a companion? A companion to study Torah with.
Our Rabbis also teach us about the greatness of a chavraya, which is a community of friends who study Torah together. We are told that Rebi Shimon ben Yochai looked for a chavraya even though he was the Gadol ha-dor, the greatest scholar of his generation. And the Zohar teaches us that the verse in Doniel
v'ha-maskilim yazhiru k'zohar ha-rakia
And those that are wise shall shine like the brightness of the firmament.
refers to Rebi Shimon ben Yochai and his chavraya.
Even the angels may not sanctify sheim k'vod malkhuto, the name of G-d's glorious majesty, when they are alone, without a chavraya. As we recite every morning in the davening, they must take permission from one another
v'notnim r'shut zeh la-zeh l'hakdish l'yotzram
and then they call out to one another,
v'kara zeh el zeh v'amar
So now we can better understand why va-yeilekh haranah was also an expression of pain. Ya'akov had a chavraya in Be'er Sheva where he was studying in the Yeshiva of Sheim and Eiver. When Ya'akov left Be'er Sheva, he left a void behind and he was missed. But now Ya'akov was leaving Be'er Sheva and going to Charan, where there was no Torah and no chavraya that could join him in the study of Torah and could appreciate how fortunate they were to have a tzaddik living among them.
My great-great-grandfather, R. Moshe Shmuel Glasner, in his seifer, Dor Revi'i, also discusses in the name of his father the gaon, R. Avaraham Glasner, the beginning of this parasha and the pain that Ya'akov felt because he was leaving the chavraya in Be'er Sheva to go to Charan where there was no Torah community. But the Dor Revi'i explains what happened from a slightly different point of view.
The Dor Revi'i bases his explanation on a famous Midrash which is found in maseches Chulin 91a. After the Torah tells us that Ya'akov left Be'er Sheva to go to Charan the Torah then tells us in the next pasuk
va-yifga ba-makom
"and he reached the place." What place? Chazal tell us that it was Har ha-Moriah.
Now there is a problem. The first pasuk says that Ya'akov went to Charan and then the next pasuk tells us that he reached Har ha-Moriah. But Har ha-Moriah is in Eretz Yisrael, not in Charan, so why did the pasuk tell us that he went to Charan before he reached Har ha-Moriah?
So the Midrash tells us that what happened was that Ya'akov actually got to Charan and it was only after he got there that he realized that he had passed by Har ha-Moriah on the way without stopping to pray (daven) there. Here is what the Midrash says:
ki mata l'haran amar
When Ya'akov reached Charan he said
ephshar avarti al makom she-hitpal'lu avotai v'ani lo hitpalalti?
"Is it possible that I passed by the place where my fathers prayed (davened) and I did not also pray (daven) there?"
The Midrash continues:
kad yahiv da'ateih l'mihedar
When he decided to return,
kaphtz leih ar'a
the earth leapt for him
mi-yad va-yifga ba-makom
He was immediately transported to Har ha-Moriah
kad tz'li
After he prayed (davened),
ba'i l'mihedar
he wanted to return
amar ha-Kadosh Barukh Hu
Ha-Shem said,
ba tzadik zeh l'veit maloni v'yipateir b'lo linah
"This tzaddik has come to my hotel, and he will leave without spending the night?"
mi-yad ba ha-shemesh
Immediately the sun set.
By reading words of the Midrash very carefully, the Dor Revi'i explains this Midrash, in the name of his father in a remarkable way.
The Midrash tells us that after Ya'akov got to Charan and realized that he had passed by Har ha-Moriah without praying (davening) there and decided to return,Ya'akov had kephitzas ha-derech and was immediately transported back to Har ha-Moriah. Then after he prays (davens) at Har ha-Moriah, the Midrash again says that he wanted to return. So the Midrash uses the same word
l'mihedar twice to tell us the Ya'akov wanted to return. Once when he got to Charan and then when he was at Har ha-Moriah.
What does it mean that he wanted to return? The obvious way to interpret the Midrash is that the first time it says that he wanted to return, the Midrash means -- return to Har ha-Moriah. And that the second time the Midrash says that he wanted to return, the Midrash means -- return to Charan.
But the Dor Revi'i understands the Midrash completely differently. Ya'akov had just left the Yeshiva of Shem and Eiver where he had been totally involved with his chavraya in the study Torah for fourteen years. And now finally, as we just saw, Ya'akov was going to Charan to fulfill the commandment of his father, Yitzchak, to marry someone from the family of his mother, Rivka. But Ya'akov was very troubled about leaving the spiritual life of the Yeshiva to begin a new life in which he would be mainly involved in worldly matters. And he was not sure whether it was right for him to leave the Yeshiva to go to Charan.
So when Ya'akov finally got to Charan and realized that he had passed by Har ha-Moriah without even stopping to pray (daven) there, he thought to himself: "If I have just started to get involved in worldly matters and I have already forgotten to stop and pray (daven) at the holy place of Har ha-Moriah, then that proves that I was wrong to leave the Yeshiva." And so he decided to return. Return where? To the Beis Midrash and his chavraya in Be'er Sheva.
Then as soon as Ya'akov decided to return to the Yeshiva, Ha-Shem preforms a miracle and transports him not to the Beis Midrash in Be'er Sheva where he wanted to go, but to
Har ha-Moriah so he could pray (daven) there. The Midrash tells us that when Ya'akov finished davening at Har ha-Moriah, he wanted to return. Return where? To Charan? No. Still to the Beis Midrash and his chavraya. So Ha-Shem had to perform yet another miracle, to make the sun set immediately, so that Ha-Shem could explain to Ya'akov in a dream that he really should not go back to the Yeshiva, but should go to Charan as Yitzchak commanded.
In the dream, Ya'akov sees angels going up and down a ladder planted on the ground and reaching up to the sky (heaven).
v'hineih sulam mutzav artzah v'rosho magia ha-shamay'mah
v'hineih malakhei Elokim olim v'yordim bo
What does the dream mean?
The Dor Revi'i explains that a sulam, ladder, is compared to an adam, a person. Why? Because, just like a ladder which is made either for going up or for going down, but not to stay where you are, a person never stays in one place, but is either reaching a higher level or descending to a lower level.
And the dream tells Ya'akov that like a ladder which must be planted on the ground, mutzav artzah, the life of a person must start from the ground. That means that a person must be involved in worldly matters. That is his nature. Only an angel has no yeitzer ha-ra. So the purpose of a person is to live and work in a community and to take pleasure from life and his worldly activities as permitted by the Torah. This is the meaning of the commandment
b'koh d'rakhekh da-eihu
You should know Ha-Shem in all your activities.
Only in this way can we join the gooph with the neshamah, body and soul.
v'rosho magia ha-shamy'mah
But even though we must be involved in worldly matters, we must constantly try to reach a higher level of kedushah, holiness, because this world is a preparation for olam ha-ba, the world to come.
v'hineih malakhei Elokim olim v'yordim bo
The angels of Ha-Shem were ascending and descending on it
The Dor Revi'i explains that this means that even though the angels may start out on a higher level than human beings, we are capable of surpassing them if we fulfill the commandment of b'khol d'rakhekha da'eihu, as the Gemara in Chulin 91a teaches us
havivin yisrael liphnei ha-Kadosh Barukh Hu mi-malakhei ha-shareit
The Jewish people are more beloved to ha-Kadosh Barukhu Hu than are the angels.
But you might say that the nisayon, the test, is too difficult, and that a person cannot overcome the yeitzer ha-ra unless he isolates himself from the temptations of this world by staying within the dalet amot of halachah, in other words by only studying Torah in the Yeshiva. That is why in the dream, Ya'akov sees
v'hineih nitzav alav
Ha-Shem standing over him - to protect him. And then Ha-Shem promises to protect Ya'akov wherever he goes
u'sh'martikha b'khol asher teileikh
So when Ya'akov wakes up from his dream, he says
mah nora makom ha-zeh
How awesome is this place. Which means how awesome is this path that Ha-Shem wants me to travel on to join together the spiritual world of Torah and the physical world of everyday life into one.
ein zeh ki im beit Elokim v'zeh sha'ar ha-shamayim
This is none other than the house of Ha-Shem and this is the gate to heaven. Ya'akov now understands that path to reach the highest level of kedushah is the path that he started out on to go to Charan and to marry, to make a living working for Lavan, and raise a family. And because Ya'akov was so overwhelmed by what an awesome journey lay before him, he made a vow to Ha-Shem. The vow seems odd, because it sounds as if Ya'akov is making a bargain with Ha-Shem. If Ha-Shem will watch over him and take care of him and bring him back safely from Charan to his father's house, then Ha-Shem will be his G-d and Ya'akov will give ma'aser to Ha-Shem. But according to the Dor Revi'i, we understand that what Ya'akov was afraid of was not that he wouldn't be able to make a good living, but that he would lose his connection to the Ribbono shel Olam by becoming involved in worldly matters and coming under the influence of Lavan. So Ya'akov was praying that Ha-Shem would watch over him and would be able to keep his faith in Ha-Shem and his special connection to Ha-Shem even while he would be subject to all the temptations and bad influences that he would have to face in Charan.