Parshat Vayishlach-Ch.34-The story of Dina revisited

After reading ch 34 again the following verses are difficult:

   ה וְיַעֲקֹב שָׁמַע, כִּי טִמֵּא אֶת-דִּינָה בִתּוֹ, וּבָנָיו הָיוּ אֶת-מִקְנֵהוּ, בַּשָּׂדֶה; וְהֶחֱרִשׁ יַעֲקֹב, עַד-בֹּאָם. 5 Now Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah his daughter; and his sons were with his cattle in the field; and Jacob held his peace until they came

יג וַיַּעֲנוּ בְנֵי-יַעֲקֹב אֶת-שְׁכֶם וְאֶת-חֲמוֹר אָבִיו, בְּמִרְמָה--וַיְדַבֵּרוּ: אֲשֶׁר טִמֵּא, אֵת דִּינָה אֲחֹתָם.

13 And the sons of Jacob answered Shechem and Hamor his father with guile, and spoke, because he had defiled Dinah their sister,

ל וַיֹּאמֶר יַעֲקֹב אֶל-שִׁמְעוֹן וְאֶל-לֵוִי, עֲכַרְתֶּם אֹתִי, לְהַבְאִישֵׁנִי בְּיֹשֵׁב הָאָרֶץ, בַּכְּנַעֲנִי וּבַפְּרִזִּי; וַאֲנִי, מְתֵי מִסְפָּר, וְנֶאֶסְפוּ עָלַי וְהִכּוּנִי, וְנִשְׁמַדְתִּי אֲנִי וּבֵיתִי.

30 And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi: 'Ye have troubled me, to make me odious unto the inhabitants of the land, even unto the Canaanites and the Perizzites; and, I being few in number, they will gather themselves together against me and smite me; and I shall be destroyed, I and my house.'

לא וַיֹּאמְרוּ: הַכְזוֹנָה, יַעֲשֶׂה אֶת-אֲחוֹתֵנוּ.

31 And they said: 'Should one deal with our sister as with a harlot?' 

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In the above pesukim there are a number of questions to answer:

1) After Dina is raped, we see in verse 5(above) that Yaakov is alone at home and is silently waiting for his sons to return.Could he have not spoken to Shechem himself? Was he ashamed to speak up here? 2) In verse 13, why did it have to repeat the fact that Dina had been defiled, when this was already known? 3) At the end (verses 30-31) when Yaakov rebukes the sons for what they did by killing the men in Shechem, and the sons say to him “Is our sister to be treated as a harlot’?What does Yaakov reply to them? Has he accepted their reason for doing what they did? 4) When the brothers told the men of Shechem to circumsize themselves, Yaakov surely understood that this was said in guile, as they had no intention of marrying any of their daughters to these men.So why did Yaakov go along with this ploy? Also if he agrees with their plan, why did Yaakov rebuke them after the event and not stop them from killing the men of Shechem before the massacre actually took place?Was Yaakov really part of the deception?And why then did he complain to his sons if he was part of the deception in the first place?

Rabbi Yaakov Kaminetzky(USA d.1986) gives a magnificent solution to all the above questions.He begins by suggesting that there are always 2 ways to approach a problem, depending on what situation you find yourself (Rabbi Isaac Bernstein zal points out that the difference between’ halacha’ and ‘hashkafah’ is that halacha tells you what to do in a certain situation and hashkafah tells you what situations you should be in, in the first place-an interesting distinction).There can be a direct approach, which applies to a normal situation and is always preferable.However when you are dealing with a more complicated situation or with more devious individuals, an indirect approach has to be adopted,to obtain ones objective.Yaakov realised that when Shechem and Chamor made their pitch to join their people with the family of Yaakov after the rape of Dina, these were devious people in the extreme and a more indirect approach was needed with them(this is why it mentions again in verse 13 that these men had defiled Dina, so as to explain why the indirect approach was necessary, even in the eyes of Yaakov).If he had asked for his daughter back immediately, this would have been of no value.The only way to get her back is by applying a plan which matched the way Shechem and Chamor behaved.

Yaakov is a symbol of ‘truth’ and he cannot be personally involved with anything which is not ‘emes’/truth.He has to remain quiet until his sons come home(verse 5)and he can tell his sons to tell Shechem and Chamor to circumsize all the men of the town.His purpose would be to be to get Dinah out as all the men in the town are weak.But he has no intention to kill all the men in the town.If it became known that Yaakov had given the order to Shechem to do this act of circumcision, then this would have been a ‘Chilul Hashem’ as it went directly against Yaakov’s high standard of truth.So he told his sons to implement the plan, but not to kill them.This is why he waited for his sons to return before reacting to the situation(verse 5).

Now, after Shimon and Levi had killed all the men of the city, Yaakov was terrified at what they had done.He became angry then and although deception was needed, there was no allowance to kill all the men in order to rescue Dina. The brothers defend their actions in verse 31 and Yaakov is silent.In fact Yaakov does reply to them but at a later time,when he gives them his blessings before he dies.In ch.49 we find:

ה ה שִׁמְעוֹן וְלֵוִי, אַחִים--כְּלֵי חָמָס, מְכֵרֹתֵיהֶם. 5 Simeon and Levi are brethren; weapons of violence their kinship. ו בְּסֹדָם אַל-תָּבֹא נַפְשִׁי, בִּקְהָלָם אַל-תֵּחַד כְּבֹדִי: כִּי בְאַפָּם הָרְגוּ אִישׁ, וּבִרְצֹנָם עִקְּרוּ-שׁוֹר. 6 Let my soul not come into their council; unto their assembly let my glory not be united; for in their anger they slew men, and in their self-will they houghed oxen. ז אָרוּר אַפָּם כִּי עָז, וְעֶבְרָתָם כִּי קָשָׁתָה; אֲחַלְּקֵם בְּיַעֲקֹב, וַאֲפִיצֵם בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל. {פ} 7 Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce, and their wrath, for it was cruel; I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel. 

He condemns their violence and gives them a blessing.What is his final word to them? One suggestion is that he is saying it is better to seperate them so that they will never unite again as one group so that the violence is never repeated.

Another suggestion is that Yaakov is blessing them to become the teachers of Israel.Why is this appropriate?The answer is because the teacher of Torah needs to be passionate about Torah, in order to really convey his message.These two sons had great passion in their defence of Dina, so turn it now into passion for teaching Torah throughout Israel.This is the key to successfully imparting the message of Torah to the people of Israel and this became a focus of Shimon and Levi in the future.To inspire one must be inspirational, as it says in the first paragraph of the Shema: ‘You shall teach them diligently’ but only after the words are ‘upon your heart’! This is the greatness of Yaakov that he turned a negative trait into such a positive one for the future survival of the Jewish people.

The approach of Rav Yaakov zal is challenging and his comments about teaching are really to be taken to heart for every teacher of Torah.

Rabbi Ian Shaffer SCW 2018 Shabbat Shalom