When you look through the book of Beraishit it is hard not to be struck by the sheer tenacity of our Patriarchs and Matriarchs to not only persevere under sometimes crushing and challenging circumstances, but to emerge from the event and courageously shoulder on engaging whatever next life places before them. This model of defying life’s frustrations and defeats and refusing to retire from the struggle no matter its difficulty finds expression in an interesting phrase that repeats itself in our Parsha.
R. Stuart Weiss offers this fascinating insight.
The Parsha we read yesterday speaks broadly of three events: The death of Sarah, the purchase of Me’arat Ha’machpela, and the shidduch and subsequent marriage of Rivkah and Yitzchok. A possible thread that connects these narratives is the use of the verb, va’yakam, to rise up, which repeats itself in all three cases. To illustrate:
- When Avraham is done mourning Sara, the pasuk says, “VAYAKAM Avraham, and Avraham arose…”
- And when Eliezer is sent to find a wife for Yitzchok, the verse says, “VAYAKAM vayelech, and he arose and went …”
- And to cap it all off, when Rivkah assents to the marriage, VATAKAM Rivka…va’taylachna, and Rivkah arose and went ….”
After the trauma of Sarah’s death, we would certainly have been sympathetic if Avraham had chosen to retire from the stage of history, but he does not. He’s alive and there’s more living to be done. There’s a son to be married off along with another 50 years to father six more children. And Avraham rises up!
Both Rivkah and Yitzchok’s “rising” would also signify a new and important chapter in their lives. Rivkah would leave a home filled with idolatry and chicanery for a new life of chesed and emes (kindness and truth) as she helps to forge our nation. And Yitzchok would emerge from the ordeal of the Akeida to find love and companionship with his wife and take his rightful place among our Forefathers.
The message here is quite plain. When faced with adversity and hardship, our spiritual DNA, “hard-wired” for us by our ancestors, kicks in. First we know to endure bravely and then “va’ya’kam,” to rise up and push forward.
What a metaphor for Jewish renewal this is! It is this behavior of vayakam, most recently witnessed when in the aftermath of Sandy’s devastation so many rose up and displayed the uncommon courage to reclaim and restore and the blessed ethic to help and share, that inspires and gives us all strength – chizuk! We salute them all.
(from Rabbi Jeffrey Bienenfeld)
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