by Rabbi Avi Billet
There are two times when a quality of Leah and Rachel is mentioned in our parsha – the first is immediately before Yaakov tells Lavan he will work for seven years to marry Rachel, the Torah inserts a parenthetical comment that “ועיני לאה רכות ורחל היתה יפץ תואר וטבת מראה.” (29:17) Leah’s eyes were “rakot” (see possible explanations below) and Rachel was very beautiful and pleasing to look at.
The second time is shortly after Yaakov marries Rachel (according to most commentaries this happens a week after he marries Leah), the Torah tells us that “וירא ה' כי שנואה לאה ויפתח את רחמה ורחל עקרה.” And God saw that Leah was “s’nuah” and He opened her womb, while Rachel was (remained) barren.
What are we to make of these depictions of their physical appearances and Leah’s status as mentioned before their respective wombs status?
Rashi says Leah’s eyes were weak from crying. Everyone who knew the families said “Rivkah has two sons and Lavan has two daughters. The older (Eisav) will marry the older (Leah), and the younger (Yaakov) will marry the younger (Rachel).” [For many reasons it is hard to reconcile this rumor mill regarding two families which, though related, live hundreds of miles apart. But we’ll get back to this at the end.]
Onkelos says the term describing Leah’s eyes means her eyes were beautiful.
Ramban suggests Leah’s eyes may have been weakened by the sun. Along similar lines, Netziv says her eyes were sensitive and therefore she couldn’t be a shepherdess like her sister because she couldn’t spend too much time in the sun.
Ibn Ezra quotes Ben Efrayim (likely a Kaaraite), who suggests the word “Rakot” is missing an Alef, and should have said “Arukhot” – meaning she had long eyes (Ibn Ezra doesn’t give full context, and we are left to conjecture as to what Ben Efrayim meant). Leaving aside the problem with the suggestion that the Torah is missing a letter, Ibn Ezra thinks the suggestion is so foolish he suggest that Ben Efrayim himself is missing an Alef – which either means means he is missing אלוף (wisdom), or that that Ben Efrayim’s name should be read Ben Parim – the son of cows – for making such a foolish suggestion (either way you look at it, clearly Ibn Ezra was not a fan of the Karaite).
Rashbam says Leah’s eyes were pleasant, as the word “rakh” means soft. He concludes that a bride who has pleasant eyes does not need to be inspected for any other beautiful feature. (See Torah Temimah who makes a similar point quoting the Talmud Taanit 24a)
Daat Zekeinim (Baalei Hatosafot) begin like Rashbam noting that “Rakot” means “soft and tender,” similar to the term “Rakh vatov” – soft and good.
Then they say the parallel comparison of Leah’s eyes to Rachel’s beauty means the following: “She was beautiful because her eyes were beautiful, and she appeared soft and childlike. But Rachel was super praiseworthy in her beauty, save for the fact that her eyes were pained from crying because she feared she would fall into Eisav’s lot. [This fear was grounded in the fact that] she was barren, which would cause Yaakov to divorce her [for she could not bear children to him], which would cause Eisav to marry her off the rebound.”
According to this, Leah’s eyes are mentioned because they were her most beautiful feature, while Rachel’s other beauty is focused upon, because her eyes were most unbecoming.
The Sha"kh on the Torah (Rav Mordekhai HaKohen) goes in an entirely different direction than just about everyone else, somewhat related to the Daat Zekenim approach.
When Rivkah first appeared on the scene in the Torah, we were immediately told וְהַנַּעֲרָ טֹבַת מַרְאֶה מְאֹד. Not so Rachel! She appeared on the scene, Yaakov first saw her, then he gave water to her sheep, then he kissed her, then he cried. After telling her why he gave her water, why he kissed her – because he is her cousin – he is brought to meet his uncle, who, after a month, asks him what his wages should be for working as a shepherd for Lavan's sheep.
THEN the Torah tells us וְעֵינֵי לֵאָה רַכּוֹת וְרָחֵל הָיְתָה יְפַת תֹּאַר וִיפַת מַרְאֶה: :ח) וַיֶּאֱהַב יַעֲקֹב אֶת רָחֵל. After Yaakov had been around a month!
Shakh writes:
It would seem that Yaakov loved Rachel on account of her beauty… But it can’t be that this is so, for it would have told us when Yaakov first met her, ‘when Yaakov saw her, she was so beautiful, so he took the rock off the well for her…’ As a matter of fact, the Torah does not emphasize her beauty as it did with Rivkah! Rachel’s description was told to us not when she was introduced, but later, and is written in the past tense: Rachel – היתה יפת מראה - was [ie ‘had been’] beautiful and pleasant to look at. That was before she became a shepherd. Since then her beauty has depleted on account of her weariness, but Yaakov loved her nevertheless. When he heard she was a shepherd, he thought ‘Maybe she’s so ugly she became a shepherd. And because she’s so ugly, none of the male shepherds have anything to do with her.’ But when he saw her and how she resembled his mother, it tells us ‘when he saw her’ meaning her modesty, how she comes after all the shepherds, and walks among the sheep instead of in front of them, he knew she had nothing to do with the other shepherds. So he kissed her and told her of their relationship, to test her ‘welcoming guests’ skills. When she ran home to tell her father of their new guest, his feelings for her grew and the love became strong.
This novel interpretation demonstrates what we all know to be true. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and is much deeper than skin deep. And no matter how we look at it, it is hard to come to a clear conclusion as to what the Torah is telling us through depicting Leah and Rachel in this way?
The Alshikh explains Leah’s eyes were רכות from crying – but not as much because of what many suggest – the thought she might marry Eisav – but because she שהתחננה לה' ובכה תבכה. She would beseech God regularly and thus would cry.
If the “talk of the town gossipers” (note brackets above in the 4th paragraph) is improbable due to distance and the likelihood that the people who knew Rivkah’s family did not know Lavan’s and vice versa, then Rachel’s personal fears of the possibility of not remaining married to Yaakov due to her own (perhaps known only to her) infertility is a fairly logical conclusion to draw. Her barrenness, then, is a feature to watch as Leah’s womb opens up with God’s help.
So what are we to make of Leah being שנואה? Does that word mean hated? Or perhaps “less loved?”
Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch writes “God chose precisely the one who felt slighted and disadvantaged, and made her the principal ancestress of His people. For the names that this less-loved wife gave to her sons show us that, precisely in her feeling of disadvantage, she was saturated with love for her husband; the names show us that she uplifted herself to fully appreciate the role of motherhood in the destiny of woman and the happiness of marriage, and that for both she cast her burden on God, Who sees and hears all and causes His Presence to dwell between man and woman. Her husband’s love was her goal, and with every child born to her, she hoped to add another layer to the foundation of this love. In the end, her hopes were fulfilled. What was denied to the bride and wife was granted to the mother of children.”
There are certainly other possibilities of where this “hatred” feeling comes from.
• He liked Leah as a cousin, but never wanted to marry her.
• He had been tricked into marrying her, and hated her because he was victim of a rouse.
• He had been tricked into marrying her, and he hated her because of her role in not owning up to her true identity,
• She was a detestable woman, so he hated her.
Some of these don’t really make sense. Because if Yaakov really hated her, it stands to reason he would have divorced her. After all, his marriage to her was made under false pretenses.
So what does it mean that “she was hated?” A lot of it could have been in her mind, comparing herself to her sister. God’s perspective could also simply be a reflection of Leah’s feelings. It’s not farfetched to say that she was “less loved,” as the Torah doesn’t mince words in describing Yaakov’s love for Rachel (29:18,20,30)
At the same time, Yaakov also gets angry at Rachel (30:2), in a manner we never see him treating Leah – even when Leah seems to be very forward after trading her “dudaim” (flowers – mandrakes?) to Rachel in exchange for the evening with Yaakov.
So was it real hatred that was going on here?
Reb Bunem of Pshischa had a different perspective in explaining Leah’s being “hated.” He suggests it is impossible that Yaakov hated her. Rather, she was hated by herself, the same way that a true righteous person is very hard on his or herself. She saw her own flaws, knew her inadequacies, may have had leftover feelings of sadness from the thought that at any time Yaakov might divorce her, leaving her open to being picked up by Eisav.
Another approach, completely in the other direction, is the one offered by Rabbi Chaim Paltiel, based on one premise that Leah was actually greater than Rachel, and based on another premise that Yaakov actually felt Leah was out of his league (either because she was “too great” or because she was destined for Eisav).
R Chaim Paltiel suggests the hatred was a rouse. “If I let on that I love her, Eisav’s hatred for ME will multiply.” And because Yaakov “hated her,” she had many children to contradict her beauty. Combining his approach here, we can better understand what he writes about Leah and Rachel’s beauty.
He says Leah was more beautiful than Rachel. That’s why her eyes were weak!! Her father would hide her in an inner chamber, and when she’d emerge, her eyes became very sensitive because she was not used to light.
Presumably then, her having many children was a way to hide her beauty in case she’d ever encounter Eisav, who might otherwise be upset that Yaakov had taken his intended bride because who thinks of a busy mother in that way? Rabbi Paltiel even says that Rachel’s being depicted as beautiful by no means indicates she was more beautiful than Leah.
Of course, there is a passage in Midrash Tanchuma which has Yaakov, in the morning, accusing Leah of being a liar and a cheat like her father, to which she responds, perhaps heartlessly, perhaps coldly, “It takes one to know one. Weren’t you the one who said to his father, ‘I am Eisav your first born!’” This, the Tanchuma suggests, is when Yaakov began to hate her.
Leah is described as the Gedolah, in comparison to Rachel being the Ketanah, which can simply be a measure of older versus younger, but can also refer to a measure of greatness. The Midrash Aggadah suggests Leah was greater because she would eventually be the mother of Kehunah and Malchus (see also Rabbi Eliezer in Baba Batra 123a), while Rachel only had Shaul and Mordechai to boast about. The Pesikta adds Yosef to Rachel’s list, but notes that like Shaul, Yosef had no dynasty as he was just a one-time king and left no heir to his throne.
Our goal through Torah study is to consider different possibilities, different interpretations, learn from each one as to how to relate to people and how not to relate to people.
Ultimately, Leah and Rachel are each vindicated in one form or another. Leah is the mother of most of the tribes and is buried next to Yaakov. Rachel is the mother of Yosef, who saved the family through bringing them to Egypt, and is the mother we always imagine petitioning the Almighty on our behalf through millennia of exile.
Both beautiful. Both extraordinarily beloved. As it should be.
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