D’var Torah – December 13

I hope this finds you all well.

There’s this man, and his passion is restoring and building boats. Fair enough, it’s a nice hobby. One day the man decides to build his dream boat, his magnum opus, something he’s always envisioned. He buys the finest lumber and parts, and spends hours locked away sanding, shaping, coating, and sealing the wood, building the engine, and crafting the bilge pumps. He blows off date night with his wife, forgets his daughter’s dance recitals and his son’s hockey games, and skips visiting his folks. Day after day, night after night, week after week, year after year, he labors on that boat. Even his conversations focus entirely on his project. Well, as one might expect, his wife divorces him, his children become estranged, and his friends give up on him. Finally, one day, his boat is finished. But when he looks at it admiringly, his happiness is shattered as there is no one to celebrate with him.

There is a famous question: “Is the juice worth the squeeze?”

In other words, was the result or reward worth the effort, the pain, and the tribulation.

In this week’s parsha of Vayishlach* we see two examples of this. First, after wrestling a strange man (many argue an angel) throughout the night and coming out victorious, Jacob is blessed with a new name, Israel.[1]However, during their contest, the stranger dislocates Jacob’s hip socket, leaving him with a permanent limp.[2] Second, Jacob and his favored/beloved wife Rachel have a second son together, Benjamin. Benjamin becomes Jacob’s favorite child, second only to Joseph.[3] Tragically, Rachel dies from childbirth.[4]

Was the blessed name Israel worth the limp? Was the birth of Benjamin worth the death of Rachel?

The great Rabbi of the 10th century Saadia Gaon wrote “The more valuable the thing, the more effort it demands,” and “The good attained by effort is twice as precious.”[5]

On the other hand, late in his life, when Pharoah asks Jacob how old he is, he replies, “The years of my sojourn [on earth] are one hundred and thirty. Few and hard have been the years of my life, nor do they come up to the life spans of my ancestors during their sojourns.”[6]

Perhaps the lesson here is that we have to individually decide if the end result is worth the effort that gets us there.

Bizrat HaShem, with God’s love and guidance, may we all have the judgement, discernment, and wisdom to determine when the juice is worth the squeeze.

Wishing you a Good Shabbos and a great weekend.

L’Shalom,

Rabbi Aaron Stucker-Rozovsky

“Run to do even the slightest mitzvah.” – Ben Azzai (Pirkei Avot 4:2)