Saturday, November 24, 2007

In Shul Dvar Torah - Parshas Vayishlach

Today in Shul, Rabbi Tzvi Klugerman gave a Dvar Torah about Yaakov. He commented that all of the forefathers had run ins and stories with angels. Avraham in his tent, Yitzchak at the akeida. Yaakov however, seemed to have a little bit more contact with the angels than the other two.

It seems that Yaakov utilized or had a keen awareness of Angels more than anyone else in his time. We see this first with his dream on Mount Moriah, where he lays to rest and he has a dream that entails a ladder that a has angelic creatures traveling up and down the steps. Yaakov even seems to have a relationship with them on a more personal level. We see this in the first Pasuk of Parshas Vayishlach , according to Rashi’s explanation of the verse it says, “Then Jacob sent angels ahead of him to Esau his brother…”. Yaakov seemed to have such a close relationship with the angels so much so that he could tell them to do things for him.

If this is so, then why didn’t he have an Angel fight the battle with Esav’s angel? This would have saved him time and of a considerable amount of pain

It seems that we can learn a lot on a personal level from this happening. It is true that Yaakov could have sent an Angel to fight his battle. He instead made the executive decision that this battle was something that he had to do alone.

Yaakov was teaching us that our biggest battles must be fought by ourselves without any armies or supporting casts. Often times we are so busy, that our responsibilities and true priorities take the back seat to whatever is most convenient for us at the time. Yaakov is telling us that this is a terrible misconception.

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