“and he saw that he could not [defeat him] and [the angel] touched [Yaakov’s] hip at its socket, and his hip socket was strained as he wrestled him”. There is no struggle without a price to pay. The expectation that one can fight any kind of war without us feeling the tremendous pain comparative to Yaakov’s hip – is a false expectation, and anyone who promises this is making false promises. One of the analytical claims made against those who say that pikuach nefesh displaces the mitzvah of settling the land of Israel is that this statement is not technically possible in any fashion without considering the spiritual status. From the moment that we recognize the mitzvah of settling the Land of Israel and its definition according to the Ramban “that it should not be given over to other nations” – it is clear that the nations will not leave the Land of Israel out of the goodness of their hearts and it is clear that we must fight. It is extremely painful to say this, but there is no war without victims. The mission we have is to do all that is possible so that this tremendous sensitivity doesn’t wear down, that we shouldn’t become callous, that we shouldn’t forget for a second the people who paid the price of war and their families, from the those who died of their physical wounds and those who died inside and were psychologically scarred. However, we cannot live in a fantasy that our “calf” has not been struck.
It is true that this applies to spiritual struggles as well. The Torah already teaches us that the entrance into the Land of Israel will involve great damage and there will be many spiritual victims. The Torah warns us to be wary of the encounter with Canaanite culture and its byproducts, and oftentimes describes that which will occur because of our entrance into the land. Not only this, but God also spoke to Moshe in definitive language: “behold, you will live with your fathers and this nation will rise and stray after foreign gods of the land which they are entering into, and they will leave me and violate my covenant that I have sealed with them”. Despite this, the Torah does not prohibit entry into the land but instructs us to fight with these tremendous spiritual dangers.
Through this the Torah teaches us the fundamental principle that, as stated, permeates all aspects of life, whether security or spiritual: the reality we live in demands that we undergo struggles that are not so simple throughout. These are struggles that even lead to justified fear, and even Yaakov Avinu in our parsha, despite the divine promises that accompany him from Charan and finally to dwell in Israel, was afraid: “and Yaakov was very fearful and in his sorrow he divided the people with him and the flocks and the herds and the camels into two camps”. The unique property of our nation’s founder was not that he did not fear, but that the fear did not paralyze him, and he gathered courage and fought with the reality he was presented.
It would be a great mistake to let fear run our daily lives, and in the same vein – it would be a great mistake to ignore it. It would be a great mistake to ignore the possibility that it will hurt us tremendously, and we feel this pain daily, not leaving us for a second. Similarly – it is a great mistake to run from it and live in a false reality that dictates that reality can exist in a protected bubble, as if we already have experienced the End of Days. As stated, this is true physically and also spiritually. One who believes that he will succeed in fighting the spiritual reality and conquer it without paying a painful price – will find himself shrunken, and at times downtrodden.
Establishing the prohibition to eat the sciatic nerve for continuity internalizes this two-fold principle – the struggle and its price, victory and its pain. This is explained by the Sefer HaChinuch when discussing the roots of the mitzvah: “and this hints to the angel that fought with Yaakov Avinu, who according to Kabbalah is the ministering angel of Esav, and wished to uproot Yaakov and his progeny from the world and was unable to, and caused him suffering by touching his thigh. So too the descendents of Esav cause suffering to the descendants of Yaakov, and in the end [the Jews] will experience salvation, like we have found with our forefather, who the sun shined upon for his recovery and he was saved from suffering. So too, the sun of Mashiach will shine on us and we will be healed from our suffering and be redeemed, Amen BiMehera BeYameinu”. Amen.
