The whole of the book of Genesis can be seen as a history of brothers… and sisters… and brother and sister…

“Hang on a minute,” someone is saying. “How can you possibly reduce the first book of the Torah to a single theme like this?”

The thing is, like all creative books and all art, there are many different strands in the Torah which can be newly discovered, revisited, coloured and reshaped. Look at Hamlet, for instance. There are literally thousands of books written about just this one play. As for…

“Hang on a double minute,” that someone is now saying with a great deal more heat. “How can you even think about comparing our sacred text to a piece of literature?”

Read not, ‘Compare the Torah to a work of art, but rather compare the work of art to the Torah’. The Torah is simply the greatest of creative works. Indeed, its words embody the creation of the world, of humanity and of a people entrusted with a holy task. It resonates in its depth, shines with its insights and weaves into its being a multitude of shimmering threads.

So after that preamble, I return to the story of siblings. It starts extremely badly. The first brothers to be born are destroyed when one rises up and murders the other. From then on there are problems of varying degrees of intensity. Ham, the son of Noah, shames his two brothers Shem and Yefeh by observing their father naked. Ishmael and Isaac are estranged. Rebecca seizes the first opportunity to escape the malign influence of her mercenary brother. Jacob so alienates Esau that the latter plans to kill him. Leah and Rachel are rivals for Jacob’s affections. Finally, Joseph’s presumption and snitching enrage his brothers so that they almost kill him,  settling instead for selling him into slavery. It is this final story of sibling friction, culminating in the reconciliation that draws Genesis to a close, which is told in the most detail. Both Joseph and his brothers make a journey towards, on the one hand, generosity, wisdom and forgiveness and, on the other, towards a recognition of guilt and the desire to make amends. The opening words of Ya-yigash are, thus, among the most moving in Bereshit. “Judah walked up to (Joseph) and said, “Please, your highness, let me say something to you personally. Do not be angry with me, even though you are just like Pharaoh.” And so Judah, the brother who has demonstrated most clearly the human capacity for change from evil to righteousness, tells the story of his father’s loss and and his consuming fear of losing his youngest son as he believes he has lost the second youngest. Most importantly, Judah begs to be allowed to be Joseph’s slave in Benjamin’s place.”

As always, the parsha has far more in it than I can possibly touch on. To experience some of this, to share in prayer and song and to take part in a particularly special service at 10.30 on Saturday. A  graduate of Kehillat Kernow and graduand of Exeter University, Murray Brown, together with Pat Lipert will be leading us.

“But the children clashed inside her.” Is it not unusual for twins to fight? Are not twins usually as alike as two pins? Yet in the case of Esau and Jacob, from before birth, during birth – when Jacob emerged grasping his brother’s heel – right through to when Jacob departs from his parents’ house for Padan Aram, there appears to be nothing but friction and rivalry between these two twins. Their characters are very different. The parents don’t help either. “Isaac enjoyed eating Esau’s game and favoured him, but Rebecca favoured Jacob.” The conflict between the children is reflected in the different preferences of the parents, and why does Isaac, the man who, in his youth at least, used to go out into the fields to meditate, let his belly decide which of his children he will love more.

None of this bodes well for the future of the Jewish people. Things, however, are not quite so simple. It could be, as Rashi* says, that Esau knew how to entrap Isaac with his mouth. He might have had a hairy body, but he had a smooth tongue. Also, Rebecca had a good reason for favouring Jacob. She had been told by God that the older would serve the younger. Jacob is the one destined to take forward the Covenant. And yet again, Esau is not all bad, not all hunter and motor mouth. He clearly loves his father and goes out to hunt so that he can serve him a delicious meal. He leaves his best clothes at home, according to Rabbi Shimon*, in order to don them when he returns so as to honour his father. What is more, the words that Esau utters on discovering that his blessing has been stolen by Jacob cannot but arouse our compassion: “Is there only one blessing that you have, my father? Father! Bless me too!”

Jacob, the trickster, leaves home at the beginning of Va-yetzei. He clearly has a lot to learn. And learn he does. He has a dream of angels going up and down a ladder which reaches from Earth to heaven. This is a journey Jacob will now make repeatedly, each time learning something more. He will ascend in spirit and take each new insight back to the reality of his life. He will need to, because he is about to arrive at his uncle’s, another trickster, but one who learns no moral wisdom, who ascends nowhere and who has no redeeming features.

Va-yeitzei is a sedra so full of seminal events, including the birth of all but one of the future tribes of Israel, and so rich in meaning, I could spend a lifetime thinking and discussing it, but, for now, I must confine myself to introducing our leader for this Saturday. Harvey Kurzfield will tell us more and guide us through the service. Come at 10.30 to hear him and to share in our communal prayers, songs and conversation.

* See Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sachs: ‘Covenant and Conversation’ 30 Nov 2016