Torah portion: Parashat Vayechi
In accepting responsibility for errors, Judah recognizes that there can be no self without responsibility
There is a strange verse in the prophet Jeremiah. Merachok Adonay Nirah Li; God appeared to me from afar. Sometimes that which is beautiful and divine only appears to us when it suddenly becomes far away. This is all too often the tragic paradox of human existence.
Only yesterday we could have called them and told them how much we love them, appreciated them, valued and respected them. But we did not. The drive of ego, competition and the oppressive demands of every day living made us too busy.
And then death or disease strike and all of the sudden the one who was so close and available that we could not see them clearly now becomes visible for first time. Sometimes a person first becomes fully present in their absence.
And need one say anymore in regard to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. This column about leadership and Messianic Consciousness is dedicated to one of the great heroes of Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
A blessing to his children
Jacob is blessings his children. The central figure who received the blessing of Kingship and Messianic consciousness is Yehuda. The key to Judah's blessings and to understanding the messianic consciousness of enlightenment that is central to Hebrew wisdom is revealed by a striking phrase. Lo Yasur Shevet MeYehuda Umechokek Mebein Raglav. "The staff shall not depart from Judah nor the "law inscribing instrument" from between his legs".
Biblical scholarship asks correctly; why is this phrase in the future tense. And the correct answer is that because in the past Judah actually did lose his staff and law inscribing instrument. In the story of Judah and Tamar Judah gives his staff and signet ring to Tamar and for a critical period is not able to recover them. It is the process of their recovery that Judah raises to Kingship and Messianic Consciousness.
So in order to understand the Jewish notion of leadership and Messianic consciousness incarnating by Judah we need to go back to the story of Judah and Tamar.
After the sale of Joseph, Judah leaves the company of the brothers and takes on a wife who is the daughter of a Canaanite man. From this union three children are born. Judah marries off his first son to a woman of unknown origin named Tamar.
The first son is 'displeasing to God' and dies before Tamar has children. Judah, in accordance with the law of the ancient Near East, gives to Tamar the hand in marriage of his second child, Onan, the brother of the deceased. This second son refuses to give his seed to fertilize Tamar…and is killed by God, again leaving Tamar childless. At this point according to biblical law Judah should give Tamar the opportunity to marry his youngest son, Shelah. Judah, however, is unwilling to do so. Whilst we reading the text know that Judah's two sons died as a direct result of their own sins. Judah blames the stranger, Tamar.
Consequently he fobs off Tamar, telling her to remain in her father's house until his youngest son Shelah has come of age. Of course, Judah has no intention of allowing his third and only remaining son to marry the woman who 'killed' his sons.
Secret of Judah's energy
Now let's try and understand the secret of Judah energy as it plays itself out in this pivotal narrative.
It would seem that a core motif is implicit in the text.
We see that Judah is irresponsible to literally everyone in the story. He does not fulfill his responsibility to his two dead sons, for according to biblical tradition they can be granted life even after their death by extending their kin line. This was accomplished through the marriage of the widow Tamar to their closest kin, in this case surviving brother, Shela. His child through Tamar would be considered an extension of the life of the deceased brothers.
After the first brother, Er, dies Judah indeed fulfills this responsibility by giving Tamar in marriage to the second brother, Onan. Onan however also dies childless. At this point Tamar should be offered the opportunity to marry Shela the youngest brother. Judah's refusal to give Shela to Tamar is, in the biblical framework, tantamount to killing them again. Judah does not fulfill his obligation to Shela. Shela's destiny is to marry Tamar. Judah prevents him from fulfilling his calling. Judah is irresponsible to Tamar by refusing to grant her Shela.
Responsibilities shirked
In all relationships Judah has shirked his personal responsibility. Personal responsibility flows from a sense of personhood. This is precisely what Judah lacks at this point in the story.
Were the story to end here the book of Genesis would be a pessimistic tragedy about human nature. It is at this point however that Judah's guide and angel appears on the scene. As is often the case she is someone who has been part of his life for many years. She is someone whom he has never recognized for who she is. She is Tamar.
"A long time afterward" Tamar is still at home, twice-widowed, trapped into waiting for Judah's youngest son. She knows that Shelah is now an adult and that Judah has not stood by his word. Hearing that Judah is nearing her home town Tamar disguises herself as a prostitute, covers her face, and waits for Judah . Judah sees what he assumes to be a whore by the roadside, and offers a deferred payment of a goat for their transaction. Tamar, who is only too aware of Judah's ability to make promises he does not keep, slyly insists upon a particular pledge of payment – no less than all of Judah's symbols of identification. Judah gives her his "seal and cord, and the staff which you carry," and then sleeps with her. Tamar conceives by this encounter.
Judah later sends the payment of the goat in order to reclaim his pledge, only to find, of course, that the prostitute has disappeared. His seal, cord and staff - symbols of his self and royalty - are seemingly lost. This is the incident alluded to in Parshat Vayechi where Judah loses his staff and his signet ring which is parallel to his Mechokek, his law inscribing instrument. Three months later he hears that Tamar is pregnant and sentences her to death by burning; he does not make the link between the veiled prostitute and Tamar.
Tamar makes no public outcry. As she is led to the stake, Tamar simply sends the seal, cord and staff to Judah with the message: "I am with child by the man to whom these belong." Judah recognizes the pledge, and orders her immediate release, saying "She is more in the right than I, inasmuch as I did not give her to my son Shelah." Tamar later gives birth to twins, who carry on the royal line of Judah.
What is the bible trying to teach us in this strange, dramatic and sometimes tawdry tale?
One of the pivoting points in the story is in Tamar's demanding an Eravon- a pledge to guarantee payment. She wants a pledge that is an expression of Judah's sense of self. This is precisely what she is trying to subliminally communicate to Judah - the need to claim his core sense of self and Responsibility.
The word Eravon, the pledge, she demands of Judah is a legal term in Hebrew. It denotes a cosigner on a loan who becomes obligated payment should the borrower default. The Arev, as the cosigner is termed in Hebrew, bears second line indirect responsibility. One Biblical scholar has perceptively pointed out the obvious; the person here with indirect responsibility towards Tamar is none other than Judah himself. If Judah refuses to give her Shela in lieu of his sons than Judah is obligated to marry her himself. Judah then is the Arev. He bears second line responsibility. Thus when Tamar demands an Eravon from Judah she is in effect demanding Judah himself. Since Judah has refused to fulfill his obligation towards her she has come to claim her due.
A closer analysis of Judah's situation reveals that he is not only indirectly obligated in Tamar's fate: Tamar is finally able to show him that Judah is personally and directly responsible. If Judah does not wish for his last surviving son to marry Tamar, then there is one last person who fulfills the same familial requirements: himself. Hiding behind the youth of his son Shelah, and Tamar's seeming 'bad luck', Judah chooses not to acknowledge that the person directly responsible for Tamar is none other than Judah himself.
Tamar's goal is to have Judah reclaim his sense of self. She is trying to provoke a confrontation which will lead to his being able to rightfully reclaim his staff, signet ring and cloak- the symbols of his personhood.
Judah's response to Tamar's challenge is clear and immediate, "She is more in the right than I," In accepting that the objects are his own, and therefore that the child in Tamar's belly is his own, and that the circumstances leading up to this event were his own fault, he is acknowledging that there can be no self without responsibility. It is this quality according to the text grants him Kingship and fosters the Messianic consciousness which will emerge from Judah and the house of David.
Rabbi Mordechai Gafni - Teacher and student of Torah; Leader of Bayit Chadash Spiritual Community and Movement; Chair of Integral Kabbalah at Integral Institute of Ken Wilber
The "Bayit Chadash" website: www.bayitchadash.org
