After it writes for you Eisav’s settlings and offspring in a concise manner – for it is not worth the space to detail how they settled or chronicle their battles and their victory of the Choree – it details Yaakov’s settlings and his offspring in a lengthy manner, with all the happenings which caused them, for they are indeed important to Hashem to expand on them.
Rashi, Beraishis 37:1
For the next four parashiot, the Torah turns its full focus to the tale of Yoseif and his brothers, and Rashi seems to explain to us why so much space is needed to chronicle this story. Rashi alludes to “Gilgulei Sibasam,” the continuous turns of events that bring our story to its unlikely and unpredictable climax; there is a focus on not only the outcome of these parashiot, but also on the particular methods by which we arrive at their conclusion. In contrast, Rashi observes, the story of Eisav carries no further importance than its conclusion, and so we skip the gory details of how Eisav won so many battles and conquered so many lands; we merely list the future rulers of
What Rashi fails to answer, however, is why the lineage and history of
Similarly we find by the generations from Adam to Noach “He begot him” and so and so, and then it dwells on Noach. And from Noach to Avraham the same.
Rashi’s continuation does not answer our question. We chronicle the generations according to chronology; once we reach the appropriate place in the timeline, the Torah slows down the story to include every crucial detail. But do we ever break from the historical order? Strangely enough, we do by Eisav. Aloof Magdiel, among many of the other listed chieftains, wasn’t even born before Moshe’s death, let alone before Yoseif’s dreams. Why then is the Torah so eager to run through Eisav’s lineage?
Rashi certainly cannot be focusing on the chronology of the stories; after all, if Yoseif is only seventeen years old at the beginning of our parasha, Yitzchak must still be alive, yet Yitzchak’s burial is clearly detailed before the Torah discusses a word about Eisav’s progeny! Chronology is clearly not the Torah’s concern, but what then determines our parashiot’s organization of Yitzchak’s family tree?
This is comparable to a pearl that falls in the sand. A man feels around for it and sifts with a sifter until he finds the pearl. Once he finds it, then he throws away all the pebbles from his hand and takes the pearl.
Clearly, Eisav is compared to the pebbles and Yaakov is compared to the pearl. The man is either Hashem or the Torah. If Rashi wasn’t clear before, he explicitly states here that the purpose of running through Eisav’s lineage is so that we can cast him aside.
But why does Rashi tell us that the pebbles are in this man’s hand to begin with? Why not just write, “Once he finds the pearl, he takes it”? Perhaps Rashi is emphasizing the value of these pebbles. Had the man not found a pearl, he would have been willing to hold on to the few pebbles he discovered; only after he uncovers treasure do the pebbles become relatively worthless. Likewise, the Torah first addresses Eisav’s story to teach us that Eisav bears worth, but once Yaakov enters the spotlight, Eisav is permanently cast aside.
The Gemara in Avodah Zara teaches us that before Hashem awarded the Torah to the B’nei Yisrael, He first gave every other nation a chance to accept His offer. The Sifri recounts Hashem’s conversation with the B’nei Eisav:
He proposed the Torah to the B’nei Eisav, and they responded, “What does the Torah say?” Hashem replied, “Lo Tirtzach, you may not kill.” Upon hearing this, the Bnei Eisav replied “How can we be expected to keep the Torah?! We are the children of Eisav, whose nature was to kill, like the pasuk says “ViHaYadayim Yidei Eisav,” and who was promised by his father, Yitzchak, “Al Charbichah Tichyeh, you shall live by your sword.” We cannot accept the Torah and abandon our lifestyle.”
Sifri, Devarim 33:2
This Midrash suggests that Eisav was in fact capable of accepting the Torah. The only thing that stopped him and his descendants was their unwillingness to detach themselves from their exhilarating lives of battle and murder. As Rashi states in Parashat ViZos HaBracha, “Lo Ratzu,” the B’nei Eisav were simply uninterested.
Perhaps Eisav is not hastily counted so as to be immediately disposed of. Perhaps we don’t really recognize how wantonly we rush through Eisav’s lineage until we contrast his story, or lack thereof, against Ya’akov’s. Like the man with the pebbles, we can only measure Eisav’s worth on a relative scale, and so we recount each king’s and capital’s name, but the description ultimately bears no comparison to the parashiot of VaYeishev through VaYechi. Just as Hashem first proposes the Torah to the Bnei Eisav, we too first consider his spiritual worth. But we soon come to recognize how little worth he and his descendants truly bear.
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