Vayishlach: Fighting the Yetzer Hara by Rising from Yaakov to Yisrael

Transcript

This Torah class is brought to you by TorahAnytime.com. Yaakov Avinu fights with Sari Shel Esav. He holds him in a lock, in a headlock, doesn't let him go up. Chazal say he wanted to go back to say shira, to say praises to Hashem. And Yaakov Avinu says, I will not let you go unless you give me a bracha, unless you bless me. Rashi explains, what's the bracha? To be modeh, to admit that the brachos are mine. Yet it's interesting that Esav doesn't want to do it. Sari Shel Esav does not want to do it. Rashi quotes the Chazal based on a pasuk that he said, We'll do this later. In Beis El, when you get back to Beis El, Hashem will change your name, and there I'll be modeh to you. I will tell you that yes, I give you the brachos b'lev shalem. He cries. Rashi brings that the Sari Shel Esav is mischanen u'vocheh, was crying, I don't want it now. And yet Yaakov says, I want it right now, and I will not let you go unless you bless me right now, unless you admit right now. And therefore he was forced to, Vayevarech oso sham, the pasuk says. It's interesting, the conversation here. What is it about? I want it now, I want it later, I'll only do it later. No, I want it now, and the Sari Shel Esav has to cry about it. I mean, what's the big deal if you get it later? So pashut, I guess he doesn't trust Esav. He doesn't trust Esav's sar to show up. Esav promised that he'll be there. Hisar, the malach of Esav says, I'll be there and do it then. You know, they say over for a Belchanan. Reb Elchanan Wasserman was in America, and when he came back they asked him if he learned English, if he learned to speak a little language of America, a little English. So he said, Not much, but a little bit he did learn. He learned that when he comes to a balabos, a gvir, and he asks him money for tzedakah for the yeshiva, and the gvir says, Mi'etz Hashem, I'll try my best. So I learned that means forget about it. That means it'll never happen. I'll try my best means tishkach mizeh. That's what it means. That's how much English he says he learned when he came to America. Maybe that's the pshat here too. The Sari shel Esav is saying, When I get to Beis El, I'll be there. Yaakov says, You ain't going nowhere. It's now, and we're not waiting for later. So I would say maybe. But you see there was more to it. Now he's crying, I don't want to do it now, I'll do it later. Sari shel Esav has to cry, and Yaakov wants it dafka now. And it's also interesting that it's affiliated with the change of the name. The bracha on the brachos, the hoda'ah, is Yaakov or Yisrael? Yaakov or Yisrael? No, we'll change the name now. No, we'll change it later. No, I want it now. How does that fit in with the hoda'ah labrachos? So Rashi explains, eikev means that you got it through foolery, a kavah, you did it through back channels. Yisrael, sar, galui, openly, respectfully, you got the brachos. That's part of the hodaah, which means I'm not just want you should be modeh it's mine, but I want you to be modeh on how I got it. Yes, he wants it to rewrite history, I don't understand, but he didn't get it that way. That's not what happened. What happened was he got it b'eikev. So why is he forcing the sari shel Eisav to say, No, no, no, no, I want you to say you got it, Yisrael, unless he means now, that if now you'll give me the brachos, by you admitting, that means now you're giving me the brachos from self, from what you want, from—because you're, right, because you're giving it to me. So that's not anymore the old way I got it, b'eikev, through a trickery, but I got it, what? Yisrael. Sara, shrara. I got it through a royal means, so to speak. Now, what is that royal means? You hold a guy in a headlock, and you tell him that he's never getting out of this headlock unless he gives you the brachos. You would call that what? Royalty? Shrara? I don't know, that's also a way of forcing the brachos, no? So last time he did it with trickery, and this time he's doing it with force. There's something missing in the conversation that needs to be explained. So, I'll tell you what I think the pshat is.

We know there's something called Bechinas Yaakov and Bechinas Yisrael, which means sometimes Yaakov, Klal Yisrael, who is the children of Yaakov, are on a level called Yaakov. That's a lower level. And then there's Bechinas Yisrael, sar, on a higher level. What is the difference between the two? What's Bechinas Yaakov, and what's Bechinas Yisrael? What does it mean? I would say the pshat is as follows, rabosai. You know, the sari shel Esav and the confrontation with him is represented, a representation of what the Sefarim call yetzer hara. It's not just Esav then, nor is it sari shel Esav then, but it's through the doiros milchemesha shel yetzer hara. The Gemara in Sukkah tells us, daf nun beis, that the yetzer hara has many names, and one of them is ish. And when it says, Vaya'avek ish imo, Sefarim tell us, who is the ish? It's the yetzer hara. So this is an eternal war. You're right, it's learned through the prism of the story of Yaakov and Esav, and it's learned through the prism of the sari shel Esav, but actually it's the eternal fight of ra over tov, yetzer hara over yetzer tov, Esav aveirah against Yaakov Torah. It's the eternal struggle of the yetzer tov against the yetzer hara. How do we fight the yetzer hara is learned from this parsha. A lot of lessons are taken from the way Yaakov deals with the sari shel Esav and how he's supposed to fight with the yetzer hara. As a matter of fact, there's a minhag. Chassidim have this minhag, but it's actually brought in the maamloyos that every week, motzaei Shabbos... To read Parshas Vayishlach. Brought down in the mamlois. Chassidim have such a minhag. Why? I think the pashut pshat in the minhag is that every Motzei Shabbos we're preparing ourselves for a week of the milchemes hayetzer. We go out into the world, make parnassah. The week comes with a lot of fighting, struggle, strife against the yetzer hara. And so we read Parshas Vayishlach as a segulah or a textbook to learn how to deal with tzarei shel Eisav when it's Vayavo Eisav el Yaakov levado. Yaakov's out in the street alone. Not anymore in the beis medrash, Shabbos. He's going out into the Vayavo Eisav el Yaakov levado, alone. So the way Yaakov deals with tzarei shel Eisav becomes either, if you want to say, the reading of it a segulah, but even deeper, the learning of it becomes a textbook on how to fight the yetzer. How do we fight the yetzer? Let's take some of the lessons. One of the lessons are, you got to know your own enemy. Chovos HaLevavos speaks about that, that if you don't know your enemy, you're not going to fight him. That's when you want to attack your enemy directly. When you want to have that you overpower your enemy, then you got to attack him. And how do you attack? From the feet, to make him fall. Notice that that's actually what Eisav is trying to do to Yaakov, b'kaf raglo. He's trying to get him to fall. Yaakov actually does this originally, b'akev Eisav. He's grabbing Eisav by the foot, and that's b'remiyah. You try to outsmart the yetzer hara, right? That's how you attack the enemy. You outsmart him. That's when you attack the enemy. That's the darga called Yaakov. Yaakov is akev when Klal Yisrael has a yetzer hara, so to speak. It's living with the yetzer hara, yet it needs to combat the yetzer hara. So it needs akev to make him fall by akeivas, like Rashi says, remiyah. He's got to find and figure out a way how to deal with the Esav, like a snake. You got to deal with him. Like akevei, like the snake, of course, that's the point. But then there's another way on how to deal with the yetzer hara, and that's srarah. You lift yourself up above the yetzer hara, above the yetzer hara. That's called srarah. Ki soriso. Notice the lashon, ki soriso. Sarah, elevate. You rose above the yetzer hara. You know, there's two ways how a person could fight. A person could fight by toppling, by combating, by winning, or a person could rise above it, and then it doesn't affect him. Klal Yisrael, Yisrael, that darga is when they rise high and that the yetzer hara has no shlita to them. Yaakov is when they fight hand to hand. They do battle, and you have to topple.

Akeiv, you go for the ankle, and you have to outsmart the yetzer hara, like all the baalei mussar speak. But then you have something called Yisrael, where the Yid elevates himself above, above. He's on a higher madreigah, and they can't affect him. Actually, what I've told you is the basis for the three founding shitos of mussar. Mussar has Slabodka mussar. That's one mahalach, one form, one shita in mussar. Then there's Kelm, and then there's Novardok. What was Slabodka? Slabodka was the avodah of romemus. A person elevates himself. He elevates himself. He realizes who he is. You're going to go down to the yetzer hara's nonsense? He has nothing to do with you. Tell me, would a king, a president, go to the bawry to play cards with a guy who's just laying on the floor in the bawry? He has nothing to do with him, right? A melech, a talmud chacham is malchi rabbanan. How do you come to even be in the same room with a yetzer hara, so to speak? What connection do you have to a yetzer hara at all? That's one way to fight the yetzer hara. That's called tiferes, romemus, gadlus haTorah, gadlus ha'adam, how great is a person. This was the mahalach of Slabodka on how to fight yetzer hara: mussar, gadlus. You build the person up till he realizes he can't go down to the level of the yetzer hara. It has nothing to do with him. It's lowering to his stature of who he is. Then we have Kelim. Kelim was the midah of emes, but it was also mostly yiras Shamayim. They worked strongly on the yiras Shamayim. Yiras Shamayim makes a person able, able to null, able to make the yetzer hara, to keep him intact. Yetzer hara, yiras Shamayim, they don't go together. So they worked a lot on yiras Shamayim. Navardik did the other way around, shiflus ha'adam. What they did was they knocked the person: Who are you? What are you? So if you're nothing, how could you run after a yetzer hara? Look what you're doing. It's called shiflus, and that's called bittul, the avodah of bittul. Who, what, when, and they were mevatel olam hazeh. You would listen in the shmuzen of Navardik, they would say, What's this world? This world is nothing, and it's nonsense, and it's garbage, because everything is about shiflus, breaking it down to size. I once discussed with the Mashgiach of Telshe that maybe that's pshat in the Gemara. The Gemara says if the yetzer hara comes to you, there's three ways to deal with the yetzer hara. First, you should learn with him in the beis medrash. If that doesn't work, then go and read Kriyas Shema. And if that doesn't work, yazkir lo yom hamisa. Many Torahs have been said on this Gemara. I would like to say another one based on the way I explained to you the concepts of mussar and how to combat the yetzer hara. Torah. Torah is the first way to do it. Yisnasus. A person elevates himself. Teireh, ah. It's not working. Iker Kriyas Shema, yiras Shamayim. So you got to go do the Yiras Shamayim. If that doesn't work, yaskil yom hamisa, and the vardik, bittul. You're gonna die. What's this world? Bittul hataanugim of olam hazeh. So the first thing is, and I don't mean Slabodka over Nevardik, over Kelm, but it's the concepts could be: first, beis medrash, Slabodka, Torah, gadlus haTorah, roimemus haTorah. If not, Kelam, Yiras Shamayim. And if not, Nevardik. And they all work. They all work. These are three systems of mussar on how to combat the yetzer hara. You know, I was thinking once to myself that actually the Avos had all these inyanim. By Avraham it says, Ata yadati ki yerei Elokim atah, Yiras Shamayim. By Yitzchak we find he was locked in the house as a blind person. Chazal say, Yitzchak k'meis. Yitzchak had to remain in the house like a korban. He had no taanugei olam hazeh. This is the inyan of avodah. This is the inyan of his batlus, meis, yom hamisa. Yaakov was Torah.

Yaakov combats Lavan, Esav, with his Torah. With his Torah he combats them. The bechinah of the gemaras of this medrash, Yikra Kriyas Shema, Yaakov l'yom hamisah, could be rooted in the avos, that the avos shtelled a vek different mahalchim on how to fight with the yetzer hara. With this, rabosai, I understand what went on over here with the Sari shel Esav. The Sari shel Esav is how you fight the yetzer hara. You know, one of the things he wanted was his abek. I don't know if you know, Chazal tell us that they were like two people hugging each other. That was how he was fighting, wrestling in a way that they were hugging each other. And there was a lot of lesson in that. There was a lot of lesson in the way they were fighting, and one of them, I believe, is the pshat equals. And I think that's what it means, miyad achi miyad Esav. Chazal tell us, and the Baalei Mussar speak, how he was afraid of both things, miyad achi and miyad Esav. That even when Esav comes as an ach was bothering him. So I always understood, you know what it means? Because even when he comes as an ach, he's a dangerous guy. Even as he comes as an ach, so then he comes to ruin me by influencing me. That's the pashut pshat, miyad achi, miyad Esav, that there's two things: there's the achi and there's the Esav. Beis Halevi speaks this Torah, that even when he comes as an ach, he's a danger. And what do they mean, influence? But I would say, maybe there's another point to miyad achi, miyad Esav. We're equals. One of the ways to fight the yetzer hara is to know you're not equal to the yetzer hara. You're much greater than the yetzer hara. One of the atzas hayetzer, one of the tricks of the yetzer hara is, fakert miyad achi. Me and you, we're the— the Yidden and the goy, we're both the same. We're equals. Equal rights. We're all the same. Everyone's the same. When you have everyone the same, guess what? You're in trouble, because it's not true. If you don't know who you are, you don't realize that you're above and you're much greater, you're going to lose, ki sarisa im Elokim va'anashim. Do you know that one of the things Chazal tell us, that when the yetzer hara, saro shel Esav, was fighting, vaye'avek. Vaye'avek means what? Dirt. There was so much earth and dirt, and the mefarshim, the Acharonim, discuss what is the remez of the earth. What is it trying to bring out? And I always understood the pshat is, he was trying to throw dirt on Yaakov Avinu. Yaakov, you think you're this polished, this most beautiful. You ever see when a person is a king, you know how you can ruin his day? Put a little— make a little spot of dirt on him. Dirt! Yay! You're like everybody else. You wear dirty jeans like everybody else. Let a person has no shavius to himself, he walks around. What's wrong if I wear a dirty shirt? What's the big deal? One of the yesodos of Hilchos Talmud Torah is what? Revealed, he does not even have a spot on him. A talmid chacham does not have one spot on him. Why? Kavod haTorah. He has to realize that he is malchus, royalty. Are you ovek? He was trying to throw dirt. You're not royalty. Make you dirty. Yaakov Avinu is Yisrael sarisa. How does Yaakov win the yetzer hara now? By rising above. Originally, akeiv. His way of dealing with Esav, Satan, yetzer hara was by trying to outsmart him and win him, and b'akeivah, with remiyah, with fooling him. All of a sudden, at the end, here, after going through Lavan, he's saying, You know how I fight you? I fight you b'sarisa. Did he overpower the saro shel Esav? No. Let's see. Ki sarisa im Elokim va'anashim vatuchal, and you were able. He didn't win him. When you're fighting the yetzer hara, direct combat, you have to win. It's either him or you. But when you rise above, when you rise above, when you rise above, you don't win. You don't have to win. He doesn't come to you. V'lo tuchal, you stand where you are. Tuchal means that—

The yetzer comes to me, I stand in who I am. You know, the sulam was one of the simanim. It was supposed to be a nevuah of what nisyonos Yaakov was going to go through in his journey to the house of Lavan. We spoke many times, malachim olim v'yordim, aliyos v'yeridos, ups and downs, life. This was supposed to be the sulam on how he was going to reach. And it's also interesting, the way the sulam worked. Hashem took the whole Canaan, compacted it under the sulam. The idea was the sulam was the way, the derech of Yaakov Avinu all the way to Shaar HaShamayim. This was the sulam. Malachim olim v'yordim bo. The Zohar says it was in who? In Yaakov. One of the things they showed him by the sulam was that his face was by the Kisei HaKavod. It was the fourth pillar of the Kisei HaKavod. Chassidishe sefarim always say that's the pshat, the pasuk, V'hinei Hashem nitzav alav. He woke up and he said, I know Hashem is here, but anochi? But that I was also here, lo yadati. This I didn't know. Pashut pshat is, anochi I didn't know, but anochi lo yadati. Chassidishe sefarim, vataitch it, anochi, V'hinei Hashem nitzav alav, anochi, that me too, I'm also part of the Kisei HaKavod. That's unbelievable. Now why did they show him this? Because the way to fight the yetzer hara is to know who you are, how great you could be, that you're tachas Kisei HaKavod. Tell me, if someone is on a level... But he's tachas Kisei HaKavod. He's one of the stands of the Ribono Shel Olam's throne. Would he be busy playing around, being in the sea, talking to a yetzer hara? You've got to be kidding me. Below his dignity. They were teaching Yaakov this idea. If you look at the sefarim, Yaakov is emes; it's Tiferes and Netzach. The two other middos of Yaakov is Tiferes and Netzach. Tiferes is honor, glory, pe'er. Netzach is to win. How does Yaakov win? With serisa, with royalty, with Tiferes. He was above it all. It's interesting, Yaakov Avinu, it says, Vayivaser Yaakov levado. What does levado mean? So Chazal say levado, like it says, Veniskav Hashem levado, that Hashem is alone. What does it mean, Hashem? Yaakov is like Hashem? Yes, the answer is very simple. Veniskav, He rises above to be echad. The ma'alah of Yaakov is that he's echad, just like Hashem is one. There's one Hashem, there's one Yaakov, there's one Klal Yisrael. Mincha, we say this. Mincha is keneged Yaakov Avinu. It's the third tefillah; it's keneged Yaakov. What do we say? Atah echad, vShimcha echad, umi ke'amcha Yisrael goy echad. That's Yaakov. What? Tiferes, gedulah, vateres yeshuah. It's Tiferes. It's Tiferes, talmid chacham. It's Torah. Torah is Tiferes, kavod haTorah. It's echad, and he's meyuchad. And when he knows Veniskav Hashem levado, when he knows that, that he is alone, it's only him and Hashem. He doesn't connect to a yetzer hara. He rises above the yetzer. Ki sarisa im Elokim, and that's why Yaakov says, Now I want the bracha to be moideh to me now. I don't want the way I fight you is by akev. I want a different madreigah now. Sarisa, the way I fight you. That's why it has to be now at the fight. And that's why the sari shel Esav was crying. By Yitzchak he's crying because what? If it's to fight on our terms, you'll try to knock me down, I'll try to knock you down, I got a chance. He's crying. Why is he crying? And the answer is because he's crying to the sarisa, that the way to beat the yetzer hara now is with Yisrael. Ah, I don't want to do that, Yaakov, because I'm not letting you go. Ki sarisa im Elokim va'anashim. You didn't win me. A tochal, but you stood your ground. You rose above it. You realized that you're echad. V'niskav Hashem levado, like it says, Levado Yaakov levado. Your face is on the kisei hakavod, and I think that's a pshat, I heard we could add a beautiful pshat. He asks him, What's your name? Vayomer, you know what the malach tells him? Vayomer, Mah shmecha? What is your name? So the mefarshim ask, Vayomer, Vayish...

He asked him. Then he called him. He tells Yaakov, Mah shmecha, what is your name? They say the Baal HaMusar, I heard this b'shem Rav Keller, Rav Chaim David Keller, a friend of mine from my neighborhood told me this pshat, b'shem Rav Keller, a beautiful vort. He asked the malach, what's your name? Because I have to know how to fight you. That's what it says in all the sefarim. I got to know what your yetzer hara, what you are. The yetzer hara tells him, What do you care who I am? Vayomer, he says to him, Mah shmecha, what are you? The way to fight me is to know who you are. Know that you're a Yid. Know that you're special. Be proud of who you are. Respect who you are. Understand who you are. Atah echad, v'shimcha mi ka'amcha Yisrael goy echad ba'aretz. Tiferes, rise above. Then you'll combat me. That's how you fight me. I want, says Yaakov Avinu, I want you to be modeh to me right here, right now. And that's the way I'm going to win you. Ki sarisa im Elokim v'im anashim. You've just experienced another Torah class brought to you by TorahAnytime.com.