Divrei Simcha on Parshas Vayishlach 5767

In this week’s parsha, Yaakov and Eisav meet for the first time in 34 years. After they meet and greet, Eisav invites Yaakov to join him. Yaakov says ‘thank you very much but I need to say no’. In chapter 33, verses 13 and 14, we find out Yaakov’s reasoning for not joining his brother. He basically says to Eisav that you move quickly and I move slowly. There’s a great lesson we can learn from this: it is not Yaakov’s middah (trait) to always be in a rush.

Later on in the parsha, we learn about the terrible crime of Shechem. Shechem abuses Yaakov’s daughter Dinah and then asks for her hand in marriage. He is told that if he and his entire nation get a bris milah, then they can get married. Immediately, Shechem runs to perform the bris. Three days later, Shimon and Levi come along, and kill everyone in the city. Yaakov is very upset by their behavior, but Chazal, our Sages, point out that Yaakov does not say they did something wrong. Actually what they did was the right thing, because Shechem and his nation did not sincerely convert. They only converted out of a desire for Dinah.

This always bothered me. How did Shimon and Levi know that they did not convert sincerely? This year, I finally found an answer. The Torah says that Shechem wasted no time in getting his bris milah. When someone comes to convert, we push him away. We give them a hard time. We make them wait some time, sometimes a few years. We do this because we do not want people to rush into something. To be sincere, you can’t rush into it. When Yaakov’s sons saw Shechem rush into getting the bris, they realized it wasn’t sincere.

I once read the following story in a Rabbi Plisken sefer. A man was once taking an overseas flight and there were two lines to get onto the plane. One line was moving faster than the other. A guy in the slower line started (very loudly) to complain that the line was moving so slow. The person behind him started thinking — why is this person in such a rush? We are all going onto the same plane and have assigned seats. What’s the problem?

Why are we always in a rush? Is there any reason why we always need to be running everywhere? Therefore, Yaakov teaches us a great lesson — take your time. I’ll go along at my own slow pace. Because when we move along at this pace, we avoid many problems.

Good Shabbos!

-yes

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By Rabbi Yaacov Seltzer
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(305) 652-0186