Vayishlach - Living Out Our Childhood Wounds

2:52 It's one pussuk, and again it's so worthwhile to spend time learning chumash because when you actually learn chumash, you're going to say like this makes very little sense at first glance, right? So obviously there's something deeper going on. So who do we turn to? Rashi, right? You always turn to Rashi because even though Rashi offers us the simplest explanation of what's going on Rashi also offers us the deepest explanation of what's going on. So Rashi says as follows. What does it mean? Bishcon Yisrael Be'erat Zahi that when they were residing in that region, listen what he says Ad shalobal luchavron etzal Yitzchak eru koleleh All of these things that happened, all these troubles Before He Came to Hebron so the all the bad stories that happened all happened before he came to Hebron. So this story that Ruvain laid down with Bila happened where? Before he came to Hebron who was living in Hebron? Yitzchak his father. So does Rashi really answer our question? Not yet. Not yet. We have to wait for the next question.

4:05 We have to understand the depth of Rashi that really, really all these things happened. Why does the Torah tell us it happened here? It happens here means before he came to Chavrun where his father was. Okay, but say there, but like still what's the significance of that? Okay, so that's another question that we have. Now Rashi tells us about a Gemara in Shabbos, which is why you never heard that Ruvain laid down with Bila because it's not actually what happened. Listen to what Rashi says. Vayishkav What does Vayishkav mean? Vayishkav would normally mean that they had relations. He says, Rashi says, mitoch sheb bil bele mishkavo. It doesn't mean that they had relations. It means that he disarranged the location of Yaakov's bed. That Yaakov was, as we'll see in a moment from Rashi, that Yaakov, after Rachalimenu died, He moved his bed from Rachael's tent into the tent of Bilhah And what did Ruvayn do? Ruvayn, as we'll see in a moment, moved the bed And because he moved the bed, the strange look in your face, don't worry Because he moved the bed, Mala'alav ha-kassav ki'ilushchava So the Torah says that he laid down with Bilhah because moving the bed was the equivalent of laying down with her Now obviously, obviously what question are you going to ask? You're going to ask the question.

5:35 Those don't seem to be the same thing at all, right? It's one thing to move your father's bed. It's quite another thing to have an inappropriate relationship with your father's wife. So even though Rashi says, malalav akassu, it's kihilo, it's the same thing to us. Obviously, what question are we going to ask? It's not the same thing. It doesn't sound at all the same thing. So what is Rashi V'alama b'il be'al V'chil El Yitzuv And why in fact did he move the bed? Listen what Rashi says. Shekashah mei'sa Rachol nota Ya'kav mitaso. When Rachol Yiminu died, Ya'kav Yiminu took his bed. Sha'ay'sinn asuna tada b'ol Rachol. V'lobashar olam. Where did Ya'kav Yiminu spend every night? He slept with Rachol in that tent. Una sana b'ol b'ol. And now Ya'kav Yiminu moves his bed from the tent of Rachol into the tent of B'lal. Of course who was Bila? Bila was the maidservant of Rachl, not of Laia. So he moved the bed from Rachl into Bila, not into who? Not into the tent of Laia. Baruvaim. Ruvaim comes along with Tovah el-bon emo and he objects to the insult to his mother. He objects to the insult Ammar nishez emachos yimihi sot saralee yimihi shifchas achos yimitayt saralee yimihi It's one thing, the fact that my mother's sister was a rival wife.

7:09 But now that the rival wife has passed away, now that Rachel Yiminu has passed away, it's quite another thing for my mother's rival to be a Shifchah, to be a maid serpent. And he was deeply upset by this and he moved the bed into Leah's tent and that was terrible. Okay, that's what Rashi tells us. But obviously we still have to deal with the fact that it doesn't sound, not saying it's a good thing, but that's certainly a lot less than what the Torah says that he did. So far so good? Okay. You look like you have a question? Yeah, what's your question? Can you like, re-say the last part?

8:15 Because He Moved the Bed. Those don't sound like the same thing at all. Right? And then it tells us this whole story of what Ruvain Shehbun was. It's one thing that you were sleeping with Rachel in her tent, but what an insult now that the rival wife has become a shivchah, Teleah, and that you didn't move the bed in Teleah's. So he was justified and he moved the bed in Teleah's tent. Okay? That's what Ruvain told himself to justify his actions. Okay, so far so good? Okay. Another Rashi. Vayyubine Yaakov Shneimasa, right? The end of the Pasak. Remember we said at the end of the Pasak it says that Yaakov had 12 children? Yeah? Look what Rashi says. Maschilah Inyen Reshon, it starts again with the previous subject. Mishanola Binyamin, from the time that Binyamin was born, Nishlamah Amita, that Yaakov Avinu's family was now complete, right, his bed is now complete, Umeyatur Uyim Lhemonos, and now it's appropriate to count all of the children of Yaakov, Uminan, and now so they were all counted, Vrabo Senu Darshu, and listen carefully, Urashi says, and our rabbis expounded upon this and said, Llamdenubah, this comes to teach us something.

9:35 This is not in fact just the disjointed end of the Pasak, but it comes to teach us something, Shekul an Shavan Vekul an Sadikim That all the children were equal and all the children were righteous. Shaloh Chata Ruvayn. That Ruvayn didn't sin. So it says Ya'aqovino had 12 children. What does that mean? 12 and not what? 12 and not 11. Because if you were looking at the Pasluk itself in the Torah, what might you have said? Ruvayn, you moved your father's bed? What a terrible Aveira! Ya'aqovino Rovinu now only has 11 children, Rovin is out. So the Torah comes to tell us, this is what the HaChamim darshan, the Torah comes to tell us he wasn't out, they were all equal, Rovin didn't sin, he was a tzadik. Wait a second, what's the obvious question here? A minute ago, in the puss of what did it sound like?

10:30 That he had an inappropriate relationship with Bila. We now took that down from an inappropriate relationship to He Moved the Bed but it's like He had an inappropriate relationship. Okay, well if it's like He moved the bed and that's like an inappropriate relationship then surely what? He knocked him down. Surely He didn't. Surely even if you want to say it's not the worst of Eretz in the world, we can't say everybody here is equal. Yehuda didn't move the bed. Levi didn't move the bed. What does it mean? Way way way. This didn't happen yet. We're talking about this. We're way before that, yeah? So I'm saying like like they're all tzedikim they're all equal This is a big thing that the Chagam were saying. Yeah It might be true it might be true that he had fewer intentions But still he did something that was clearly wrong you want to say that he didn't do an Aveira Say people do an Aveira all the time because they have good intentions right so like what does that mean?

11:28 Okay, so that's another question All right Does anybody know when Ruvain does teshuva for this Avera? Close but not all the way Close but not all the way. Let's say you got 50% of the way there. You're on track Vayoshev Ruvain El Habar Yossef HaTzadik now much later. Yeah is in the pit. Yeah and Ruvain Leaves and he comes back to the pit. Vihinein Yosef Babar and Yosef is no longer in the pit. Vayikra esbe gaudav and now he tears Kriya. Where was he? Where is he returning from? What would he say? He was learning. Look what Rashi says. Asukayah Bessakko Ubata Nisot, he was wearing sackcloth and he was fasting. Al sha b'il belyetsue aviv.

13:05 Why are you looking at me? It seems like this was the first time that Ruvain realized I did something wrong. Why now? He didn't know? Obviously what you said before was a little bit right. He must have felt like he was justified until this moment and then he realized I did something wrong. But wait a second, I thought he didn't do anything wrong. Did he do something wrong? Did he not do something wrong? Rashi says he didn't do anything wrong. But I guess he did do something wrong because now many years later he's doing teshuva for it. But why are like on such a random day? We've got to look deeply to understand. Okay, so let's see. Can we can we do something deep now? Yeah now that we understand? Oh, it's remember. It's one Pasluk Isn't it amazing how one Pasluk what we have like like eight questions so far?

13:58 one Pasluk Rashi's a A Gemara, right? Just trying to get basic shot here is so difficult. Let's see if we can come up with something really good. When we are not aware of our unconscious wounds, we act out from a place of pain and we think we're justified, but in truth all we're doing is spilling out our stuff. I'll do my best. When we act out, it's being recorded. When we act out our unconscious wounds, we often erupt, we spill out our stuff on everybody else, but really, we're just spilling out our stuff because we haven't dealt with our stuff. So we might think that we're justified, but we're not actually justified. We're not aware of the deeper unconscious reasoning that's happening within us. And very often what might be happening is that you are subconsciously playing out not your wounds but the wounds of your parents.

15:21 And a little uncomfortable in the room when I said that there was like a little air that just got let out of the room. Yeah? Like sometimes a child might not realize that they are living out certain aspects of their parents' lives. Like for example, like for example, I'm just a silly example, yeah? Let's say I'll do something with the boys, make it a little bit easier to swallow, yeah? Let's say a father has this unhealed childhood wound that he was never cool enough in high school. Or his glory days of high school are behind him. So now he like needs his son to be super cool. So he needs his son to play for the basketball team or the hockey team. Have you seen the show before? And then what happens? He's a fan in the stands, right? But if the ref makes a bad call, you ever see those fathers that just erupt in the stands?

16:51 You're the child, but you're 15 years old. You're playing DRS hockey. What do you know? You're 15 years old. You don't necessarily have the emotional or psychological awareness to be able to understand why it's important to you to be a superstar hockey player. So you might have this pressure inside of you that you're like, I have to be the best at hockey. And what you may not be able to articulate is the reason you know you need to be the best at hockey is because there's this thing that's been communicated to you that you've got to make your father okay. So you're living with that inside of you and now one day you're practicing and you shoot and miss and all of a sudden it's like your entire world is falling apart. You were Rufane growing up in your mother's house. What did you know about your mother that maybe you couldn't articulate?

18:25 Well maybe you saw that your mother was in unbelievable levels of pain because your father kept choosing the rival life. And you as the child, what was your need? I just have to make sure my mother's okay. So this is a lesson, a very deep lesson for all of us that we often think that we know why we're doing what we're doing but maybe the thing we're doing is living out somebody else's life. Does that make sense? So when Yaakov moved his bed in the aftermath of Rachael's death, what was Ruvain experiencing? He wasn't experiencing his own pain. Whose pain was he experiencing? Leah's pain. And there's a very big difference between experiencing our own pain and the pain of our parents. Because our own pain we could deal with. But when we experience the wound of our parents as the child, that hurts in ways that we don't understand.

19:34 So why does the Torah describe it as Ruvain laid down with Billah? That's not what he did. He moved the bed, right? But now we could start to understand that the Torah doesn't describe the action. What does the Torah always describe? The subconscious reality. Right? You appreciate that move? The Torah tells us in the, even though it's like why the Torah tells the thing that didn't happen. No, the Torah told us the thing that happened. The Torah told us the thing that happened. Chazal give us the actual story, which is he just moved the bed. But the Torah is giving us the psychological insight into the nature of Ruvayim. Because whenever the shadow side of ourselves acts, it's always acting out symbolically. We think we're doing what we're doing, but how often is what we're doing really just a symbol for something deeper that's going on inside of ourselves?

20:34 So the Torah always classifies actions based on their inner meaning, not only the physical mechanics. So it's true. Ruvain did not have a forbidden relationship with Billah, but he broke into the private domain of his father's marital space. A Boundary Was Crossed In a certain sense he inserted himself where he didn't belong Does That Make Sense? And why did he insert himself where he didn't belong? Because Who Was He? He Was Acting Out Leah That's What He Was Doing He was acting out Leah's pain And so when he saw the bed be moved Leah Didn't Say Anything Because In Leah's Mind Like This is the nature of my relationship with Yaakov. He's loyal to Rachal. That's the wife that he has a favored relationship with, whatever that means, right? So when he moved to Beit Tabila, Leah is like, yeah, I've seen this show before. Yeah, why does Rubein erupt?

21:36 He erupts for his mother who doesn't erupt. His mother already came to term with him. So like, Yehudah was born, Tammot das Hashem kinasati yosu michalikah yintlasi yosu michalki. R'uvain Shimon Leivi Yehudah T'ul Yehudah was born, right? R'uvain saw it. And maybe even R'uvain, again, maybe even she accepted that okay, this is the reality, but maybe it's still hurt. Right? So she was still carrying it. Yeah, maybe she was still carrying it. And maybe again, we're saying these things, Ahaschon, I don't want to speak negatively about the avos at all. Again, I'm only saying that the Torah speaks in a certain way to communicate messages to us. Rubein is so sad, he has to watch his mother, just be alone every single night.

23:16 We're only speaking on our level, right? How do we feel? Because we do have feelings around the things that happen in our own homes, right? Between the relationship that mom and dad have. How many children play interference in their parents' relationship? That's a game that hurts. I don't know if it's the best game. You know, if you have a child who's acting out, psychologically speaking, sometimes it could be that the story is something like this. Mom and Dad have Shalom bias issues but when I act out, now all the attention is on me. Mom and Dad aren't fighting with each other about each other anymore, now they're fighting about me. And in a certain way that kid is playing a very heroic role, no? It's like he's throwing himself in front of the truck to make sure that he can save his parents' marriage. Now does he know that he's doing that at eight or nine years old? Of course not, it's subconscious.

24:11 That is what's happening. But he's also caught in war issues. We're acting from a deep place of woundedness. That's why this is such a profound thing. That 8 year old may not know what he's doing, but neither does the 25 year old. It's because we haven't done the internal work of the world. We're acting from a deep place of woundedness. Vayishma Yisrael I really hear you. Meaning, at the time when Ruvain did it, Ruvain felt justified in what he was doing, and Yakov Avinu didn't tell him that what he did was wrong. Because he wasn't going to hear that what he did was wrong. Because Yakov Avinu understood he's hurt.

25:36 And when people are hurt, the only appropriate response to somebody else's pain is to sit with them in that pain and to authentically listen. My wife has this line. She says, don't just do something, sit there. It's the opposite of don't just sit there, do something. Don't just do something, sit there. There's value in really giving space. Vayishma Yisrael Yisrael wasn't going like this, he wasn't going, okay buddy, I hear ya. No. He was saying I hear you. You hear the difference? I hear you. Perhaps I even understand you in ways that yet you don't understand about yourself. And here's what happens if you try to give mussar or even to try to give like to try to help people understand what's going on underneath the surface. What you're doing is you're introducing shame. Shame Which is why when we discipline our children, when we choose to say something, we have to really understand what did the kid do wrong?

27:10 And is the kid a vessel to be able to hear this? Because very often in our attempt to educate our children, what are we really doing? We're really making matters significantly worse. Do you have any kids walk around thinking I'm a bad kid because of the discipline that they received at home and in school? It doesn't mean that there's not a place for discipline. Of course there is. But you have to know who you're talking to. That kid who's acting out, let's take the kid who's acting out to spare his parents the Shalom bias issues, mom and dad are yelling at home so he says, alright, I'll be the lightning rod so that everyone's focused on me and they're not fighting with each other. We are going to go over to that kid and let's say he's acting out and he's making problems in school and he's making problems with his siblings and you go like, why are you doing this? Right? So now the kid's like, okay, the energy is off of off of mom and dad now, right? But now it's like, I'm bad. That's a terrible thing to do to a child when they're acting out from a place of pain. Does that make sense? And now the Torah comes and tells us something unbelievable. And some of you alluded to this. You didn't get all the way. If a child does something inappropriate,

28:27 From a deep place of pain, they're not a sinner. They have not in any way been diminished from their brothers who did not act out from that pain. Kulan Shavin Kulan Sadikim. The Torah tells us at the end of this story, Ruvain did not sin. A sin is when you do something against Hashem. Yeah? Did Ruvain I can't do anything against Hashem here. I, but you'll say he moved into the sanctity of his father's bedroom. It was a total boundary violation. How could you say that's not a sin? It's not a sin because the intention matters. The kid who's not davening because he's in too much pain to daven is not sinning. He's just in too much pain to daven. Does that make sense? A person recently told me they went through something ridiculously hard in their life. Like 10 times harder than anybody else I hope would ever have to go through.

29:27 And they're like, yeah, I don't daven anymore. I was like, okay. Isn't that like a terrible thing? I'm like, I don't know. It sounds like you don't daven anymore. That's a big aveira, right? You're not trying to do an aveira, you just can't talk to Hashem right now because you're in too much pain. There's a big difference in the way that we frame it. Yaakovinu's response, listen to the power of this response, Vayishma Yisrael, Yisrael hears him, creates a space and then what's his message to him? I'm going to count you like I count everybody else. Nothing has changed. Did Yaakovinu even tell him that he did something wrong? No, he didn't. That's why he didn't know that he did anything wrong. It's why he never did teshuva because what would he have done teshuva for? It's like could you imagine a kid saying like okay something tragic happened that I stopped davening for a year and then afterwards being like I have to do teshuva for not davening. No you didn't do teshuva for it because like you didn't even think you did anything wrong you just couldn't talk to Hashem right?

30:34 Yaakovinu never gave him mussar. He had nothing to do true before until many many years later and now He sees his brothers, right? Isn't it always easy to see something when it's not happening to you when you're seeing it from the outside? And now it's like you're watching the story and you're going wait a second. This story looks familiar to me, right? And there is Yo safe and the brothers hate him This is...wait a second...am I doing that? Do I hate Yossef because he's Rachael's child? And then he realized because he did the internal work on himself, is that why I moved the bed? I thought I moved the bed because my father did the wrong thing and he hurt my mother. But that's not really the reason why I moved the bed. Why did I move the bed? Because I

32:31 To wear sackcloth and to start fasting for the Avera that he had done all of the years before and then it wasn't even an Avera. He was cool on Shabbos and he was like all of his brothers but he realized I was just acting out from my place of pain. And now he comes, and by the way, because there's always that question like, how could Ruvain have been so cruel? Your brother's in a pit surrounded by snakes and scorpions and you're doing teshuva, what are you two from? Get your brother out of the pit. No, he's Dafka doing teshuva at that moment. I'm not saying it was the right thing that he did teshuva at that moment, but it was the first time in his life that he said, oh, this was the wrong thing to do, I have to fix it. I've got to fix this. And now he's done and he's worn his sack off and he's fasted and he's coming back heroically. Now I'm going to save Rachael's child. What could be more noble than the pained child of Leah stepping up and saving the child of the rival wife?

33:29 What could be more noble than that? And then he comes to find out that his brothers sold him down to Mitsrayim. And he tears his clothing, he tears Kriya, and he goes into Avelas. Why? Because I couldn't stop the intergenerational trauma from playing itself out. And now it's deepened. And now he's sold down to Mitsrayim and that is the beginning of exile, right? Because after that Yosef becomes the Viceroy of Egypt and now everybody goes down to Mitsrayim and because of that there's 210 years of slavery where there were supposed to be 400 and 190 years of Mitsrayim that we didn't serve there that becomes the Gullis for the rest of Kahl Yisrael's history. The reason why we're still in Gullis today is because we're finishing up the 190 years that never happened in Mitsrayim. In other words, and I've thought about this for a long Our entire history is just a replay of Mechiraseosif, which is why the sin of Sinasrinam is so profound.

34:42 Why can't Jews learn to live together? Because we are still playing out the pain of those children that did not know that they were in pain and so they hated each other. Our entire story, the story of our history, is to rectify the sin of Mashiach Rashiossef. He didn't tear Kriya because they sold him down to Mitsuraim. He tore Kriya because he saw how now, because we made that one final move and he thought he could stop it. He said, if I could just rescue my brother, that would fix everything, right? And it would have. If he would have pulled him out of the pit and it would have been Lei's child rescuing Rachael's child, wouldn't that have been the ultimate moment? Mashiach would have come. There would have been no need for anything. Mishiyev could have come in that moment. But he got there just a little too late. Because he came to realize this realization that he was living out his own pain just a little too late. Our work is, and this is what it means to be truly growth oriented. To be truly growth oriented doesn't mean that you start dovening or you start learning. Those are like the basics. To be truly My truly growth-oriented is to become a curious observer of self and to start to wonder, why am I showing up in the world the way that I'm showing up?

36:05 Whose life am I actually living? Is this my father's pain, my mother's pain, my sibling's pain? When I acted out in my life, why was I really doing that? Maybe I was that heroic child. You know, I've said this before publicly and I'll say it again and I'm not embarrassed to say it. I was expelled from elementary school in fifth grade. I have no tinas whatsoever on the school for throwing me out. I'm sure that I was a ruckus in the classroom. I'm sure that I made it very difficult to teach. I understand. I only have one tina on the school. Just one thing that I wish they would have done better. And they didn't know to do any better because it was the 80s, right? And we didn't start becoming psychologically aware until like the late 90s, early 2000s. Today if I was a fifth grader in school, they wouldn't have thrown me out. I'd have like every therapy in the book.

36:59 Speech therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, art therapy, hydrotherapy, talk therapy. By the time you're seven years old, I'd be like speaking in parts language and like, I'd be like, this part of me, that doesn't really mean I'd be like a... My only time... I have no tinas. It was the eighties. They didn't know any better. My only tina was, I wish somebody would have asked me why I'm behaving the way I'm behaving. And for all the years that I was in school, nobody ever asked me that question. Nobody was curious enough to wonder why is he behaving this way. So they just kept sending me to the principal's office. And the principal kept telling me to stop. Don't you think if I could have stopped, I would have stopped? But nobody was curious. And you know the crazy thing? I believe this about myself. I believe that if they would have asked me why I was behaving the way I was behaving, I believe that if they would have been someone who was curious enough and open enough

37:49 I was a poor kid in a rich school and I felt less than. That's my story, my story is that I didn't know how to get positive attention. So I just felt different then everybody else. Turns out though that when you make a ruckus in the classroom, everybody will laugh. And that feels really good. So they threw me out of school. And they were right for throwing me out of school. I probably was dead. I'm not right for throwing me out of school. I probably was very difficult. I imagine the teachers came to the principals and said we can't teach with Berg in the room. I get it. But just be a little bit curious. Why is that kid behaving that way, right? And then maybe you'll find out and then maybe you'll go like, oh, that's actually pretty legitimate, right? Because the word disorder is a really poor word because disorder makes it seem like you don't make any sense, right? And actually, every one of us makes sense. We don't have disorders. We're actually all ordered, right?

38:46 Every one of us is understandable. We're just not necessarily understanding yet what's happening in our inner world. We can blame institutions for not being good enough at being curious, but the truth is as we become adults, it's our responsibility to be curious for ourselves. And to say, why am I showing up in the world the way that I'm showing up and especially in those areas where you think you're justified? And you're like, you know how like you become like a social justice warrior? If something happens and you're like... yay... brrrerrer! and you'd end up riled up behind you... It's terrible what they're doing to this girl right? Why are you having that reaction? Ya'akovinu was great machanekh. For Yishma Yisrael. You heard him? Ya'akovinu understood what was going on but he understood Ru'vain couldn't hear it. So he just said, You moved the bed? You're still a topic.

39:43 You're not any different than any of your brothers. He is different than his brothers. He moved the bed. He moved the bed from pain. That's not his identity. Treat yourself with kindness and compassion. Recognize that you're still virtuous on an inner level. And eventually, if you're paying enough attention on life, life will teach you. Akkadosh Baruch Hu teaches us throughout history. Life will teach you what's really going on in your inner world. And that will be your opportunity to do Teshuva. Okay, girls, have a beautiful Shabbos.