Isidor Rabi, the Nobel laureate in physics, was once asked, Why did you become a scientist rather than a doctor, lawyer, or businessman, like the other immigrant kids in your neighborhood? His answer was profound. “My mother made me a scientist without ever intending it. Every other Jewish mother in Brooklyn would ask her child after school,
‘So, did you learn anything new today?’
But not my mother. She always asked me a different question. Izzy,’ she would say, ‘did you ask a good question today?’
Celebrating the search for truth made me become a scientist.”
It also led him to embark on a journey that culminated in discovering nuclear magnetic resonance for which he won the Nobel.
Chazal teach us that the descendants of Esav will be subdued only by the descendants of Rochel. Indeed, Rashi points out that it was only after Yosef was born that Yaakov makes the decision to return to Eretz Yisrael and face his brother Esav. What is it about Yosef that presents the antidote to Esav?
What is it about Yosef that gives Yaakov the confidence to overcome Esav? The Shem Mishmuel provides a beautiful answer. You see, the name Esav comes from the word asuy, which means completed, fully done. When Esav was born, he looked adult-like with hair over his entire body. Esav embodied the attitude of asuy.
He felt complete as he was with no need to change. He saw no value in improvement or growth. He was proud of where he stood. To advance was unnecessary. To climb higher was worthless. Yosef, on the other hand, represented the complete opposite. Yosef comes from the root of mosif, to add or increase. Yosef always saw room to grow.
Good was never his ceiling. He constantly aspired to become greater. He recognized the danger of complacency. Being stagnant was unimaginable. And he therefore relentlessly pursued growth. And that was the spirit that led a young lad, who was a slave in a foreign land, to eventually become the Prime Minister and save the world from famine.
This is how the Esav our lives gets defeated. When we recognize the slippery slope of self-satisfaction, we counter the danger of complacency with the attitude of Yosef, opening our minds and hearts to new avenues of growth and optimization. As Samuel Goldwyn famously said, “the harder I work, the luckier I get.”
The comfort zone is a beautiful place. But nothing ever grows there. Success, Yosef teaches us, lies beyond its borders. Wishing you a wonderful Shabbos.
