Author: Shlomo Bar-Ayal

Before Joseph can attend his position of leadership he has to learn to be humble. That he can’t just declare himself the leader and expect others to follow. That is the reason he has to be sold into slavery and be in prison.

Judah’s doesn’t realize his potential. But Tamar does. It is only through their union is his full potential realized and he can then become the leader he was meant to be.

Both Joseph and Judah each have to undergo a crisis to achieve their potentials. The issue is not that there is a crisis that we face in our lives but how we handle them and how do we learn from them.

Jacob makes the mistake of letting all his sons know that Joseph is his favorite. This leads to jealousy and disaster. Joseph compounds the mistake by throwing this in their faces.

Jacob and Esau come together one final time to bury Isaac. They leave knowing that they have differences that cannot be bridged. The lesson is to know what we can agree on and what we cannot.

The reason for Rachel dying before her time was that she had stolen her father’s idols. She did it with the good intentions of stopping him from idolatry. The problem was that she stole them. Your intentions do not matter if your methods are wrong.

Simon and Levi destroy Schem for their sister’s honor. The reason the whole city had to destroyed was that all were complicit in the rape of their sister.

Jacob hides his daughter, Dina, from Esau because he knew that Esau would want her for sex. What he did not realize was that Dina had to power to civilize Esau. If Esau would have married Dina then he would have become a righteous man.

When Jacob and Esau meet, Jacob states that he was able to live in the house of Laban and keep all the mitzvot. Esau is amazed. Mentally he knows that it is possible, but he cannot control his urges while Jacob can.