Parasha: Vayetze · Aliyah: Sixth (Yesod)

ויגנב יעקב את לב לבן הארמי, Jacob deceived Laban the Aramite, etc. It is difficult to justify the expression "fled" which is applied here to a departure without previous good-byes. Perhaps what is meant is that when Jacob gave Laban an accounting about all that he had done, etc., he concealed the fact that he intended to leave him. He presumably asked Laban to dismiss him, thus in effect telling Laban that he had no intention of leaving without a proper ceremony. Had Laban had the slightest notion that Jacob intended to take his family and leave without a send-off, he would have had him watched day and night. The successful flight was possible only because Jacob "stole" Laban's heart. Basically, our verse wanted to explain how it was that Jacob succeeded to depart unnoticed with all his family, herds and flocks.

דרך שבעת ימים. a distance of seven days. We must examine why the earth did not "fold" under Jacob on this occasion to facilitate his journey (in response to the urging of the angel) as it had done when he was on the way to Charan at the beginning of our פרשה. If the earth even "folded" for Eliezer, Abraham's servant at the time (as we know from Bereshit Rabbah 59,11), it would certainly have seemed appropriate that the same should happen to the righteous Jacob, especially since he then would have been out of danger of pursuit. Perhaps the failure of the earth to "fold" was a way of G'd telling Jacob that he did not need to flee, that even if Laban were to catch up with him he would not even be able to speak to him offensively or threateningly. Had G'd made the earth "fold" for him, Jacob might have thought that G'd had no other means of putting him out of Laban's reach. If G'd had not spoken to Laban even קפיצת הדרך would not have sufficed to allow Jacob to escape Laban and his sons. The greatness of the miracle was that although Laban possessed freedom of choice he was prevented from exercising it against Jacob.

The fact that G'd chose not to let the earth "fold" for Jacob on this occasion also became important historically. It led to Rachel being buried in a place where her prayers would intercede on behalf of the Jewish people going into exile, Midrash Hagadol Vayishlach 35,18; according to Sanhedrin 105 Laban is identical with Bileam and Cushan Rishotayim who attacked the Israelites in the time of Othniel. If the Israelites defeated him (Judges 3,10) it may have been because he breached the covenant that Jacob and Laban concluded at Galed. Had the encounter of Laban and Jacob not taken place at that time, there would not have been a breach of an agreement not to attack the descendants of Jacob in their own country.

ועתה הלוך הלכת, "When you left now, etc." Laban said: "since you have previously expressed your longing to see your father again, why did you choose to leave now in such a way that it looked like a flight?" Laban was leading up to what he expected Jacob's defence to be, namely that he was anxious to see his father. If so, he argued, why did you have to steal my תרפים, charms? Surely this makes your entire departure appear like a flight! You must have been afraid that the תרפים would reveal your where-abouts to me!

ויען יעקב, Jacob replied, etc. Jacob said: "I do not deny that I fled. As to the reason why, 'I was afraid you would steal your daughters from me by force. As to your argument that I stole the תרפים so that they could not reveal my whereabouts to you, I swear that whoever has taken them shall not live.'" Jacob committed the fatal error of uttering a curse based on partial information.

לא יחיה, "he shall not live!" Jacob applied the legal yardsticks applicable to all Gentiles, i.e. the death penalty. Should you argue that there was no need to spell out the penalty seeing everybody knew what the penalty for stealing was, Jacob wanted to emphasise that he would not plead that he had received these תרפים as a gift or had simply forgotten to return them.

ויחר ליעקב וירב, Jacob then grew angry and argued, etc. The Torah stresses that Jacob's quarrelling was the direct result of his becoming angry. Otherwise he would not have started a quarrel.

וירב בלבן. He quarrelled with Laban. The meaning of the word בלבן is to show that this argument was considered as a quarrel only in the eyes of Laban. Anyone else would not have considered Jacob's justified argument a quarrel. In Bereshit Rabbah 74,10 Rabbi Azaryah describes this irritability of the patriarchs as preferable to the humility of subsequent generations of their descendants. He describes Jacob's conduct as conciliatory. Jacob pointed out that it was no more than fair that a son-in-law makes use of his father-in-law's utensils once in a while, etc. The approach by Rabbi Azaryah closely reflects what we have said. Perhaps the Torah also had in mind to tell us that Jacob quarrelled "with Laban," i.e. when the two were not overheard, were in the privacy of his tent. He did not humiliate Laban by complaining to him in public.

מה פשעי, מה חטאתי, "what intentional or even unintentional sin against you am I guilty of?" Jacob meant that if during the last twenty years Laban ever had occasion to fault him for an intentional or even an unintentional trespass against him, he could understand why Laban was suspicious of him now. Seeing that he had never given Laban any reason to suspect him of wrong-doing why would he do so now? Jacob also alluded to Laban's manner of searching his belongings. The way Laban had examined every last one of Jacob's belongings clearly indicated that he hoped to find not only his Teraphim but other triviae that Jacob might have stolen from him. Laban had used the disappearance of his Teraphim only as a pretext to conduct a thorough search of all of Jacob's belongings. Jacob challenged Laban's right to have done so.

מששת את כל כלי, "you have handled all my utensils." You have examined items that could not be remotely capable of concealing your Teraphim, such as utensils which are much smaller than your Teraphim.

מה מצאת מכל כלי ביתך, "which, if any of your own utensils did you find?" Did you even find a single utensil that could arouse the doubt that it was one of yours?

שים כה נגד אחי, "place it here in the presence of my brothers, etc." Jacob referred to his having invited Laban in verse 32 to "identify anything of his that he would find." At that time Jacob had still believed that Laban was only interested in locating his Teraphim. This is why he had given him permission to search. In the meantime he found out that Laban had indeed suspected him of thievery. We have written earlier that villains have a tendency of suspecting others of being guilty of the same crimes they themselves are guilty of. Since Laban was a thief, it was natural for him to think of others as thieves also. Jacob now had reason to believe that Laban would claim as his what was really Jacob's. This is why he demanded that Laban display all such items and then proceed to identify them by describing them in minute detail while not looking at them. He was not willing to accept the opinion of Laban's brothers as corroboration of any of his claims, but wanted his own people to be present.

זה עשרים שנה, וג׳ "These twenty years, etc." The reason Jacob mentioned "twenty years" was that a thief or swindler would be on guard for a relatively short time not to commit any crimes. It is not in the nature of thieves to control their natural inclination for a long period of time. Jacob therefore wanted to show that the fact he had not stolen anything for such a long period should have made it plain that he was not a thief by nature. He underlined this by the word עמך, with you; He meant you have had plenty of opportunity to observe me commit a misdemeanour. When did I ever do so?

רחליך ועזיך, "your ewes and your she-goats did not miscarry." We have to explore what Jacob meant by citing this detail. If he merely wanted to call attention to his success in managing Laban's flock, this is not the appropriate place for such a comment. He also referred to אילי צאנך, וג׳, "the rams of your flocks, etc." Who would have suspected Jacob of eating those? Moreover, if no one had knowledge of Jacob doing any such thing previously, who would step forward after all these years to testify against him?

Jacob contrasted his own behaviour with that common amongst other shepherds. They all steal and account for the missing numbers by attributing them to animals miscarrying, whereas in reality they appropriated such lambs for themselves. Jacob now cited the fact that he had never even claimed that any of Laban's ewes or she-goats had miscarried as proof that he could not have stolen any of these animals. He could therefore not be accused of having eaten any of these animals himself. All his success had been due to G'd who had not allowed a single miscarriage to occur in order that Jacob could not be suspected of dishonesty.

The reason that he mentioned "the rams of your flocks" is to teach us that the Torah considers a male baby lamb already as a ram when it has only just been born. Perhaps Jacob referred to a legal point mentioned by Maimonides Hilchot Gezeylah chapter 2, according to which if someone stole a lamb and it developed into a ram (grew up while in the thief's care) the thief has acquired it [legally speaking, this means primarily that he is responsible for its wellbeing. Ed.], the original owners not being able to reclaim the same animal as compensation. This rule applies even when the owners had not given up hope of retrieving the same animal. Jacob told Laban that even when the circumstances would have been such that he could have legally kept an animal for himself, he did not avail himself of the legality of the matter but acted strictly according to what his conscience dictated to him as being correct moral behaviour. He could have returned lambs to Laban instead of fully grown animals; however he returned fully grown ones if perchance an accident had happened to one of the young animals under his care. He did not even "consume" the difference in value between a lamb and a fully grown ram.

טרפה לא הבאתי אליך, "I did not bring you those torn by wild animals, etc." How does the expression הבאה, bringing, fit the situation of an animal torn by wild beasts? Also, why did he repeat: "They were my loss, you collected from me?"

Jacob pointed out to Laban that he took compensation from him for something that he was legally liable for as well as for losses for which Jacob was not legally liable at all. He spelled out טרפה as an example of losses due to wolves, and: "I did not bring you," as examples of losses due to attacks by a lion. We find the following statement in Baba Metzia 93: "When a shepherd or trustee abandons the animals under his care by making a trip to the city, and a lion came and trampled an animal to death, or a wolf came and tore an animal, etc." We see that different animals cause death by different methods. A wolf leaves the scene of where he caused harm immediately, whereas the lion kills his prey and remains at that site until he has devoured it. He leaves only the skin and the dung. Similarly, Jacob alluded to these two kinds of predators. He added: אנכי אחטנה, concerning the fence for which he was responsible. Had there been a single wolf, proper fencing in of the animals would have prevented such an attack; therefore the paid keeper is responsible for such damage (Baba Metzia 72). Jacob referred to the other kind of fence, i.e. one that is trampled on by the lion, something for which the shepherd is not responsible. Laban took no notice of these distinctions and insisted on compensation from Jacob regardless of the cause of the damage he suffered. Rashi must been inspired by the Holy Spirit when he gave this explanation. He had the same thing in mind as we have have just elaborated on.

When Jacob added: גנובתי יום וגנובתי לילה, "regardless of whether it was stolen from me by day or by night," he referred to damage incurred through hostile humans; in either case Jacob paid, whether he was legally responsible or not, such as when it was stolen at night.

31.42. לולי אלוקי אבי…היה לי, "Were it not for the fact that my father's G'd the G'd of Abraham helped me, etc." The reason Jacob did not merely say "the G'd of my father Abraham," and chose to repeat the word G'd, was twofold. 1) He meant to say "firstly my father's G'd stood by me because of my father's merits." 2) It was due to the unlimited power of G'd who supervised my fate personally so that I was able to salvage my earnings. When Jacob said: אלוקי אברהם, he meant that it had been Abraham who had spread the fame of that G'd and acquainted mankind with His truth. He demonstrated to the world that G'd judges fairly. Jacob implied that if his father had worshiped a different god such a god could not have saved him.

Jacob had an additional thought when he spoke about "אלוקי אבי" (in addition to אלוקי אברהם). First he spoke about the "G'd of my father," i.e. the merit of his fathers, which assisted him. In the case of Abraham this was the merit of חסד, Abraham's outstanding virtue (compare Micha 7,20). In the case of his father Isaac it was the virtue of justice referred to by Jacob as פחד יצחק, "the One whom Isaac stood in awe of." Jacob refrained from saying אלוקי יצחק in order to be able to allude to his father's outstanding virtue. We find G'd Himself referring to אלוקי יצחק in Genesis 28,14. Jacob mentioned both attributes to illustrate the fact that G'd had done outstanding kindness for him and had also helped him to obtain justice from Laban. Unless G'd had employed both these attributes Jacob would not have attained all that he had.

את עניי ואת יגיע כפי, "my misery and my handiwork." Jacob meant that had it not been for the misery he had suffered G'd would have paid him his reward only in the Hereafter even though he was entitled to it here and now. It was only because of the anguish Jacob experienced that G'd paid him his deserts already now and paid him what was due to him for the labour he had performed (compare Deut. 24,15).