Generational Trauma, or Inherited Trauma, are damaging behaviors passed down through the generations. They are often unwitting, built into our emotional DNA. These chapters of Genesis contain the family dramas of our matriarchs and patriarchs and are full of generational trauma. This week we arrive at parshat Tol’dot, where we first encounter the sibling rivalry of Esau and Jacob. Rebecca, their mother, encourages Jacob to take advantage of his elderly father, Isaac, and steal Esau’s birthright blessing. Jacob engages in some shady dealings with his brother, exploiting his hunger and exhaustion, and then tricks his father (although the text allows for some question marks there.) At the end of it all, Jacob is on the run, exiled from his parent’s home, but with the precious blessing of his father in tow.
While reading through the parsha, I was struck by a similarity in language between this scenario and the previous generation’s traumatic moment: the binding of Isaac. In that story, Isaac and his father, Abraham make their way up the mountain to make a sacrifice. As Isaac begins to wonder what exactly they will be sacrificing he says “Avi? My father?” Abraham responds with the ever-laden and significant word, “Hineini. Here I am.” In Tol’dot we have a reprise and reversal of the use of Hineni; first, when Isaac calls out “My son,” and Esau answers “Hineini,” and next, when Jacob calls to Isaac in much the same way Isaac called to Abraham, “Avi? My father?” This time, it is Isaac who responds “Hineini.”
It might seem as though this is just a colloquial use of the word, but Hineini is never used casually. It always connotes intense presence, heightened spiritual awareness, and tells the reader that something significant is happening. These moments, between parent and child are ones that rupture the trust between the two. They are moments of abuse of power, of lies, and of theft. Jacob escapes with the blessing, but very shortly he, himself, will be the victim of falsehood and lies. Having left his own sibling rivalry, he lands squarely between another, that of Rachel and Leah. The trauma continues to play out with his own children, as he shows preference for Joseph above all the rest… and we know what that leads to. These stories are powerful examples of the ways in which “hurt people hurt people,” and suggest that we revisit the hurts done to us down through the generations.
But I don’t believe this is a fatalistic view; rather, a cautionary one. Our text highlights these family dramas to remind us of our own pitfalls, and invites us to make different choices for ourselves.