Carys Bloom - Dvar Torah

My Torah portion is called VAYISHLACH and it is found in the book of Genesis. It is about the story of two brothers, Jacobs and Esau who both want their father’s inheritance.

The inheritance would initially go to Esau since he was the oldest, however Jacobs wants it too.

Jacob eventually tricks his father into thinking he was Esau and gets the inheritance. Soon after Esau finds out about it and wants to kill his brother.

Jacob runs away to escape from Esau and twenty years later Jacobs returns.

The moment before Jacob meets up with Esau he is absolutely terrified. People have told him that Esau is waiting with four hundred men that are armed. Jacob knew that confronting his brother could end up in war or reconciliation. He decided he would carefully plan the reunion in a way that he could control the situation without upsetting anyone. Jacob after meeting up with Esau after all those years, walked away unharmed.

The worst thing to do when you are afraid is to just sit there being afraid and thinking about it. Dwelling on it. That is the complete opposite of what Jacob did. Instead, he had a plan. Jacob would send Esau gifts and cattle hoping it would almost soothe his anger or make Esau want to forgive Jacob more.

Obviously it worked because when they met, Esau didn’t want to kill Jacob anymore. Jacob left his brother unscathed.

This could mean that Esau just missed his brother, or that Jacob is a really smart guy. And everything was good in the end.

You should always try to fix or look at the positive side of things. For example when you see a glass of water, do you look at it and see it half empty or half full. Having a positive outlook rather than being negative. But it is also good to have balance.

In my life there have been times when there was no possible way that I could have been positive, for instance when my brother passed away. The glass was empty.

There have also been times in my life when I was very sad, but the situation was for the best. When my parents got divorced I was very sad, but it would mean that I would have two happy homes with two happier parents who love me very much.

Today is my Bat Mitzvah and if I am being honest, I was quite nervous about today. But as I have been preparing for today and as I stand here today, I realize there wasn’t much I had to be afraid of after all

Shabbat Shalom