She or He?

 Boqer tov! 🌞

Contained within today's aliyah we find the words of Bereshiyt 29 v 25, where we read of Ya'aqov waking up to find Leah next to him instead of Rachel:

    "And it came to pass in the morning that, behold, it was Leah;..."

    We've been reading that for years and it makes perfect sense - in English. But just for a second, let's look at the Hebrew

    "בַבֹּקֶר וְהִנֵּה־הִוא לֵאָה" - in the morning and behold 'she' was Leah.

    So last night I was watching a teaching on the Torah portion and heard that we should rather look at how the word is written and not at how it is spoken. What does that mean?

    In Hebrew, Hu is He and He is She. Hahaha🤣

But really, it's true. He = הוא and She = היא. (At a certain stage in the development of the Hebrew language, the Waw and the Yod were used as vowels - the Waw representing the O and U sounds and the Yod representing the E and I sounds).

    I was taught that the Waw in He and the Yod in She could be used interchangeably with either gender.

    However, if we look at the word הוא in this verse, without the Hiriq, it says He and not She.

    I asked the Lord how my teachers could have taught me wrong! His reply was that there are many hidden treasures in the Torah and they are not just given out willy-nilly, they have to be worked for. I was duly put in my place.

    When I woke up this morning, I checked my Torah, and truly, the word is written with a Waw. Then I checked my notes relating to the use of the Matres Lexionis, and there it was: The Waw represents the O and U sounds and the Yod represents the E and I sounds. OK.

    But what does it mean: "In the morning, and behold, HE was Leah" ?

    There are many anomalies in the Hebrew text of the Torah and the Tanakh, and this is definitely one of them. There is a certain rule of Biblical Hebrew grammar where a word or phrase is written one way, but spoken differently. Again, this is definitely one of them!

    

    Let's go back to the question: Why did Ya'aqov decide to live with two sisters? Couldn't he have just accepted Leah as God's plan for him? Or perhaps divorce Leah and marry Rachel? Why on earth would a man decide to live with two sisters as his wives?

    

    A certain sage from approximately 300 years ago wrote a certain commentary on the Torah and in it, he made the argument that, indeed, Ya'aqov realised that HE was Leah, meaning: He understood he belonged to Leah, by the design of the Almighty. But where does this understanding originate?

    Upon waking to find Leah instead of his beloved Rachel, he yells, shouts, and asks her why she tricked and deceived him.

    Enter Leah the Lawyer!

She said to him, so the story goes: "Didn't YOU trick your father and your brother? And you're accusing ME of tricking you?"

    She shut him up!

And this is how Ya'aqov knew he was Leah. She was his wife and that would not change.

All this comes from one Hebrew letter. The Torah must be learned in the original language, Hebrew. There's just no other language that conveys the meanings and lessons God has for us to learn.

I hope this little bit of information excites you and gives you a hunger to discover for yourself the treasures of the Torah.

🎉Shavu'a tov!🎉