Especially when they are stories that we learned from a very young age, it is very hard to take a new look at a text without regressing to the way we have always been taught. In
Wrestling Jacob, Rabbi Klitsner tries to do just that with the Jacob narratives in Genesis. Klitsner does this by using a plethora of literary parallels, pointing out peculiar word choices and psychoanalyzing Jacob.Not only does Klitsner do a great job of reading each part of the Jacob stories in a new way, he shows how the stories can be read together, each part dealing with the psychology of Jacob. When Jacob follows Rivka's advice and fools his father, he gives up his own moral autonomy. He spends the rest of his life trying to repair his torn soul, something that only finally happens when he fights with the angel and wins. While his ideas are certainly enlightening sometimes it feels that he is stretching the text to fit in the psychological ideas. Many times word choice and parallels help this type of reading, but when they aren't there it seems forced. One interesting chapter that I think is entirely relevant today was the comparison of Jacob's "stealing" of his father's blessing to Jacob's "stealing" of Lavan's sheep. Through much critical reading, Klitsner argues that Isaac was always going to give the real blessing to Jacob. What he got from Isaac with his guile was added material blessing. Since it is perceived by Esau that Jacob stole the entire birthright, everything he does is seen as trickery, leading to hatred. Similarly, Lavan feels that Jacob stole his sheep when he continuously is able to choose which type of sheep will be born. After that Lavan is skeptical of everything Jacob does and never feels that he got everything he has fairly. He never even admits that his wives, Lavan's daughters, are his. Even though everything Jacob has he got fairly, since some of it is perceived to be taken unfairly, everything is put into doubt. Perhaps we can see underpinnings of the situation in Israel in the Lavan and Jacob story. In the Lavan story, somethings, while not actually taken unfairly, are thought to be stolen, and then everything Jacob has is deligitimized. Similarly, much of the world believes that we have taken Israel in an unfair manner. Therefore, everything else that has been acquired fairly in wars, like in 1967, are delegitimized. I really do think Israel is in a similar situation to Jacob with Lavan, in this respect. However, I am not sure what to make of that information. What do you think?
