Saturday, December 09, 2006

DVAR TORAH: Vayishlach (Count Esau the Impaler)

Dots! Once again normal Dvar Torah is superseded by scribal oddities. When Jacob and Esau are reunited. Though he expected his brother to kill him, Esau hugged and kissed him. Kissed him, eh? The Torah says, וַיְנַשֶּׁק־לוֹ (vaynashek lo), which means "and he kissed him", but there is one of those rare dots above the word written in the Torah scroll. The Rabbis take this to mean that there is more than meets the eye about the word. וינשק־לו, with only a single letter changed becomes וינשך־לו, (vaynashekh lo) "and he bit him". Ergo, Esau's a vampire.

Another pointless read as I have no time. Shabbat Shalom.

PS: Whoa, my cousin's watching "Boy Meets World" and I just noticed producer Michael Jacobs, a member of my shul, having a cameo where he's davening, with kippa, tallis, and what appears to be an Artscroll in a NICU-ward of a hospital.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

i was so hoping i was the first and only one who came up with this brilliant interpretation.
further on the subject, what about his wanting that red RED soup? methinks it has much to do with his hankering after, well, you know, not to put too fine a point on it, BLOOD! and all that hunting, huh? then, you know how naftali sends his son to get the deed for the Ma'arat Hamachpeilah, and he lops off eisav's head, and it goes rolling into the cave? k, that's pretty classic vampire busting. also, they say one of the distinguishing features of eisav was that he was born with a FULL SET OF TEETH. but maybe, how about they were fangs? even creepier. makes for a great retelling of an old classic, huh? i might just have to write it.