This week’s פרשה is ויצא פרשת. It starts off saying that יעקב is running away from שבע-באר because he had just taken the blessing of the בכורה from עשו, and רבקה, his mother said it was not safe for him to stay there. יעקב didn’t have an initial destination to go to, but he ended up in חרן. In חרן he found a place to sleep, but before he went to sleep he took 12 rocks, put one under his head and scattered the rest around him. There is a מדרש here that comes to say that when יעקב woke up there was only one rock meaning that they all combined into one. Isn’t that weird though? Why did they form into one? The rocks all wanted the honor of being יעקב’s pillow and in turn were all fighting about who deserved it. As a solution for this argument, they all formed into one big rock. This מדרש teaches us that just as the rocks all fought to have the honor of being under יעקב’s head, so to we should all run to do מצוות and have the honor of being ‘ה’s “pillow”.
The פרשה then goes on to say that יעקב had a dream and in this dream he saw a ladder with one angel going up and one angel going down. From this event, one might come to ask what is the significance of a ladder, why can’t it be stairs or a hill, why is it so important? The difference between a ladder and anything else is that a ladder has to lean on something whereas stairs are free standing and don’t need any help. In addition, the פסוקים also say that ‘ה was at the top of the ladder, which in turn means that the ladder was leaning on ‘ה. The significance of the angels going up and down is to show us that every person needs a direction and our direction should always be up towards ‘ה and just as the ladder was leaning on ‘ה, so to we should also always lean on ‘ה and know that He is there for us.
Shabbat Shalom,
Michal Malka