פרשת תולדות תשכ"ו - ברכותיו של יצחק

הכי קרא שמו IS IT BECAUSE HE HAS BEEN CALLED [JACOB]—This is a question, like (29:15) “Is it because (הכי) thou art my brother?” Perhaps that is why they have given him the name Jacob — in reference to what was to happen in the future — that he would some time or other supplant me (יעקבני)? (Tanchuma). Why did Isaac tremble? He thought: Perhaps I have sinned in blessing the younger before the elder, thus changing the order of relationship between them. But when Esau began to cry out, “for he hath supplanted me these two times”, his father asked him, “What did he do to you?” He replied, “He took away my birth-right”. Isaac thereupon said, “It was on account of this that I was grieved and trembled: perhaps I had overstepped the line of strict justice. Now, however, I have really blessed the first-born — ‘And he shall indeed be blessed’”.

?הכי קרא שמו יעקב, the line is a rhetorical question. Esau says: “although Yaakov had been named thus because at birth he had held on to my heel so that I became the firstborn and entitled to a double inheritance and he was without such distinction, is he now going to turn the tables on me and get the share of the firstborn, i.e. both blessings?” The word הכי as a question also occurs in connection with Lavan and Yaakov when the latter works for his uncle. When the question of wages came up, Lavan exclaimed הכי אחי אתה ועבדתני חינם, “would there be any justice in your working for me without wages merely because you are my brother (and one does not have to pay one’s family)?” (29,15) Lavan implied: “on the contrary, you should be paid more generously because you are my family.” We have learned in Baba Batra 139 that when someone dies leaving behind many children (sons) and the estate is substantial, the sons share the inheritance whereas the daughters receive a stipend from the estate pending their getting married. When the estate the father left behind is meager, the daughters get the stipend whereas the sons will have to fend for themselves even if it involves begging. Admon says וכי בשביל שאני זכר ויפה כח בנכסים מרובים הורע כוחי בנכסים מועטין? “Am I supposed to suffer because I am male, able-bodied and my parents were wealthy?” [his argument was accepted by Rabban Gamliel, as was every other argument quoted in the name of Admon in the Talmud. Ed.]