Our Ancestor, Jacob - or Israel

Our parasha for this week, Vayechi, shows at length a truly beautiful deathbed scene. Jacob is ill (Midrash says that he was the first one to be sick before he died) and summons Joseph to make him promise that he will carry Jacob back to Israel to be buried in the Cave of Machpelah, not left in Egypt. Joseph makes this promise and brings his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, for Jacob to bless. Jacob blesses them both, holding them on his knees, essentially elevating their status to the same as his sons’ – they each become a Tribe and each get a portion of land in the Promised Land. He then calls for the rest of his sons and speaks to each one individually, from the heart, from knowing each one’s nature so very well. These are not all by any means blessings! He then dies. Joseph obtains permission from the Pharaoh to bury his father back in Israel, and Jacob is indeed carried back to the Cave of Machpelah to be buried alongside his family.

Once Jacob is gone, the other brothers fear that there is nothing now to stop Joseph from seeking revenge on them for the way they treated him. But he assures them that this is not on his mind and that instead he is grateful that he was able to be in Egypt first to prepare a way to feed all the rest of the family when famine strikes Israel.

My beloved father had the twin luxuries of time and mental capacity to create a patriarchal scene for his own death. He took each of his children in turn and also my son, the oldest of his grandchildren, and privately gave each of us his blessing and words about our lives and hopes for our futures. And the father of my children asked for and received special time alone with each of our grandchildren in his own final days.

Beautiful images of beautiful deathbed scenes. We do not have the ability to plan out our own deaths, of course, and can only hope that things move in this direction rather than that direction. Jacob’s final hours are something we can only aspire to but not count on. So what is there that we can learn from this long story in the Torah?

Jacob is considered to be the direct ancestor of the Jewish people. His name was changed to Israel in his wrestling with the angel, and we take our name from that. His sons became the Tribes and those of us today who are ethnically Jewish and are aware of this fact are descended from one of three of those – Levi or Judah or Benjamin. Thus, his life story is sometimes seen as a metaphor for the entire Jewish nation. Everybody comes together at the end and surrounds him while he lies on his bed speaking to each one. We remember that Jacob and Esau came together to bury Isaac and that Ishmael and Isaac came together to bury Abraham. We can learn from these poignant tales that family is paramount. There is our relationship with God, there is our responsibility within the community, but front and center is our place in the family. In the end, it is not your customers who will stand around your deathbed. It is those you love most to whom you make your primary commitment. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks writes, “[Genesis is n]ot about the creation of the world, which occupies only one chapter, but about how to handle family conflict. As soon as Abraham’s descendants can create strong families, they can move from Genesis to Exodus and their birth as a nation.

“I believe that family is the birthplace of freedom. Caring for one another, we learn to care for the common good.”