Vayishlach
What can happen in the dark?
Reflection by Or HaLev teacher Dafna Arnoni:
“In this week’s parsha, Yaakov takes another step inward to himself and to the encounter with God. He goes through a kind of initiation, meeting the darkness and the fear of his brother Esau, and through that encounter he becomes Israel.
`Yaakov was left alone. And a figure wrestled with him until the break of dawn.` (Genesis 32:25)
Yaakov crosses the Yabak crossing, and is left alone.In the darkness, a story is told of an encounter with a `man` who struggles with him until dawn.
Neither of them prevails over the other, and at dawn the man, or angel, asks Yaakov to release him.
Yaakov asks for a blessing, and the same character gives Yaakov a new name – Israel, saying `For you have striven (Heb. saritha, connected with first part of `Israel.`) with beings divine and human, and have prevailed.` (Genesis 32:29).
Yaakov underwent an experience, a test. Some interpret the figure as the angel of Esau. Some see it as Yaakov himself, or an inner part of himself that he had to meet in order to pass through, to grow, to be born as the father of what would become the Israelites. In the midst of the struggle, Yaakov remained intact. And so did the character with whom he struggled.
The night passed, dawn rose and the dark figure continued on her way. We can look at this mysterious story like the dance of light and darkness within us.
In the darkness can arise fear, pain, not knowing.
If I meet these places from a present and stable place, something in me undergoes a change.
If I am there with myself, a transformation can happen, a rebirth.
Even as night falls, we know that eventually the dawn will rise within us.
Darkness requires us, like Yaakov, to do the work. It says in Psalms, `to proclaim Your steadfast love at daybreak, Your faithfulness each night`, (92:2).
At night, in the darkness, we need faithfulness. The faith that there is something here to pass through, that at the end the light will return.
May we meet ourselves in a loving presence, and may the dark parts of us be illuminated by a soft light of compassion and faith.”