FROM MUNDANE TO INSPIRATION

Dear Family,

I hope everyone is well.

I want to wish Renee, Sid and Brian long life for the Yohrtzeit of Uncle Dave which was last week. You should have only joyous occasions to celebrate.

In this week's Sedra Toldos, we learn about Yitzchack RE-DIGGING the wells of water which his father Avraham had dug, because they had been stopped up by the Philistines.

I saw an interesting article written by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz AH, who passed away a few months ago, explaining the significance of this story.

Avraham was a pioneer of Judaism.

He searched to find out the meaning of everything, he asked many questions, and everything interested him.

This was represented by him digging and searching into the earth to discover living waters, and he was put through many tests by Hashem.

Some excitements last 5 minutes, some a few hours, some a few days, months, or even a few years etc, but mostly they tend to dissipate and become dull.

This is represented by the Philistines.

They are not particularly bad, they don't show abominable behaviour as with other Nations that we meet in Torah, and on the whole they are decent people.

But what do they do? They come along and fill the wells of living water (enthusiasm and zest for life), with earth (dullness) - Sitemum is the Hebrew word used for this, which has the root stam.

Stam is like, 'whatever', or a shrug, or ordinary, or path of least resistance, or random.

They deflate everything they encounter, and this rapidly passes from one person to the next.

And the Philistines also represent this tendency which we have within ourselves.

And this then was Yitzchak's work.

His father had the energy, inspiration and enthusiasm of a pioneer.

Yitzchak is the second generation, and he now has to follow in his father's footsteps and re-dig the same holes which the Philistines had stopped up.

On the one hand it is easy because the wells are already well located, and an opening has already been made, but on the other hand it is difficult because there are no new discoveries

Despite the difficulty Yitzchak pushes himself forward and redigs the wells, TO AGAIN DISCOVER THE JOY OF THE LIVING WATERS

This applies to us both in our secular and spiritual lives.

Even although we are repeating similar tasks every day, we need to redig the well to find fresh living waters, and to try find something new and interesting.

And this is done, as was done by Avraham, to ask questions, try to understand better, refresh what we have forgotten, penetrate subjects deeper etc

It applies also to looking for hidden treasures in other people, and requires much training and practice!

Gut Shabbos to all

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