How did Yaakov fight an angel & how can we fight ours?

the reason why the angel couldn't fight Yakov is because he realized he was Isel it wasn't that I can't fight you now your new name is Isel it's he identified the Isel within him he identified the person within him is incredibly resilient okay friends The Story begins before we dive into this uh passage of the tal that we're about to read I want to give some background and the background is a story from this week's Torah portion if you happen to be listening to this when this is recorded if you're watching this on YouTube it might not be this week's Torah portion it's t portion of VL Yakov is finished running away from his brother as wanted to kill him it's now time to go home he finished his he finished his mission his mission was to start a family and live an ethical Jewish life in the town of in a place where it was unlikely which was with Lov and he's done it's time to go home it's time to go back to the land of Israel go back to his parents and on his way back he's anticipating that he's going to be meeting asov and that's a very scary thing he makes the necessary preps but then there's the Side Story and I want to give this just want to quickly go through this side story that takes place as context to the passage in talmud we're about to read the T the Side Story is that Yakov finds himself alone and there's this angel that comes out and starts attacking him he gets into a brawl with an angel which by the way there's a discussion among the commentaries where um as to whether this was prophetic or whether this literally happened which is a discussion which is beyond the capacity of of today's but it turns out he had the ability to overpower that angel and thwart the angel off the angel the only thing Angel could do was actually hit him in his hind um sciatica the sciatica nerve that's why we don't eat the sciatica Vein from animals and the angel gives him a blessing you're not going to be called yov anymore you're now going to be called Israel you have a new name why aren't you called yakob anymore Rashi says yov comes from the word to to deceive deception when asov felt deceived by yob he said he deceived me it also means yob also means the heal grabbed the's heel um but that's not going to be your identity anymore your identity is going to be Israel what does the word Israel mean s Minister you're a minister you're a person with dominance you're a person with rulership who commands respect you've gained some sort of strength and because you've gained some sort of strength that strength has become your identity okay with this the tal would comments on this portion of the Torah and this is 13A the talud says the talud contrasts the changing of jakob's name to the changing of Abraham's name Abraham also had his name changed but it's a little bit different what's the difference between the name change between Abraham and the name change of Yakov Abraham's name change was permanent yakob name change was more like a name addition what's the difference between the two so I'm going to read it in Hebrew and and translate in English you're welcome to follow along in the Hebrew or in the English anybody who calls Abraham by his old name which is a without the hay transgresses a positive command a positive Mitzvah if you call aaham you violated a positive mitvah because the Torah says your name is now going to be calling him would be violating thater says no no no you didn't violate a positive command you violated a negative command sh you've transgressed sh you didn't just miss an opportunity but you transgressed because the says that the the verse says you shall not call your name anymore you call aaham you've violated a command debate whether it's a positive command that you've violated or negative command that you've violated the next line The Tam says that's the case is that the case if you call S SAR she had her name changed as well the says that situation is not exactly the same the second next paragraph over there over there wasn't a command it was more of a fact God told your wife SAR that's not going to be her name anymore her name is now s there it wasn't a command it was a revelation her name is not SAR it's sah right it wasn't the command it was a revelation then the tud says what about yov Now's name was changed to is was Jacob now it's Israel so if somebody calls him yobi is that to a transgression and the tud answers sham it's not comparable you can't compare yakov's name change to Abraham's name change why the because because after his name was changed to from yob to Israel the Torah then again refers to him as yob once again God said to Israel to isra in a vision at night he said yov Yakov the Torah is narrating God says to Israel Yakov Yakov as if God's calling him Yakov again God is explicitly saying that you cannot call Abraham his old name a yet God intentionally calls Yakov yov and not just Israel he took on an additional name so if we were to summarize the ruling of this talmud it's a sin to call aaham by his old name yet yov keeps both names now the truth is this can almost be in parenthesis here but I think it's worth mentioning if you look in any halik codes you can look in the R's code the Miss Torah you could look in the the code of Jewish law where it synthesizes the rulings of the talmud you will not find this passage in the talid you will not find this ruling not there why not so I I there there's several different opinions here but one opinion says that that it's not a literal Prohibition in other words this portion of tal is not as much as it is a remember we had distinctions between and is the laws of the a is the philosophy and ethics of the talud and the fact that myones and other codes don't quote this implies that this is not but this is actually a which means when the says if you call Abraham you're you're transgressing it's not a literal transgression it just means there's something wrong here with doing it philosophically but not necessarily Hally it's more of a philosophical issue which we'll get into soon not a issue that that's one school of thought there's another school of thought and this is from the Ben of Bagdad from the 1800s and he says it actually is a transg and you know why it's not in the or not in the ra it's a transgression to callaham a in front of him you don't have to worry about that yet it's not a right now that's not an issue because he has passed away already but this begs the question let's say that this is not a issue it's more of a philosophical issue right there's a philosophical issue with calling aaham his old name but there's no philosophical issue calling Yakov by his old name why not what's the difference why are we so adamant against calling of raham by his old name his old identity forget your past man right that's a little scary but when it comes to Yakov he could hold on to his past and he could hold on to his future and it's just two different identities that he shifts back and forth the the or is one of the biblical commentaries one of the classic commentaries on the Torah um he's a fun commentary he's fun because he gets he's interesting he gets into he he pokes at at Torah from different angles He he'll expose you to to cabala he'll expose you to he'll expose you to philosophy to to simple interpretation apparently by the way when when he had authored his commentary he wasn't planning on being a Biblical commentator he was a rabbi who was studying Torah with his daughters and what emerged was interesting conversation that they felt was worth writing down and ultimately turned into a book but the says what's wrong with the name as opposed to abam a his old name when he was named well let's look back at the story why did God change him from Ab to Abraham anybody remember why what was it that caused that change he didn't have any children yet with Sarah right so God changed both both of their names yeah aam is not destined to have children with Sarai but Abraham is destined to have children with sarra it's it's like the old joke this actually happened apparently in La there was a dangerous area called South La South La was very dangerous in that South Central so so what happened I could be getting the story backwards but correct me if I'm wrong but apparently South La is very dangerous and the mayor wanted to put a stop to the crime years ago so he changed it to South Central and now there's no crime in in South La anymore um and now South Central it's a new city there's not a lot ofme I could be getting it backwards maybe it was South centr he Chang the whatever it was right so Aram a is not having any children with sorai so God says I have an idea I'll change your name to a abam and I'll change her name to Sarah and those people are destined to have children by the way we still on some level carry on this this tradition there's a tradition when God forbid somebody's sick and it's a frightening illness a terminal illness there's a tradition that we add a name to the person because your name is associated with what we call your muzzle your your spiritual identity your flow right from above and if God forbid if somebody's ill we change their name because now it's the original person is destined to be ill but the new name is is not I remember when I was in yiva there was a student who wanted to take on a new name just because he liked the name and he asked the RV in the community and the RV said don't mess if your life is good keep it that way if something's wrong you change your name if something's not wrong don't change your name um which is very interesting aam had children by the way so why did God need to change his name he had ymo he didn't have a child with Sarah he had a child with Hagar he had ymo when his name was Abraham he had the child so the explains identifying Abraham by AB is associating the lineage with is but when we exclusively identify him as aaham with the hey when his name was changed we're exclusive we're exclusively associating him with this is what the says that we it's a and that's why the is explaining that's why the talud says a sin whether Hally or philosophically depending on how you interpret it but there's a sin of associating him by his old identity because that is not the Jewish lineage the Jewish lineage is not ismo I get canceled for that by the way but that's okay [Music] the right our our our ishite neighbors who can be um you know don't want to hear that and that's okay um but the the lineage goes through y and that's his identity in contrast to Yakov however in contrast to Yakov who had the 12 tribes Yakov or yal Yakov had 12 tribes Israel 12 tribes right it's it's one and the same it's kind of one it's not a separate identity in that way it's not a separate familial identity which is why the Torah so adamant about not calling abam AB yet you could call Isel yob and we do call is yak we go back and forth we're missing a step here though right this begs a question if you don't want to associate ofam with his old name because you don't want to associate him with ymo why would I associate Israel with his old name yob who's yakob associated with asov why was he named yob he was literally named yakob for one reason because he grabbed onto the heel of as and and the word yov comes from the word a heel his core identity as a Yakov is the heel of Asa so for some reason we still want to identify Yakov with his identity as a con with his connection to ASV why would we want to do that right we're still we're missing something here if you were to put on the lenses of the teachings of the You' you've learned a lot of the teachings from the and you've you've seen his his style what do you think the reab might say the answer is that's his job is to deal with Asa his job is to deal with Asa his job is not to run away with Asa from ASV A's job is to go to where he finds himself and not run away from the challenges but to transform the challenges if he were to just retain the identity what he would be doing is saying I'm going to live above my problems and I'm going to and I'm going to sweep them under the rug because there's a part of me that's above them and I'm going to forget about the actual issues themselves and I'm not going to try to transform the world around me I'm going to live with my soul and forget about my body the torus says don't do that you're us o but you're you're also a Yakov when when it came to that fight that Yakov had with the angel there's a beautiful teaching from the sasis the sasis was the the of the dynasty or group of gur theur and the has beautiful teachings on the par Theus explains that the reason why the angel couldn't fight Yakov is because he realized he was Isel it wasn't that I can't fight you now your new name is Isel what's the connection it's he identified the Isel within him he identified the person within him that is beyond problems that is incredibly resilient and the person that is deep within our soul that is incredibly resilient and doesn't get intimidated by issues The Sire the minister within because that's why he was called eel he identified that within him wasn't like he earned that name through fighting it was more like through fighting he discovered a part of himself that was there all along why we we do that in life we have challenges and we persevere we persevere we fight we grow and what we discover is a strength that we had within ourselves the whole time that we didn't necessarily know about um the Yakov is the physical part of him and he says Angels could attack Yakov Angels could attack bodies problems can attack bodies they can't attack Souls the the uh the previous laa said when he was being taken away into prison from communist in the by the communist Russians communist Russia they're grabbing him they're pulling him away and as he's getting into I don't know if it was a car or wagon or whatever it was his last parting words until he was finally redeemed his parting words to hisim was that only the body of a Jew can be imprisoned not the soul of a Jew the body of a Jew this is what the is it says the Yakov was attacked but the moment Yakov identified within himself the thr the stronger part of him that's totally resilient it doesn't get attacked it can't get attacked it's too resilient however Yakov goes in Meet ASV right not e all but Yakov meets ASV because there's a part of us that has to live above we we live life in like this uh what What's the word I'm looking for there's like this dichotomy there's a part of us that has to what were you going to say is that dichotomy equilibrium but equilibrium that's that's a better word right there's an equilibrium because there's a part of us and we have to balance it there's a part of us that has to live above the world and there's a part of us that has to engage in the world there's the part of us that has to operate like shabas and be totally separate and then we have to go into the work week and engage and if we're fully engaging and don't have shabas or if we only have shabas but don't engage we're not doing what we need to do we're off balance the is is like the shabus this is what the says the is is like the shabis of a but the Yakov is the work week and what Yakov discovers is I have a I can't just be I have a mission and you know when his mission started by the way the moment he was born grabbing the heel of asov where he was identified as this is a yakob this is a person whose job is to transform asov you know where you see this by the way in the Torah portion this week if if you read the story if you read last week's story why is Yakov traveling why didn't he just stay with love on where it's safe just stay there forever God tells him you got to go back to Israel you're done go back to your family go back in peace and what do Yakov do he starts sending Messengers to see if asa's coming if God told you to travel somewhere and you're going to go back in peace you need to start sending Messengers to see if it's safe you got to start you know God tells you to go into the water you're going to start feeling is it too hot for me God told them to go to Israel yet yakob says okay but let me make sure it's safe are you kidding me God literally told you to do that it's like what the spies did it's right but but the implication is the fact that yakob did this this is what the re says in this teaching that I was citing the implication is that Yakov believed that his job wasn't just to go to Israel but his job was actually to influence ASV to inspire ASV to change ASV so this evil Barbarian who wants trans who who wants to destroy him and kill him and he says I could go to Israel and just run to safety like God told me but I have a mission in the meantime I got to inspire this guy and and by the way it worked temporarily because what did Yakov and ASA do when they met they embraced asa's heart melted and that was not asa's intention by any means he had 400 men with him he had 400 Soldiers with him so that certainly wasn't the intention it didn't last long because they went their separate ways and the Jewish people carry on through the lineage of Yakov and the amalekites Carry On Through the nation of ASV the amikit we know what they tried doing to us and the we know what they tried tried doing to us and the Romans who had destroyed the second temple we know what they tried doing to us so the battle is still multigenerational but the prophet and this is happens to be the Tor for this week's portion but the prophet ovadia uh assures us that there's going to be a time when the Messiah comes where the world is going to be full of the knowledge of God and the children of ASV are going to be subdued to truth are going to recognize where the true lineage of blessing comes from the children of as when the whole when msia comes the whole world is going to experience the truth of God how could you not recognize this truth but in the meantime we have Aus we have a mission like yov and by the way I don't mean our job is to prze our job is not to create people create more Jews turn people becoming Jewish right but our job is to get people to recognize a certain truth that there is one God and with that comes an objective morality that we don't just get to Define based on our political opinion on the other hand we can't get swamped up in politics and get get SW get swept up by what the world thinks we have to be the is right there's this equilibrium there is this the Isel part of us the part of us that's above problems there's the Yakov part of us the part of us that has to deal with problems and we got to deal with both of these we got to manage both of these once AB had he's got to stay focused but for us as benov and Ben is we have this and by the way they compliment each other when you have a very inspiring shabas you have a better work week and when you have a productive Work Week a spiritually productive Work Week where you get to inspire the world around you you have a very meaningful chabas you have good conversation at the table and you come into chabas refreshed so they compliment each other when we operate on the equilibrium one side of equilibrium as a as being above our problems as being Soul Ori oriented so when we're the yob who has to meet asov we can finally meet asov in peace with full confidence and this is actually what happens I'll leave you off with this because Yakov comes with his big bribe all his gifts all the animals and stuff that he has for for ASF what does ASF say oh I shouldn't yes I have plenty yob says I insist yes I have everything the kakar one of the commentaries in the Torah points out asov says I have a lot implying that there's still room for more yako says I have everything he's satisfied he's satiated when it comes to materialism he was satiated because he was really operating on the level of Y him operating on the level of Y enabled his operation with the world yako to be more efficient when we can find within ourselves these the part of us that doesn't need to to to employ deception like Yakov might because we're confident we're comfortable in our own skin we're able to fight that angel so now when we interact with the world even when it's not chabas right we our impact is unimaginable you you never you can never guess what that uh I think we'd be surprised on the level of impact that we might have have okay that's my story and I'm sticking to it