This week we begin Jacob’s journey to Padan Aram and his adventures there. After a divine encounter with a ladder, he meets his beautiful cousin Rachel, and instantly falls for her. In exchange for Rachel's hand in marriage, Jacob promises seven years of work for her father Laban. But he is deceived; he ends up marrying her older sister Leah instead. He does marry Rachel, but in exchange for another seven years of work. And then he's tricked into more work. With a real good grasp of genetics, Jacob grows rich in spite of Laban’s treachery and eventually sneaks away from him. His now rather large family of two concubines, two wives, soon-to-be thirteen children and lots of livestock goes with him. But as he starts home he realizes something: he will have to eventually confront Esau once again.
In one of the stranger stories in the Tanach, we have a record of ancient breeding practices. When Joseph is born, Jacob decides its time to go home. But Laban protests, knowing that his own wealth is because of Jacob. Jacob agrees to stay on for a while longer, but asks for his wages in a unique manner. The text reads:
32. I will pass through all your flock today, removing from there all the speckled and spotted cattle, and all the brown cattle among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and of such shall be my hire.33. So shall my righteousness answer for me in time to come, when you come to look into my wages with you; every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and brown among the sheep, that shall be counted stolen with me. [Genesis 30:32-33]
Laban then gets all the purely white sheep, and all the solidly colored goats. Jacob gets all the others. Laban, in short gets the “perfect animals” Jacob gets the less than perfect, the flawed animals - or so it must seem to Laban. Yet as we learn Jacobs’s manipulations: Jacob using some strange white striped rods, induces conception in the animals at the drinking trough, and they produce speckled striped and spotted ones.
41. And it came to pass, whenever the stronger cattle conceived, that Jacob laid the rods before the eyes of the cattle in the gutters, that they might conceive among the rods.42. But when the cattle were weak, he did not put them in; so the weaker were Laban’s, and the stronger Jacob’s.[Genesis 30:41-42]
He separates this lot and continues to have the animals conceive. When the animals are solid, he continues to breed only the weak animals of the solid animals since these are Laban's, creating a small weak flock. The hearty among his speckled flock, however, he continues to breed, making them even heartier. Eventually he has a large number of sheep and goats and the wealth to have other conveniences such as servants and camels.
Jacob thought of value not by appearance but by strength, and bred the imperfect looking animals for strength and vitality, while Laban’s perfect looking animals were bred for weakness. Rods which are easily visible by sheep and goats will entice them to scratch their heads on it as I found out once while using a monopod to photograph in a petting zoo. Anywhere I set up my subjects would duck under the camera to scratch their heads on the post holding up my camera. Rods might just keep the female sheep and goats docile enough that the males would come along and copulate with them. What let Jacob to pull the Darwinian wool, so to speak, over Laban’s eyes was Laban’s belief that a good sheep was a perfect skin. Their vitality, and thus their ability to reproduce, was not an issue for him -only their looks.
Of course, the Irony of this plan is who is doing such a plot. We read earlier in this portion:
16. And Laban had two daughters; the name of the elder was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. 17. Leah had weak eyes; but Rachel was beautiful and well favored. 18. And Jacob loved Rachel; and said, I will serve you seven years for Rachel your younger daughter.
This is the same man who went gaga for the pretty yet rather barren woman Rachel instead of the incredibly fertile Leah. Jacob was guilty of the same thing he’s pulling on Laban, but apparently he’s learned his lesson. But then again how guilty are we of the same thing as Laban? According to any source I know of, more people choose who to talk to people with pictures posted on online dating than only their description. If you don’t have a picture, you might not have a chance of getting any responses, a bad picture gets less responses than a good picture.
We are told that Leah had weak eyes, whatever that means. In the Targum pseudo-Jonathan they were Ziran eyes from pleading with God that she would not have to marry Isaac’s first born, Esau. As far as the priesthood is concerned, such eyes would disqualify one from making sacrifices. Indeed the things that are listed along with this are rather interesting:
ZIRAN. It has been taught: One whose eyes are bleared and granulated; weeping, dripping and running. A Tanna taught: Zewir, lufyon, and tamir are blemishes. Zewir is one whose eyes are unsteady [mezawar]. Lufyon is one having thick and connected eyebrows, and tamir is one whose eyebrows are gone. [Behorot 44a]
Rashi comments that Ziran means they pivot back and forth, they were shifty eyes. Rashi implies that she never made eye contact for long. The rabbis on using a whole series of defects around the eyes are emphasizing something here: our appearance matters, especially the eyes.
And thus we get the paradox of this week’s portion. On one hand Jacob learns that it is not outward appearances that indicate strength and quality, which he first learns with the proclivity of his wives. In the same chapter describing such proclivity, He then demonstrates the same thing by conning Laban out of all of his sheep, basing everything on appearance. Yet at the same time, appearance is all too often used, even by the Torah, and Talmud for determining who is capable of giving sacrifices and blessings. We can see this paradox in the statement of Etcs of rivals it Hillel and Shammai in the Perkei Avot:
He [Hillel also] used to say: if I am not for myself, who is for me, but if I am for my own self [only], what am I, and if not now, when? Shammai used to say: make your [study of the] Torah [a matter of] established [regularity]; speak little, but do much; and receive all men with a pleasant countenance. [Avot 1]
The more lienent Hillel advocates inner work, and Shammai the outside appearances. Both are right, but how?
In a world with thousands of interactions every day, we do not have the time to get to know someone well before we make a judgment. Indeed it would be waste of time, and in some ways painful, to know someone well and then judge them. Instead we make up our mind whether we want to pursue such an exchange within 30 seconds of meeting someone and decide how legitimate they are. And with the first few seconds, based in their dress grooming and posture, we decide whether we will pursue that conversation or not.
It of course has quirks and problems. The biggest is to believe that the appearance is the only thing, like Laban, who could not see that quality extended beneath the skin. All too often we look at the “Beautiful people” because of their dress or appearance. Magazines are full of the stuff, but never really getting under the skin to the quality of the person underneath -- even “in depth interviews” are superficial and scripted. Rachel may have been such a person, her stealing of the household gods seem to point that although she is good looking she does not accept the God of her husband. And if number of children is any measure, she want strong either, having only two and dying in childbirth on the second, unlike Leah who has seven children.
The other problem is the issue that was true of Leah and her weak eyes. In the case of any of the eye conditions mentioned above, as eyes are a window to the soul, they would portray a negative image as the window is distorted or closed, and that makes people uncomfortable. To look into Leah’s eyes’ or for her to look into Jacob’s was difficult, and thus they never connected. But many things such as a unibrow can be shaved, a habit of not looking someone in the eye can be corrected through practice, and we can connect even when we thought we might not be able to
Even though we should never be superficial, our appearance dictates our interactions with others. Dress, grooming, our posture, eyes and mouth all tell volumes about us instantly. For a person in a leadership position, such as a priest, there is a need to build confidence fast, and this is the reason for the restrictive rules about priests and the people with defects.
I believe there are many people with or without physical defects who sabotage themselves in their quest for connection by looking like they want to look and not like they want to connect- including me for quite a while. Like the sheep, they insist the inside does count, but they are unaware that like Leah and Rachel, it’s that first impression which makes people trust you enough to connect. Yet I also believe the things that had the most impact, eye contact, grooming dress, and smiles are all controllable by us. No matter what other defects we have, fat, thin, ugly or gorgeous, it is those things we can change, and often easily which makes us attractive or unattractive. And there is always one inexpensive and powerful one which we can all add to make ourselves attractive. Remember you are never dressed without an honest smile. It was Shammai who said to greet everyone with a pleasant countenance, literally with a beautiful shining face. I think he meant a smile.
Sage advice from a sage.
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