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Torah portion: Seeing the forest for the trees

Parashat Toldot (Genesis 25:19-28:9)
[additional-authors]
November 19, 2014

Sequoia trees are some of the largest and oldest trees in the world. Whenever I visit Sequoia National Park, I am awestruck that the trees under which I stand were seedlings when the Temple still stood in Jerusalem. I marvel at what it must take for something to live that long. 

Sequoia is one of my favorite places to visit, but each visit comes with a reminder that this forest, which grew and thrived for thousands of years, almost did not survive the last 125 years. Before it became a national park — before we as a nation realized that we needed national parks — these ancient trees were in danger of being cut down.

Today, there are parts of Sequoia that are nothing more than tree graveyards, filled with the stumps of trees that had lived up to 3,000 years by the time they were cut down. The massive sequoia trees were irresistible to lumber barons who continued to cut them down even after realizing the wood was fragile and prone to shatter when felled, only good for making grape stakes. It was an example of how, too often, immediate satisfaction takes precedence over what’s best in the long term.

The story of Esau selling his birthright to Jacob is another such case. The Torah tells us that Esau comes home hungry and tired after a day of hunting, and sees his brother Jacob preparing a hearty soup; Esau’s hunger drives him to exchange his birthright for a bowl of this soup.

We have midrash that provide details for his actions. Esau does not deserve the birthright, we read, because the soup is for his grieving father and Esau has been out performing wicked acts.

Rashi teaches that Esau, in fact, despises the birthright and is uninterested in it, because it comes with too much responsibility or because it will only benefit his children, long after he is gone. Esau cannot see the value in his birthright, only his immediate need: filling his stomach. He is so focused on the present that he has no view of the future.

Perhaps it is human nature. Israeli-American behavioral economist Dan Ariely, author of “Predictably Irrational,” explains that when we have a trade-off between something we want right now and something we want in the future, it is very hard for us to focus on the future. We tend to overvalue what is in front of us and have a hard time seeing the value or risk in the future. 

We do this with money, spending it now on something we want instead of saving; we do it with our health, eating that doughnut when we know it is not good for our long-term health; and we do it with our environment, taking what we want now though we risk our future to do so.

It may be that Esau is just like most of us. He is hungry now, and that matters more to him than a birthright that he may not receive for several years and that, even then, may not come with a tangible benefit.

So how do we learn those lessons? How do we learn to understand that the things we do now may make a big difference to us years from now? Ariely suggests that just knowing the ways we may act irrationally can remind us to think more carefully about our choices. 

In that regard, the study of Torah can have a real and lasting impact on our lives. In modern society, we are surrounded by cultural messages about living in the moment, about being present and focusing on the “here and now.” We are told that the key to a worry-free life is to seize the day and not to stress about the future.

But Torah can help us to think more carefully about the future. Reading and rereading these stories reminds us that human nature can lead us to make impulsive and unwise choices, and that we must consider the long-term results of our actions, not just our present-day desires.

About 125 years ago, a small group of people did just that. They were able to put a stop to unneeded logging and preserve what was left of the ancient forest. Today, we still have time to make changes to limit the human impact on our environment — the recent climate-change talks with China offer hope for the future. 

Esau choosing immediate pleasure over his future and his children’s birthright is an ancient story that continues to play out every day, but it doesn’t have to. Holding up the mirror of Torah to our lives teaches us how to be better people and how to create a better future for ourselves and the generations to come.

Rabbi Shawna Brynjegard-Bialik is a rabbi at Temple Ahavat Shalom in Northridge.

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