At an opportune moment
while Lavan and his sons were out shearing their flocks, Ya'akov=Jacob being very much aware of Lavan and his
family's resentment to his success, escapes Lavan's attention and leaves
without saying goodbye. After 3 days
Lavan hears about Ya'akov unannounced departure and pursues him. When they meet
Lavan acts like the aggrieved father and accuses Ya'akov of deception, trickery
and embarrassing him by fleeing with his daughters like ' prisoners of the sword'
and also taking his gods. Ya'akov answers that he was afraid that Lavan would
steal his daughters. After cursing anybody who stole the gods, Ya'akov invited
Lavan to do a search. When Lavan turns
up nothing, Ya'akov feeling angry about the search confronts Lavan. The sages
of the Medrash praise Jacob's words, preferring the' kapda'nut = taking to task
and rebuke' of Jacob to the words of humility of David. Instead of attacking
Lavan and using aggressive language Jacob tries
to appease Lavan and just defend and justify himself. He asks –
'what is my transgression, what is my sin that you pursue me'. Lavan in fact
wanted to kill Ya'akov, but he uses understatement and non-violent
communication. He says - what is my sin that you ' pursue me and does not say 'kill me'. David in his humility asks Jonathan-
what I have done, what is my sin before your father that he seeks my life.
David talks about 'bloodshed' in his attempt at appeasing and being conciliatory.
Although Ya'akov is
praised for not openly attacking Lavan and
using instead NVC -
Non –violent communication, the Alter
from Slabodka, Rabbi Finkel brings to
our attention that the Torah introduces Ya'akov's with the language of argument
and confrontation and the sages call it 'kapda'nut ' = taking to task and
confrontation . Aggressive and confrontational language may be hidden or
concealed but it is implied. When a person is accused of doing something wrong
and then in an apologetic way defends himself, he implies that he is the '
righteous ' man and the other person is lacking. A better response would be as
the Talmud – Shabbat 88b says that a person should be one who is disgraced and
insulted and yet remains silent and does not respond with insults. But it is
not enough to remain silent. Even if one is an innocent party with no interest
in a having an argument or conflict one has to make every effort to try and
make peace with the other party. We
learn this from Moses who asked Da'tan and Aviram - leaders of a group who
joined Korach's rebellion against Moses - to come and speak to him to try and
reconcile differences and make peace. They refused to come and said that Moses
and Aaron were unfit for the leadership role, in fact a disaster bringing the Israelites
from a land of milk and honey to die in the desert. Moses disregarded his own honor and dignity
and went over to the rebels to try and end the quarrel and make peace. If Moses wouldn't have gone over to the rebels , he would have violated a negative commandment of being like Korach and his assembly. The
Talmud Sanhedrin 110a learns from Moses that one who does not make an effort to
make peace is called somebody who supports and contributes to a quarrel and
violates the negative commandment of being like Korach and his assembly.
If Ya'akov was on a
higher level, of a greater stature he could have directly dealt with Lavan's
concerns and returned to the land of Canaan with his consent. Ya'akov's stature
is being judged, not his actions. But still after they met, Ya'akov could have acknowledged
Lavan's sentiments and explained in a more neutral and non-judgmental way that in
his humble opinion the way he left was the best for all parties concerned under
the circumstances. He could address Lavan's concerns for contact with his
daughters and grandchildren by saying that he has an open invitation to come
and visit them whenever he wants to visit. However, we can see the positive in Ya'akov's
' kapda'nut ' – confrontational stance, as it did get Lavan to think of the
safety of his descendants and ask for a peace treaty to be made between them. Most
of our interactions don't require confrontation, but the pursuit of peace.
Instead of quarrels,
argument, criticism and conflict parents and teachers can focus on being less
judgmental about their own and others' actions as being for eg. Manipulative,
wrong, bad, inappropriate or even good and focus instead on the concerns,
feelings, and needs. Being attentive to the needs of others and understanding
their concerns will help to solve problems in a mutually satisfying way and
promote trusting relationships. Non- violent communication NVC or compassionate
communication helps us avoid ' doing to' or even hurtful words and create a '
working with ' relationship. When we first try to understand the concerns of
others , the concerns of our kids and students before presenting our
expectations and concerns , kids will feel understood , that we care about them
and meeting their needs and will more likely be open to taking our perspective, hearing our
concerns and being empathic. Kids then start to think how their actions impact
on others and how they can make a contribution and not just what's in it for
me. Peace is not just the absence of conflict, but people being interdependent
caring human beings.
