In one of the final scenes of the book of Genesis, as Jacob gathers all of his sons around his deathbed, he offers each one of them individualized blessings. While we can conceive of all the brothers as our ancestors, I feel more connected to some of them than others. Yehudah (Judah) is one of those. Afterall, we inherit his name, and that of his tribe, to be called Jews. Part of Yehudah’s blessing reads: כָּרַע רָבַץ כְּאַרְיֵה וּכְלָבִיא מִי יְקִימֶנּוּ׃ He bows down and crouches like a lion; like a lion, who can raise him?
Unpacking this line, it’s not entirely clear to me what makes it a blessing. Judah will lie down, he will often be on the ground, and it will be difficult for others to wake him up? Judah will be asleep and that is supposed to be a blessing? Indeed, I have spent my fair share of time at the zoo, and the lions are often resting. While we always have to visit the lions, in truth, they aren’t the most exciting animals to watch at the zoo.
Whatever happened to the lion as the king of the jungle? We conceive of the lion as the assertive, bold leader of the big cats, but this is certainly not the blessing Judah receives. One commentator, Seforno, explains what this blessing means, teaching that no one has the power or authority to wake up the lion. He writes that one day Judah will be like a lion in that no one will frighten him into rising. The lion will be the one to call the shots and decide when to stand up. In that way, the perceived laziness of the lion is actually an indication of its greatness - it is its own master.
The blessing here, that we inherit as Jews, is to be empowered in our own lives. The opening line of the Shulchan Arukh, the Code of Jewish Law, reads: יתגבר כארי לעמוד בבוקר לעבודת בוראו A person should wake up in the morning like a lion in order to serve their Creator
I think what the Shulchan Arukh is getting at here is not just that we need to be bold in our religious service, but that it needs to be on our own terms. We need to feel empowered in the way that we conduct our religious lives; it has to work for us. Moreso, I think it means that we need to be the instigators of our Jewish journeys. We should of course be inspired by others but the Jewish choices we make should be active, deliberate choices that we make because they mean something to us.
I hope that we do inherit the blessing that Yehudah receives. I pray that like our ancestor, we each feel the sense of empowerment to own our Jewish journeys. I pray that like the lion, we serve our Creator, in every choice we make, with purpose, with choice, and with meaning.
