This week’s parasha, Vayishlach, offers up a story ripe for personal applications. The parasha begins with Jacob preparing to come face to face with his twin brother, Esau, after twenty-two years apart, and how afraid Jacob is of this confrontation. This leads to Jacob wrestling throughout the night with an unknown being, and eventually overcoming it, and eventually reconciling with Esau.
Genesis 32:8 says “Jacob was greatly frightened.” Jacob is afraid that Esau will kill him, after all Esau had sworn that was his intention the last time they were in the same space, so his fear is understandable. But in reality, we all know we say things we do not mean in the heat of the moment based on fear, and Esau was afraid too. The way I’m interpreting the text and its themes on fear, is that the fear Jacob feels is rooted in feelings of unworthiness and a fear of rejection, and how by choosing the Path of Love we can overcome Fear.
Being a twin myself, I know that even in disagreements or sibling rivalries, we still love each other and that always wins out. For twins, we have a bond that is unlike any other, so I find it hard to believe that there is not an innate love between Jacob and Esau. They are opposites, and possibly reflecting their own insecurities at each other (my sister and I are also opposites, so I know this to be true in my experience). Jacob knows he hurt Esau, and he is afraid that he is unworthy of receiving love and forgiveness from him or from God.
“I am unworthy of all the kindness that You have so steadfastly shown Your servant” Jacob says to God in Genesis 32:11. Like a lot of people, this is something I have “wrestled” with my whole life, not feeling worthy of love, even more so when the love that was being offered is coming from a Divine source. Nothing was more terrifying than realizing God heard my cries and delivered me the love I had been seeking my whole life, both personally and spiritually, but I was struggling to accept the very real-ness of it, because up until this point, I had forced myself to believe that it didn’t really exist. I did not feel worthy. Fears and insecurities kicked in, thinking that this was just “too good to be true,” because in my eyes, she could have anyone she wanted, and I couldn’t wrap my head around what made me so special. Thinking she was going to wake up one day and realize that I was "boring" and that she could do better. I was struggling to tell myself that I am worthy, that it's just Fear talking, "sitting in it" alone trying to be "strong" and completely self-reliant, that I didn't need to show my vulnerabilities yet. I knew better, that I needed to communicate it, to open myself up and lean into Love, but my fear kept saying that it could wait for a more "appropriate" time (based on preconceived societal timelines). And so I wrestled with myself, “logic” (based in Fear) vs “intuition” (based in Love). It wasn’t until I was emotionally and physically exhausted that my Fear finally surrendered, that Love started to gain more control. I began to really feel God's presence, really noticing that I was being guided through this inner battle to be a better me on the other side. The more vulnerable and loving with myself and God I am, the more the fear heals, and I am more in a place to be able to receive the Divine love that was being offered. Next time, I will be ready to fully give myself, flaws and all.
Genesis 32:27 says “Then he said, ‘Let me go, for dawn is breaking.’ But he answered, ‘I will not let you go, unless you bless me.’” We are blessed when we accept and love ourselves in our entirety for who we are in this moment, when we let go of our inner resistance and let go of who we’re trying to be and say “I am worthy as I am right now.” Jacob is ready to accept himself for all that he is, a flawed human worthy of Divine love, just like the rest of us.
Jacob’s fear of being killed by Esau is a fear of rejection, a fear rooted in feeling unworthy of love. A fear of rejection can feel like it’s literally going to kill you. You’re shaking, heart pounding, everything in you screaming, and it feels like life or death. It is easier to run away and stay “safe.” Jacob has been avoiding this for twenty-two years. But avoidance is a false sense of safety. You cannot heal that fear by running away, only by leaning into it with love. Love is the real safety and where healing happens.
Jacob loves Esau, and wants to reconcile their issues, but he doesn’t know how. So he sends gifts to Esau in advance, hoping that it will put him in his favor and prevent Esau from acting impulsively towards him. But once Jacob really starts to look inward at himself, the wrestling match begins, and the Jacob that comes out on top is the one that has chosen the Path of Love. He could run away, but he knows it’s time to stop running and put his faith in God that things will work out. And though he is still afraid, he alone steps forward toward Esau, bowed low with his heart open and ready to give himself and receive Esau. And to his surprise, Esau embraces him. Esau didn’t want the gifts that Jacob sent, he too only wanted the love of his brother.
After the dust had settled from their conflict, all that remained was the love they had for each other. That once they were both ready to give and receive each other, they were guided back together, ready to heal those wounds because they both chose Love. The lesson here being that once we face ourselves and take accountability for our part in conflict, can we heal and reconcile through a Path of Love, that it’s okay for us to catch our breath before approaching one another again with our hearts open to the other. Hopefully, unlike Jacob and Esau, we can resolve our conflicts sooner, so we can decrease Fear’s power over us.
The Torah doesn’t tell us if Esau had his own wrestling match, but if you ask me, I think he did. When Esau had sworn to kill Jacob, he was speaking from a place of fear and rejection. He felt rejected by their father Isaac, and was afraid that he would not be blessed too. Esau wasn’t trying to be anyone else but himself (unlike Jacob), but he was being made to feel unworthy because of Jacob’s (and Rebecca’s) actions. I don’t think it’s much of a stretch to say that Esau felt unworthy in Rebecca’s eyes, her favoritism for Jacob being obvious, so when the only one he felt loved by, Isaac, told him that his blessing was given to Jacob, he now felt alone, unloved, and afraid. With Fear consuming him, he could only feel anger as a way to express the pain he felt. When he was finally ready to wrestle with himself, he had to overcome his fear of loving his brother, to let go of the pain that was caused by his actions. When he won his battle, he too was ready.
We all have our own personal wrestling matches, to overcome our worst enemy–ourselves. We all hurt the ones we love when we’re in conflict, when Fear is steering our actions. In order to overcome Fear, we must choose Love. Open our hearts and give of ourselves. Speak softly and really listen to each other. “Love thy neighbor as thyself” the Torah tells us, and by loving ourselves, we can love the other properly. We must give and receive at the same time, because they are in tandem; as I give myself to you, you give yourself to me, and we receive each other, knowing that we are worthy as we already are, perfectly flawed. We should always lean into this love, that is where we heal not just ourselves, but the world around us.
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