I have set myself a goal for December – to shift from feeling driven in the way I work, to calmer and more accepting ways of being at work. I often feel like I am frantically moving my attention from one urgent task to another, doubting myself, feeling disappointed, and worrying about what might happen next. However, change is risky because we can try to change too much and either fail to change very much at all – or, worse, succeed in overbalancing from too anxious to become too relaxed and passive. This is an exploration of the challenges of equanimity and personal change, and draws on the example of the patriarch Jacob.
Equanimity
Jewish tradition extolls the virtue of השתוות
– Hishtavut, equanimity. This quality is illustrated by the story of the
man who sought to join a group of Kabbalists as an initiate. The admission test, which
he failed, was whether he felt the same when people praised or insulted him (1).
I remember, as a child, being in awe of my father when something went wrong in
his work and his reaction was of one of utter calm. However, equanimity is
an ideal that eluded the patriarch Jacob.
Jacob – the name means the crooked blocker
Jacob’s name and identity was inherently about trying to stop the inevitable. When Jacob was born, his hand held on to his brother's heel, which is interpreted as him trying to prevent the inevitable fact of his brother being the first born (2). This act earned him the name Jacob (3), which has connotations of thwarting someone and trickery. As a teenager he again tried to change the facts of the birth order by offering his brother a bowl of lentils in exchange for the birth-right (4). Despite Jacob’s scheme for advancing his status, his dying blind father still chose to bless Jacob’s older brother. In response Jacob, disregarding his deep ethical reservations, impersonated Esau and was blessed instead (5). This deception enraged Esau, which led Jacob to flee to another country. When he arrived there, he boasted that he could be devious if someone tried to trick him (6). Yet, despite his boast, he was repeatedly deceived (7), and resorted to strange tricks with sticks in a never-ending fight for his rights (8).
Frantic approach to a brother
Two decades after the bitter falling out with his brother,
Esau, Jacob returned to his homeland. Anticipating
a confrontation with Esau, Jacob prepared frantically with gifts, flattery, and
preparation for war (9). He cried
out to God with a heartfelt prayer, “Save me, please, from the hand of my
brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him, lest he come and strike me,
(and my family too) a mother and children” (10). Yet, it turned out that his brother kissed him when
they met rather than sought to attack him as Jacob had expected (11). Esau even
reassured Jacob about the disputed blessings (12), with the statement: “let
what is yours, be yours” (13).
Jacob was criticized for not simply letting things be (14). Jacob’s anxious approach is linked to an interpretation to the verse in the psalm, may “goodness and kindness pursue me” (15). We can be too anxious or unaware of blessings that are sent to us, so we run away. In this psalm we request that the blessings pursue us despite our difficulty in receiving them (16).
Personal Rebranding
In the middle of
all the frantic preparation, Jacob stopped. It was the middle of the night, and
he was alone (17). Jacob entered a heightened state of consciousness
and inner struggle, separating himself from his material self and his external identity and
his name Jacob (18). Perhaps he had enough of being “Jacob”, was tired of
hustling, of the ethical ambiguities and the anxiety and stress. We read that Jacob
wrestled with a “man” while he was alone. The man was “the guardian
angel of his brother Esau” (19) – or perhaps it was how Jacob would imagine his
brother’s angel (20).
At the end of this epiphany or spiritual encounter, Jacob emerged with a new name, Israel; he was not to be called Jacob anymore. This new name symbolises strength and ability to confidently negotiate with humans or divine beings (21). This experience was intense and left Jacob scarred in his thigh (22). Perhaps the thigh represents walking and movement (23), and it being injured was symbolic of reducing Jacob's hectic pace. According to the mystics, the thigh represents the drive to victory or competitiveness (24), and it being hit represented shifting to a calmer approach.
Balance
When I studied this transformation of
identity, I was drawn to it and thought I might model my personal growth on
Jacob-Israel's dramatic change. As I read more and reflected on this, it
started to become disturbing. Despite Jacob’s new identity as Israel, a new man
filled with confidence and strength, a new crisis arose with the abduction of Jacob-Israel’s
daughter Dina (25). The old frenetic Jack-in-the-box Jacob was silent and
missing in action, but so was the new Israel identity. New ways of being taking
practice and time to develop, and can’t always be manifest. Yet, it seems like
Jacob did not fall back on his old ways either, to save his daughter through
desperate measures or tricks.
My conclusion is to aim for equanimity, but also to embrace my New York-Chabad forged drive and hustle as tools in my toolbox and aspects of my personality. Like Jacob, I can become an Israel, but I am not aiming for a negation of my earlier way of being or identity. Equanimity begins for me with being ok with being a little stressed. I anticipate that I will learn how to work more calmly, but I am trying to be ready for the times when “I don’t, because sometimes I won’t” (26). And when that happens, I hope to be ok with that too.
Notes
1) Gates of Holiness, 4th chapter, Third Gate, section 5- By Rabbi Chaim Vital; translated and adapted by Zechariah Goldman https://www.chabad.org/kabbalah/article_cdo/aid/380555/jewish/Equanimity.htm2) Rashi
3) Genesis 25:26
4) Genesis 25:29-31
5) Genesis 27:11-14, the sin of his deception was considered so serious that the in the Talmud, Sanhedrin 92a Jacob’s behaviour is compared to idol worship.
6) Genesis 29:12 Jacob states that he is Laban’s sister’s brother which is understood by Talmud Megila 13b to state that he “is his brother in deception”
7) Genesis 29:18-23 and 31:7
8) Genesis 30:31-41
9) Genesis 32:4-21, see Jonathan Sacks, in Covenant and Conversation p. 230
10) Genesis 32:12
11) Genesis 33:4, See Midrash Rabba 78:9 (33:4), p. 773, it was sincere and with his whole heart.
12) Rashi to Genesis 33:9, see Baal Haturim: the Gematriya, the numerical value of the letters in the words אחי יהי לך אשר לך (my brother let what is yours be yours) is the same as זה הברכות they both equal the number 645.
13) Genesis 33:9
14) Midrash Rabba Midrash Rabba 32:4
15) Psalm 23:6
16) Baal Shem Tov, in Shimon Menachem Mendel of Gavaratchov (ed). on the Torah, p. 271, 9
17) Genesis 32:25
18) Malbim on 32:25 p.319, his being alone relates to his preparation for prophecy, in a state of התבודדות
19) Beresheet Rabba 77
20) Ralbag, p 202 & 204, The Midrash Aggada, cited in Kasher, Torah Shlaima, p. 1282, 146 tells us that Jacob pleaded with his brother’s angel for forgiveness for the blessings from his father, but the angel representing Esau, seemed to have moved on as he responded with the question “who is complaining about you [about this]?
21) Genesis 32:29
22) Genesis 32:26
23) Netziv, in Lamm, N. A commentary for the ages- Genesis, p. 176, it is associated with the hip that is linked to walking and it represents movement.
24) Derech Mitzbotecha, Mitzvat Gid Hanasheh
25) Genesis 34:1-5
26) Dr. Seuss, Oh, the places you’ll go.
