Educational Insights from Parashat Vayishlach — “He Is Still Alive”!

- Is it right to say that there are people whom I have no ability to help or move forward?

- “Something in him has died!” said the teacher. At first glance, he seems right. But is he really?

When it seems that all hope is lost and everyone has given up, is there still room for action — even the smallest action — that expresses thought about him or some kind of regard for him?

A deep point for reflection:

Let us consider the Torah’s perspective on the reality of a life that involves a trial.

Reviving the Child’s Soul

He is alive, he is here, he is before us, yet in essence he is dead!

Perhaps it is too dramatic to use such an expression about a living person. But when we understand, see, and discern that something in his inner, emotional and spiritual world, and perhaps also in his consciousness, is extinguished and dried up, with no vitality at all — then, seemingly, there is no choice but to regard him as dead!!!

Do I truly have nothing to do? Perhaps this is not my role, as a parent or educator, for I deal not with the dead but with the living.

Let us consider and see how our parashah relates to this matter.

One of the most significant and difficult trials, if not the most difficult of all, with which Avraham Avinu was tested, was the trial of the Akedah, after which the Holy One, blessed be He, told him: “עַתָּה יָדַעְתִּי כִּי יְרֵא אֱלֹקִים אַתָּה וְלֹא חָשַׂכְתָּ אֶת בִּנְךָ אֶת יְחִידְךָ מִמֶּנִּי” — “Now I know that you fear God, and you have not withheld your son, your only one, from Me.”

Our Sages asked: why was the name of this trial, and its merits, engraved for all generations in the name of Avraham Avinu, as it says, “וְהָאֱלֹקִים נִסָּה אֶת אַבְרָהָם” — “And God tested Avraham,” when it was no less difficult a trial for Yitzchak Avinu as well, who was then thirty-seven years old and nevertheless stretched out his neck upon the altar? If so, seemingly, it would have been fitting to say, “And God tested Avraham and Yitzchak.”

Several explanations were offered to resolve this question, but especially interesting is the explanation of our master, the Beit HaLevi, who defined it as follows: the trial of dying for kiddush Hashem is easier than the trial of living for kiddush Hashem.

Yitzchak went to die for kiddush Hashem; Avraham, by contrast, went to live for kiddush Hashem, for after the Akedah he would continue living without his only and beloved son. This is certainly a greater trial: to live each and every moment with the knowledge and understanding that he has no son to continue him, for he had been bound — and by whom? By his father! And by God’s command! And despite everything — not to question it even with the slightest thought.

We thus learn that a state and reality of “life” bound up with difficulties is an extremely great and meaningful trial.

Providence brings to the doorstep of a father or educator a child, boy, or adolescent in whom “something has died,” and it makes no difference in which realm — values, spirituality, character traits, or Jewish identity. If I succeed in breathing even a little vitality into him, then in essence I have brought another “life” into the world. The life of a Jew consists of tremendous moments of kiddush Hashem, and we have learned that it is harder to live for kiddush Hashem than to die for kiddush Hashem.

Fortunate is the one who merits breathing a spirit of life into dry bones, thereby sanctifying the Creator’s Name in the world with even greater force.

The Collar Flap — a Sign of Life!

“I was completely despairing of life,” related the boy who sat across from me with his head lowered. “I understood that I had no chance at all because no one believed in me. Everyone was certain that I was useless (and therefore hopeless as well...), and reality also proved that no one truly cared about me, and no one looked after me, in anything.”

The result was that the boy left home, disconnected from his family, and in essence the family, too, let him understand that he had no place there.

“That day I thought of ending my life,” he continued to relate openly, “but while I was sitting at the bus stop, one of the teachers from the Talmud Torah came up behind me. He recognized me even though I had changed my appearance, patted me on the shoulder, and asked how I was. Suddenly I felt his touch as he straightened the collar of my shirt, which had been turned over (I had not noticed it). And before he parted from me, he also tossed out a sentence that remains engraved in my heart to this day: ‘I have good memories of you.’

That evening I changed my mind. I felt that there was still someone left who cared about me!

With that action of straightening the collar flap, he essentially gave me life!

Yes, quite literally: he gave me my life as a gift.

We have learned:

A. One must never despair of anyone.

B. Even when “something seems dead in him,” that is in fact my challenge: how to awaken and ignite the parts that are extinguished and lifeless.

C. The role of an educator and parent does not end in any situation; perhaps it challenges us to think outside the box.

D. It is impossible to describe what even the smallest and most marginal action can accomplish.

Rabbi Michael Zecharyahu

Spiritual Director at the Torat David yeshivah gedolah and Chairman of the Legiono Shel Melech organization