T orah P ortion
CAN DL E L IGHTIN G
Digging Your Own Well
BY RABBI ALAN ISER
Parshat Toldot
MUCH OF HIS LIFE, the
patriarch Isaac appears to be
a passive figure in the events
that swirl around him: his near
sacrifice at the hands of his
father; a marriage match with
a cousin; and the deception
and “stealing” of the blessing
for the firstborn, intended for
Esau, by his wife and son.

As the late Rabbi Jonathan
Sacks characterized him, he is
the least original of the three
patriarchs. He is not a spiri-
tual pioneer like Abraham, nor
does his life have dramatic ups
and downs like Jacob.

In our Torah portion, Isaac
even has a similar dispute over
wells with the Philistines as did
Truck Continued from Page 10
students, has helped Harris
and Wallace with licensing,
permits, marketing and
social media, even after his
graduation from Penn. On
Nov. 8, Whitehorn was on
hand at Clark Park, helping
out as a cashier. Harris and
Wallace have “big dreams”
for what Grassroots can be,
Whitehorn said.

“Troy and Kareem are both
very inspirational people,” said
Whitehorn. “The hope with
Grassroots, it was always to
have a social justice mission,
and part of it was trying to
employ Philadelphians from
traditionally under-served
communities and just bring
light to different issues that
they may face.”
Elana Burack serves on the
Grassroots advisory board with
Whitehorn, having begun her
association with the group as
an undergraduate and carried
that into her time as a master’s
student at Penn. At home with
her family in South Carolina,
20 NOVEMBER 19, 2020
his father. Indeed, the Torah
reports that initially Isaac dug
anew the wells Abraham had
unearthed that the Philistines
then stopped up, giving the
wells the same names as did
his father (Genesis 26:18). But
Isaac finally manages to dig
new wells to which he gives his
own names, Esek (contention)
and Sitnah (harassment) The
Philistines quarrel with him
over the first two of these Isaac
wells, but finally desist when he
digs the third, named Rehovot.

Rabbi Simchah Bunem
of Psciche, one of the early
Chasidic masters, sees great
significance in this seemingly
mundane story. Isaac first
re-digs Abraham’s wells, that
is to say, attempts to follow his
father’s spiritual path. However,
just imitating someone else will
not work. Isaac then discovers
that he needs to find his own
way to God, and thus digs his
own wells.

Every Jew must approach the
service of God by digging a well
with their own essence and,
thereby, cling to the creator. At
first, this well may not work
for your own soul, thus Isaac’s
first two wells are the subjects
of disputes with the Philistines,
which represent contentious
forces within Isaac himself in
his search for his identity.

In other words, he must
overcome his own inner
demons and conflicts. Finally,
through persistence, he arrives
at his rightful destination,
Rehovot, literally spaciousness
or wide open, the place where
his conflicts are resolved and
he achieves wholeness.

taking classes remotely, she
wasn’t able to make The Chosen
Mitbach’s debut, but she hopes
to get a taste of what she’s
been working on in the coming
months. Even from afar, she
can’t help but gush about the
project and its principals.

“Every time I’m on a call, I
walk away feeling so inspired
and humbled,” Burack said.

She feels proud to contribute to
the creation of a Black-owned
business, and to strengthen
ties between Jewish students at
Penn and the people who call
West Philadelphia home.

Hannah Bookbinder, an
academic coach and college
admissions consultant in Penn
Valley, first heard about the
project through her teenage
son, Zachary, who read about
Azir’s paralysis. Since then,
Bookbinder has come to
consider Harris and Wallace
friends, and serves on the
Grassroots advisory board.

Though she too couldn’t make
it to the opening, Harris
and Wallace’s perseverance
inspired her and her family
from afar; she spoke to Harris
on the phone after they’d
packed up for the day on
Nov. 8.

The experience has been
“eye-opening for me as a human
being,” Bookbinder said.

The Jewish community that
rallied around the truck has
been out in full force at the
first two days of Grassroots
(they rolled out again on Nov.

15), and to Harris, it’s only
a continuation of the support
that he and Wallace have
received since the beginning.

They’ll need it now, too; back in
August, they were furloughed
without pay from their jobs at
Falk Dining Commons.

There are permits pending
for Lower Merion, but in
the meantime, Sundays for
Kareem Wallace and Troy
Harris will mean serving up
IKC-certified kosher veggie
burgers, quesadillas and the
Grassroots Signature Smack
You Back Macaroni, just a hop,
skip and a jump away from the
kitchen where it all began. l
jbernstein@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISH EXPONENT
Nov. 20
Nov. 27
It is noteworthy that immedi-
ately after the completion of the
well named Rehovot, Isaac merits
an appearance from God, who
reaffirms the Abrahamic promises
of blessing and offspring. Only
when Isaac has achieved his own
spiritual identity in the course of
his life’s journey does God speak
directly to him.

There are several lessons for
us today from Isaac’s digging
of the wells. It is important,
like Isaac, to be a link in the
chain of tradition; not all of
us can be bold innovators like
Abraham. But we cannot stop
there. To borrow from another
Chasidic teaching based on the
first blessing of the Amidah, we
must invoke our God and the
God of our ancestors: our own
approach to God and Jewish
tradition as well as the rich
FBI Continued from Page 11
a sharp uptick from the 5,850
in 2015. As in previous years,
the majority were based on race.

African Americans experienced
the most hate crimes, 1,930.

Hate crimes based on religion
made up approximately 20% of
total hate crimes.

Last year also saw a huge
increase in hate crime murders,
to 51 from 24 in 2018. That
includes the mass shooting at
a Walmart in El Paso, Texas,
that killed 23 and wounded
the same number. The shooter
wrote in a manifesto that he
was acting against a Hispanic
“invasion.” Anti-Hispanic hate
crimes, according to the FBI,
rose 9% in 2019, the fourth
straight year they’ve risen.

The ADL said the FBI
numbers are almost certainly
a significant undercount of the
true number of hate crimes
in the United States because
many municipalities do not
submit hate crime data to the
FBI. According to the ADL,
86% of participating agencies
4:23 p.m.

4:19 p.m.

heritage of the past.

If we are going to forge a
Jewish identity for ourselves
that can sustain us through the
highs and lows of life, we have
to dig our own wells. l
Rabbi Alan Iser is an adjunct
professor of theology at St.

Joseph’s University and St. Charles
Borromeo Seminary and teaches
at the Conservative Yeshiva of
Jerusalem. The Board of Rabbis
of Greater Philadelphia is proud to
provide diverse perspectives on
Torah commentary for the Jewish
Exponent. The opinions expressed
in this column are the author’s own
and do not reflect the view of the
Board of Rabbis.

reported no hate crimes to
the FBI, including 71 cities
with populations greater than
100,000 — though the largest
cities tend to report their hate
crime data. The ADL also said
that the number of agencies
reporting hate crimes to the
FBI has declined each year.

“We have an incomplete
picture,” Greenblatt said.

“That being said, I think the
trends over two decades are
telling. Hate remains a reality
for people from marginalized
communities in this country,
particularly Jews, who repre-
sent somewhere between 1.5
and 2% of the population and
[experience] a disproportionate
number of the hate crimes.”
Greenblatt said the ADL
hopes the incoming Biden
administration will support
increased anti-bias education
in schools and work on a plan
to confront white nationalism.

“Extremists feel emboldened,
and anti-Jewish conspiracy
theories and anti-Jewish ideas
generally are taking root,” he
said. “Jews feel less safe. Jews are
extremely worried about this.” l
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM