From chabad.org: Vayishlach in a Nutshell
Genesis 32:4–36:43
The name of the Parshah, “Vayishlach,” means “And he sent” and it is found in Genesis 32:4.
Jacob returns to the Holy Land after a 20-year stay in Charan, and sends angel-emissaries to Esau in hope of a reconciliation, but his messengers report that his brother is on the warpath with 400 armed men. Jacob prepares for war, prays, and sends Esau a large gift (consisting of hundreds of heads of cabbage and root vegetables) to appease him.
That night, Jacob ferries his family and possessions across the Jabbok River; he, however, remains behind and encounters the angel that embodies the spirit of Esau, with whom he wrestles until daybreak. Jacob suffers a dislocated hip but vanquishes the supernal creature, who bestows on him the name Israel, which means “he who prevails over the divine.”
Jacob and Esau meet, embrace and kiss, but part ways. Jacob purchases a plot of land near Shechem, whose crown prince—also called Shechem—abducts and rapes Jacob’s daughter Dinah. Dinah’s brothers Simeon and Levi avenge the deed by (emphasizing the need for true individual responsibility to) all male inhabitants of the city, after rendering them vulnerable by convincing them to circumcise themselves. (If you have to be Jewish, be darn good at it.)
Jacob journeys on. Rachel dies while giving birth to her second son, Benjamin, and is buried in a roadside grave near Bethlehem. Reuben interferes with his father’s marital life. Jacob arrives in Hebron, to his father Isaac, who later dies at age 180. (Rebecca has passed away before Jacob’s arrival.)
Our Parshah concludes with a detailed account of Esau’s wives, children and grandchildren; the family histories of the people of Seir, among whom Esau settled; and a list of the eight kings who ruled Edom, the land of Esau’s and Seir’s descendants.
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Some thoughts about owning a Jewish identity
I think it is a genuine issue. While I would agree that any culture makes its mark on its people, I think being Jewish might just be significant. But unfortunate. This is really how I feel about things. It is the most unfortunate thing to be Jewish. One would love to take pride in it but the world just doesn’t allow us to be.
We are neurotic. We worry. We are automatically thoughtful. We frankly are very deceptive. But not deceptive in the way that you might think. It’s not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes it’s just a bit of an ingratiating manner just to say that you are appreciated. It’s crazy that some people never feel this in their lives and this is another problem with being Jewish. We assume that humanity has some sense of consciousness and we are always shocked to find that it has not.
But we are overwhelming. We need our own gigs. If this is the point of it all. It’s not just that we can do the entire design in our heads in the first 8 seconds, it’s that people really can’t tolerate it in large doses. Jewish people are very intense when they do things. They love to do things because it occupies their mind. But we are talking about an extremely active Jewish mind. Things get violent sometimes.
And here we go with the list of composers, artists and financial wizards. It’s an interesting number. I suppose you have to go to the NBA to find a place where the Jews don’t excel. Well, all of the ownership. And what about race relations? Do I have problems with brothers? Or sisters? I don’t know what to tell you. In interpersonal circumstances, we usually get along pretty good together. I’m talking about if we’re on the same team to play sports or do a job or something. This is by the way really the only way I like to meet people. I really only like talking business. Just sit around with nothing to do and let my mind roam with someone who will in no way shape or form do anything but threaten or worry me is the last thing I need on this planet.
And here we go talking about being elite. What is elite? I think it’s basically a notch or two above the mosh pit. I think this is really what the religion is about and this rather off putting standoffishness. They don’t really want to mingle. We can talk about intermarriage and listen, I’m the first to agree that we need some kind of happy medium going on in the world going forward. I mean, unless you enjoy war. But the point is you don’t want to do these really stupid games because they’re not that much fun. So we are separatists. I am a natural separatist. When I met my friends in the Jewish community and I said that I could not join but I would be a friend, it was the most sense-making thing that could be said. At least for an independent like me.
But you know, all power is corruptive and all corruption leads to the deepest comfort one’s corruption can afford. This is the normal way to do things. You could get serious about rolling around naked in a bath of warm molasses with someone who likes to taste of molasses and say that this would be a pretty ecstatic way to spend an adult moment. Forensically speaking, counting the number of deaths due to alcohol poisoning in the region, you just get drunk. So, you got it made, you’re the man, now you’re free to drink!
My problem was that I really wasn’t so aware of who I was spending time with. I’m talking about when I was drinking. It was a long time ago and I wouldn’t say I was a drunk but I was definitely drinking a lot. It seemed as though I had a ready-made group of friends. I was pretty happy with the situation actually and we were winning ball games. But then I ran into a bit of a revelation. What if they’re fun if you get really drunk but if you’re not really drunk they’re not funny at all and neither are you.
I famously had this awakening while playing ball one year. My statistics told me that something was wrong and I realized that I had been partying too much with the team. Several beers and 12 shots of tequila and that motorcycle ride home. I am writing about it now so I didn’t die but you could see what kind of arrogant fool I was. But then I realized that perhaps I was hurting myself with all of his alcohol. Alcohol is sugar and basically sugar is not what I need or want. And so I quit drinking. No big deal. Maybe it’ll hurt, maybe it won’t. I just said no more. And then I made the mistake of showing up at the field before the next game. Wow. Listen, maybe Big League ball players are beautiful people but you know beer league does not really get a lot of model types. Nevertheless, it wasn’t that they were a rugged bunch, it’s that they were all horrible drug addicts. The manager, the smartest guy I ever met, walked up to me and said you quit drinking. Very bad. The worst thing you could ever do is look at your friends after you quit drinking.
But there was an original idea there. I didn’t ask someone to tell me what to do. I looked at the situation and made a conscious decision about what the correct direction to go would be. That decision not to drink stayed with me for quite some time. It got broken in Belarus but that’s not really what this is about. But what it is about is sobriety and personal decision. Some people call it agency. Some people call it mobility. Some people simply call it having enough wealth. Regardless, it seems when you have an active mind, you were born rich. You didn’t even have to be rich and history has never allowed Jews very far above the poverty level. But in our minds, we had enough money so that we could think clearly through our problems. We could always make the right decision, especially financially.
Sore spot. Money. I can’t stand people asking me for money. I can’t conceive why people think they have the right to ask me for money. Okay, there was a time when a few locals were doing odd jobs for me. Yes, I was a paycheck for them and therefore it was logical for them to ask for money. I still never wanted them to come and ask for money but still, you would say that they had this right. But I’ve been an independent businessman my whole life and I’ve lived my business life contract by contract. Every meeting began with a business meeting where I explained to them everything I expected and that they should look forward to and what they needed to do to be successful. Either they were listening or they were just waiting to get started. Right?
And here we have the real angle. The gentile way of life has something to do with belligerent ownership. If they feel they have ownership of something, it means they have the right to completely disrespect it. Or to be more specific, to be able to march through it mindlessly. That’s the most important thing. This is completely ass backwards of course in how to make decent people. But, obviously the Russians are not that interested in making good people. But it is the acceptance of perpetual abuse as if it was coming from a loved one regardless who said it. Anywhere you go, women will yell at you. They don’t know anything about you or if perhaps someone yelling at you was a trigger for me getting violent with them, it would seem that a little respect might turn them down a notch. But they don’t even think that way. They have this right. They own this.
And hey, I completely agree that a solid holistic personal culture of health is the correct way to live. We have different ways of expressing ourselves and different levels of exercise that we actually need but I have never been opposed to good health. I know it’s ironic because I’ve been unhealthy now for so long but I agree that I am the best version of myself when I am a solid body version of myself. I’d be the first one to agree with this. The only thing I’m saying, I still have the brain running things. Only now, with a slightly cleaner body, it’s sharper than ever.
My language here is very racist. I understand this. This essay might be a racist essay. I do not believe myself to be racist. Although I do want to say that it is interesting to note who someone is when I meet them. This is not inferior or superior, it’s just a general understanding of how they’re going to work out. Have you hung out with Germans? Have you hung out with French? Have you tried to deal with the Italians? Have you hung out with the fucking Russians? Have you hung out with Americans lately? Let me tell you, there is a giant evil in replacing civil democracy with a popularity contest. Saying that Christianity wins as if there is a contest for religions is a complete misnomer. What are we trying to win? And what do you do with all the losers? Do you imagine that they will happily be processed? How many generations have you already destroyed with similar thoughts?
I’m Jewish. Maybe I am as Jewish as I am here because I had to keep screaming it again and again and again because it was the best card I could possibly play. Everyone here who is a gentile has preconceived understanding of what Jews are. And it’s not them. And it’s everything horrible and terrible. And they’ve been living with these nightmares for centuries which is why it was so easy to raise an army to wipe out the Jews in the settlement of pale. I’m Jewish. It means just being here and occupying space well, with energy and attention, is enough to infuriate whatever the hell is the creature that is not us. Because they do not act like people. They all act like murderers. And they seem to be enjoying giving pain because they so rarely get a chance to give it.
So this is the update. I know some children of mixed marriages who have their problems. There is one side of them that goes very deeply into things while at the same time there is this purely physical aspect to them. They’re going to be animals but they will be shrewd animals at least. This isn’t to say anything is good or bad and to be honest with you, it would be nice if there were no more wars and no more murder games and no more pollution from commercialism. Just a simple agrarian lifestyle where everyone you know is right in front of your face everyday, just like it’s supposed to be and just like it always has been.
In the meantime, anti-Semitism is on the rise. It’s not on the rise, it’s becoming normal. It’s a normal aspect of racism that you hate whatever it is that you deem not to be you. We insist that we are on a higher level. All of us believe this. We believe we are on a higher level and have the right to do what we like. This is exactly what the gentile has. It has ownership of its life. Dismissive and abusive ownership. Ownership without consciousness. Ownership attached to one’s emotional problems.
I’m just saying that if you worry about things and think about things, you figure things out. And if you let yourself study, really study, you’re going to learn something. And it seems like that’s what Jews have been doing. We have been studying and thinking. I think mostly listening because that’s the way it works unless you become somebody and then you get to pontificate the standard garbage. And really, if we’re talking about the religion itself, it’s you know services and etc etc. But should we be divorcing ourselves from that process? Even if we participate in it just for the love of it, it is the thing that made us who we are. The obligatory mantra. The forced prayer sessions. Everyday. Everyday. Forced moments of contemplation. Forced ideas. Good ideas and bad ideas thrown at you so that you have to deal with them and rectify them somehow. And this is what we’ve been doing. Is it worth it to be observant?
We really do need to do something about the Christian right. They are too big for the game. We are not supposed to be global. I’m not supposed to care about national sports or interests. I’m supposed to care about my community and the world set up where there is no local community and all your extra attention is sent to be scattered over the abstract of nationalism. It means getting excited over people you will never meet. It means you’re being sold a bill of goods. It means it’s all an illusion. They are replacement friends for people that don’t have any. They are replacement friends for everybody because we have all been taken out of our communities for this. We were all taken out of our communities because we needed money. Or basically it means you’re getting played and you’re being manipulated for profit. Cheers. And this really needs to stop.
So listen, Jews and gentiles are susceptible to media. Media. That’s how they get you really. It’s not that they don’t have guys or they don’t have guns because they do. It’s just they like you to live in the middle of your head in fear because that’s exactly the state they want you to be in all the time. The one that makes you spend the most money and move around the most trying to make yourself comfortable in a completely uncomfortable world.
If you ask why I am against this when obviously the popularity contest seems to offer that this is what people like, I doubt it and think it’s more of a media thing but if I start with ecology, none of it makes sense. Too much garbage. Too many drugs. Too many people with nothing to do and too much time on their hands. Too many people left insane like animals in a zoo. Literally, we are animals and we allow ourselves to be placed in zoos.
So listen, do I watch the NFL highlights and follow Japanese baseball? Sure I do. And if I want to get decadent, do I allow a little factory food into my diet just for the convenience and joy of having to work less for a meal? Hey, I am not fully functioning anymore. I have what I have and for me, thank God for the idiots of national media. But if I was a young able-bodied man, I think I would never touch this stuff. I think if I was a young able-bodied man, I would do the same thing with the internet that I did with my television and my car. I got rid of them. Not flip them for another one, stop the association then and there.
I think if you want to live a happy life, you need a happy environment which means you need a healthy environment. You need a stress-free environment. You at least need an environment where the time frame for making things happen are pretty lenient and you find there’s much more free time than you had before. And then you have to adapt to free time and treat it with something other than a stressful moment. Perhaps even something to be grateful for. Vegan lifestyle. Holistic health. Grow your own food and get out of the ghettos.
I think this essay is pretty smart. I think it’s pretty well written and very understandable. It’s also got some style and some awesome notes along the way. I like it. I give it an 8 out of 10. But what I like most about it was that I have the mind to do it. Where do you think I got this contraption? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I practiced so much it’s obvious who I am here. But where did the thought that such a thing as this even come from? Bingo. I’m Jewish. And there’s nothing any of us can do about it so perhaps you can stop trying.
