Dangers of Inaction

This week's Torah portion talks about the brothers, Jacob and Esau. Esau, the epitome of bad, is characterised by a great burning energy and fire. On the surface, this is a bad thing. Fiery ambition, misdirected, is surely worse than being passive?

Chassidic thought approaches this topic somewhat differently, however. There are two kinds of commandment in the Torah - positive commandments, such as saying the Shema prayer, or giving charity - and negative commandments, such as not to eat certain animals, not to steal, etc.

If a person misses a positive commandment, nothing can make up for the missed opportunity. Each positive commandment draws down spiritual energy, elevating the person and their environment. That moment cannot be regained.

On the other hand, by transgressing a negative commandment and later experiencing sincere regret, the energy which was channelled into the negative, is 'converted' to a positive cause and becomes a merit, a credit to that person.

This is not to encourage anyone to go out and be more 'pro-active' in transgressing the commandments of the Torah! Nonetheless we see that when the energy is there, like with Esau, but is not being channelled in the correct direction, there is a hope that at a point in the future that energy will be transformed to the positive.