Aikev: if/then

Aikev: if/then

In the parsha, aikev is translated as "because, consequent ."  Onkelos translates it as "halaf," in exchange.  Earlier this word, the root of the name Yaakov ( Jacob), meant a heel, the fulcrum of  walking.  Now we are extending that meaning to the pivot of success.  This is fundamental conditional programming: if/then.   If you keep the commandments,  then you will succeed.  It moves the contingency from physics to the author of Nature, the Creator of the universal.

The first mention of aikev is in the Garden of Eden.  The aikev is the target of the humiliated  serpent,  the place where the snake aims, as the human tries to crush its head.  Achilles. This is the symbolism : The deception, the excuse, symbolized by the agent of temptation, impedes a true understanding of cause and effect.  The ability to scapegoat permits the adventure into the forbidden. The Devil made me do it/ gotcha by the heel!

Then there is Jacob, the second born, evidencing his striving by hanging onto his brother's heel.  The brother Esau, named for the grass; the brother Jacob, named for the action of the snake (in the grass). The older brother, through his hunting adventures, finds favor in his father's eyes.  The younger brother grabs. What is left him to do? Perhaps this grabbing of the heel is a partial undoing of the previous episode.  The brother that races ahead, not thinking of what he is trampling on, is re-minded about consequences and considerations. It is Jacob who brings elements of the Torah to Esau.  The consequences seem to include getting his head stepped on. 

Eikev reminds us that what we perceive as cause and effect( the other if/then)  is a convenient fantasy, a model.   It is not the kernel, The parsha reminds us of the manna and says that the human does not live by bread, but by the word of Gd.  If the farmer plows and plants and  waters and weeds - there may be an adequate crop yield.  But storm, disease, vermin and other unanticipated  events can invalidate the hard work.    Nature is not fair.  Natural selection (the core belief of Esau?) is an excellent model, but the variations that are its substrate are the work of Gd, as are the selective forces that are its crux. 

 The parsha  gives us a formula.  Follow the rules and you will do well.  If/then. The survival from previous transgressions required extraordinary effort that cannot be redone.  The survival from previous punishment ... is that evidence of Divine kindness?