Sunday, May 13, 2012
Lavan
When we were younger, we learn about all the villains in the Torah. Everything is very black and white; here is the good guy and here is the bad guy. Then as we get older we begin to learn that not everything is so black and white, like we discussed with Esav. From the text it seems like he really did not do anything wrong; he really was just not as spiritual as Yaakov and would rather spend his days frolicking in the fields and hunting. But Lavan seems to be a different story. Although we have not really delved into this part of Yaakov's story yet, from reading over it in our Chavruta work, it seems like Lavan really is portrayed as a villain in the straight text. He tricks Yaakov, which may be Midah Kineged Midah for Yaakov, who tricked his own father and took advantage of his brother. So Lavan tricks his new (double) son-in-law then spends quite a bit of time chasing after him and trying to take his animals and his family. What is Lavan's motive? Is he presented as a villain which in itself is an obstacle or a challenge for Yaakov? Or does he have a bigger motive and purpose in this entire story?
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Greetings sade,
ReplyDeleteI must say that i enjoyed your post for a number of reasons. First of all, when we started learning about this Parasha it obviously brought back all the memories of elementary school in which we learned these stories filled with lessons. I also agree that everything was always very black and white and there was never a gray area in order to interpret the complexity of the characters.I was very satisfied that we learned how those people whom we had perceived as bad werent actually bad such as Esav and Yishmael. However, when it comes to Lavan i am not so certain anymore. I am inclined to fall back on my childhood interpretation of him as being the bad guy! I do think though that Hashem made his character so difficult to punish Yaakov for what he had done to his father and brother and to present him with a challenge. He needed to be tricked in order to taste his own medicine.