VAYETZE 1995

In the Torah portion Vayaitzai we learn how Yaacov leaves his family and goes into exile. The Torah portion Vayaitzai's main theme is how a Jew can make it in exile. However, there is a secondary theme and the secondary theme is deception. When is deception allowable and is there such a thing as justified deception? Many people believe that the ends justify the means, and we can say that in certain areas this may be so. For example, if an ill person does not want to take his medicine so you stick it into a milkshake or a child does not want to go to the doctor so you figure out some ruse to get him to go to the doctor, or you know that there is an older gentlemen that does not want to go to a nursing home so you have to figure out some way to get him to the nursing home because that is the only way that he can be taken care of. In certain instances certain types of ruses or deception would be allowable, but in most instances deception is self defeating because the person who feels deceived, even though he may concede that momentarily in this particular instance it was all right, he will never trust the person who deceived him anymore. Also, it turns into hatred. We learn how Jacob, after he received the blessing from Yitzchak through deception, caused his brother to hate him, such a terrible enmity that he had to flee from home and he was away from his father's house for 22 years because of it.
This Torah portion starts with Jacob fleeing and it says, "And he alighted in
a place and he lodged there." Yeefkah can also mean that he was wounded. "And
he took from the stone of the place and he put it under his head and he laid down
in that place." Yeefkah also means he was sick because he could not understand
how he, a student, a person who sat in the tents, could have been involved in
such a deception. The truth of the matter is that we can all be involved in deception,
that unless we watch out what we are doing we can many times cross the line.
Then it says later on that he had the dream of the angels ascending and descending
the ladder and it says after the dream that "he woke up from his sleep" and, of
course, it mentions the words here that can be interpreted differently. It says,
 
"And Jacob woke up from his sleep," but also Rabbi Yochanan says that can mean Jacob woke up from his learning. He now had to realize that he was just like everybody else, that just because you understand a process does not mean that you are exempt from it. Just because you understand about interpersonal relationships does not mean that you are not going to be affected by the situations that you encounter. People always tell me, "But, Rabbi, what do you think I have, a dirty mind?" and I tell them yes because the laws of interpersonal relationships are no different from the laws of physics and if a person jumps off a cliff, even if he understands all the laws of physics he is going to be hurt. If a person cuts his finger he is going to bleed. Jacob now realized that he was just like everybody else. That's why the ladder had to rest on the ground. You had to realize who you are and you had to guard yourself against the temptation to deceive people.
As we continue on in this Torah portion we learn how he is deceived by his uncle Laban, how he works for Rachel for 7 years and instead his uncle deceives him and has him marry Leah. Then he has to work another 7 years for Rachel, and then afterwards when he decides after 14 years that he is deserving of a salary then his uncle tries to change his wages many times so he will end up with nothing, but G-d is with him. Jacob, himself, knew that he had to cope with this type of trickery in the world. Therefore, he devised certain strategisms which would not cause him to pass the line. After all, if he would not work for Rachel another 7 years unless he first married her at the beginning, he was not going to risk being cheated again. When Laban changed his salary and said, "From now on you will have grizzled or speckled or striped sheep," he made sure that the sheep would gaze at certain types of rods which would cause them to become speckled or striped or grizzled, and in this way he would be able to overcome his uncle's trickery. We learn, too, that he, himself, tricked his uncle because when he decided to leave he just left when his uncle was away shearing the sheep. Before
 
he had asked permission from his uncle so his uncle thought that before he would leave he would ask permission, but he did not ask for permission from Laban this time. He just fled. Of course, Laban found out about it and Laban chased after him and Laban reprimanded him because he had stolen away his heart by leaving without telling him and without allowing him to say goodbye to his daughters and his grandchildren. Of course, probably if Jacob would not have fled this way Laban would not have permitted him to leave, but G-d intervened and told Laban, "Don't harm Jacob in any way." Laban also accused Jacob of stealing his idols. Of course, the rabbis explain that this was really not an idol, that this was some sort of devise that allowed people to tell direction, something like a compass, and that Rachel probably stole it not so much because it was admired as an idol but because it would have given Laban an advantage in chasing after them. This was something which also other rabbis explain was something like a mannekin which allowed people to make clothes on and make other things upon. In other words, it was something which potentially could be worshipped because people could turn it into an idol but in itself it was not an idol, but Laban looked at it as something which gave him power and which allowed him to manipulate other people. When he found out that it was gone he accused Jacob of stealing it and Jacob said a rash thing. He said, "Anyone who has stolen this object from you and you find it in their possession, they should die." He did not know that Rachel had taken the Trafim and that Rachel had hidden it in the saddle and she had sat on the saddle and told her father that she was having the way of the women, her monthly period, so that, therefore, she could not get off the saddle. Then Jacob let loose with a tirade against Laban upbraiding him because he had tricked him so many times and he had deceived him so many times and it looked like he was right now deceiving him again trying to get an advantage by accusing him of stealing when he had stolen nothing whatsoever. Of course, this time Jacob was really wrong because at this particular time Laban was telling the truth. Then they decided to part and they
 
set up a monument. Laban sets up one which he calls Schayadusa, which in Aramaic means the stone of testimony, and Jacob sets up one which he calls Galain, the stone of the witness. What is the difference between these two particular things?
The difference between these two stones is that Laban was saying, "Look, in this particular instance I am telling you the truth. I came because I wanted my daughters to be protected and I did not want you to steal way my idols. Let me worship my idols the way I want, but don't steal away my daughters also." Jacob, ont he other hand, said that even if he was right in this particular instance in most instances he had lied to him. Therefore, he was more interested in the witness, that the witness should be honest, not that in this particular instance that Laban was telling the truth.
We all know that when we deal especially in politics that there are certain types
of dirty tricks that are used, but you have to be careful not to go across the
line. We know that Nixon in this country crossed the line in Watergate. He had
the FBI and CIA make a coverup of the breakin of the Democractic headquarters
in the Watergate building. We also know that in politics many times different
tricks are used in order for people to get elected. For example, Harry Truman
when he ran for the Senate had one of his friends run against his opponents so
they would split the vote so he would come out in a three man race ahead. I do
not know who paid Perot last time or whether Perot did it all on his own, but
we know that Clinton would never have been elected against Bush if Perot would
not have run. I believe today, too, that many people, Republicans, are touting
Colin Powell to run. They did not want him to run as a Republican but as an Independent
so that he would siphon off enough of Clinton's votes so that Clinton, if he could
not get the majority of the 90% black vote which usually goes to the Democrats,
that he could not win. But we know that there is a limit beyond which you cannot
go. Jacob had to be very careful especially after he found out had he affected
 
Esau so detrimentally, how he destroyed the family because of the deception he had performed when he stole the blessing from Esau by deceiving his father. From then on in this Torah portion the limits to this deception are laid out. There is only so far that you can go. We know that in Israel today it seems that the Labor Party after the assassination of Rabin was blaming the Likud for all sorts of terrible things because it was they who set the mood in the country by not denouncing and allowing pictures at the demonstrations of Rabin dressed in a Nazi uniform. We all know now that that was not true, but the person who was spreading all these pictures of Rabin in a Nazi uniform was actually a member of the Shin Bet, a man who was placed as the head of Ayal, a breakoff of a Kahane group, a group which broke off from the main Kahane group because they said that the Kahane group as too moderate, and it turns out that this man who headed this group, Avishai Ravi, was actually a government agent. Therefore, all this propaganda against the Likud was false because the people who were actually doing all these things and saying that Rabin was a Nazi and head of a Judenrat and claiming that Rabin was leading us to another Holocaust were actually government agents, said to stir up the right and to besmirch him. In fact, right before the negotiations were completed for Oslo II there was a big to do because this group Ayal claimed credit for killing an Arab in Chalchul, one of the villages near Hebron, when really another Arab had killed him but they tried to blame the right, in order to create sympathy for their own cause. Of course, today in Israel now there are all sorts of conspiracy theories going around about who really killed Rabin, whether it was the right or the left, and maybe the left had him killed because this will further the peace process or somebody in the right wanted him killed to stop the peace process, but it is not so clear anymore that Yigal Amir acted alone, that maybe he was just a tool of some other forces. Meanwhile people have been smeared. It seems that the tactics that are being used in Israel today have passed the line where all sorts of deceptions are being used here. This, of course, can
 
only make things worse. Instead of the people getting together and being unified after such a terrible tragedy it looks like people are trying to make political capital out of it and blaming people for creating a climate of violence when actually it was the government, itself, who was creating a climate of violence especially by beating demonstrators unnecessarily, lawful demonstrators especially unnecessarily. So we see that deception really has its limits. When you use deception in a political way you never know how they are going to turn out and they end up by destroying everything.
We all hope and pray that every faction in Israel has learned a lesson. You cannot use this type of deception and political tricks even if you feel that the ends justify the means because you will only end up by destroying everything.
I am reminded of the story they tell about a woman who was terribly browbeaten by her husband and verbally abused. Her husband said, "You know, I am not going to leave you anything when I die.11 Her husband got sick and said, "I am going to put all my money in the attic and when I die I am going to take it with me." The day after her husband died she went up to the attic and she found all the money there, that he had not taken anything. She said, "See, I told him he should have buried it in the basement." When it comes to verbal abuse, when it comes to trickery we should realize that we are not going to bring heaven on earth by using such means. We are just going to disintegrate and make our societies into a veritable Hades so we have to be very careful. Jacob was very patient with Laban and he did not cross the line. Only at the very end when at this particular time Laban was telling the truth did he upbraid Laban and make a rash statement, that the person who stole his idol should die. Unfortunately, just a year and a half later Rachel did die. We have to be careful that we do not stir up things and use dirty tricks because not only do they destroy trust but they ultimately destroy the goals for which we are all working. The means in this instance can
 
never justify the means. Let us all hope that everyone in Israel will learn this lesson so that there will be true unity so the Mashiach will come quickly in our day. Amen.