When the well runs dry.....

Our Torah portion this week is Toldot, and within its verses lies the story of Isaac. If you read through the stories of Isaac, one thing becomes extremely apparent: he is rarely the main character in his own stories! There is only one small, seemingly inconsequential story where the focus is all on Isaac, and it's about... digging some wells. Wait, what?! Why is THIS the story the Torah chooses to share about Isaac? Who cares about these wells?

26:15-25: "And the Philistines stopped up all the wells dug by Isaac’s father Abraham, filling them with rubble… Isaac then began to dig anew the wells that had been dug [by] his father Abraham… And when Isaac’s servants dug in the wadi, they discovered there a well of living waters!"

In our Torah portion, wells in those days were a symbolic claim of ownership of the land. So Isaac goes to clear up and dig out the first well his father had dug. There ensues a big fight from the locals over who has rights for the water and to the well, and the locals forbid Isaac from owning that well. So Isaac names that well, Esek, Contention. He was fighting against constrictions and limitations around him. Finally, it is clear that he will not be able to take ownership of this well.

He goes a a little further and begins work on digging out a second well. Once again, the locals bar him and block his every move, (after he has done the hard work of clearing the well of course), and Isaac names this second well Sitnah, which means hatred. At this point, there is so much heated disagreement that the locals manage to drive Isaac out of the land of Gerar altogether.

So, Isaac removed himself from Gerar, and heads to a different land. There, he digs a third well, and this time, there is no opposition. Why? What happened between the second and third wells? The name of the third well tells us. Isaac named it Rechovot, which means expansion. And his third well was described as be’er mayim chayim, well of living water (Gen. 26:19).

Let's explore this...

Wells and water, of course, are richly symbolic images; in many spiritual traditions the act of digging wells represents the active inner search for the holy. In this way, Isaac's multiple well-diggings might be viewed as internal (rather than external) spiritual metaphors.

Rabbi Art Green, in his book, “Seek My Face, Speak my Name,” speaks to this journey to G!d as "a journey inward, where the goal is an ultimately deep level within the soul rather than the top of the mountain or a ride in the clouds," and in this way we can relate to Isaac's well-digging endeavors. After all, our earliest ancestors were diggers of wells. Needing water in order to live, and moving ever inland, digging wells and tapping natural springs is how they found life-giving water from within the body of the earth.

On a spiritual level, this flowing water from the earth speaks to the depths of soul work, of the journey inward where we peel off layer after layer of externals, contentions, and strivings, digging down for the deeper inward truth. Spiritual growth, in this metaphor, is a matter of uncovering new depths rather than attaining new heights. It is similar to the difference between quantity and quality, wherein quantity is what we see around us, while quality we find dwelling at those deeper and deeper soul levels.

Kabbalah explains that the three wells dug by Isaac correspond to three reverse-ascending levels of the soul, representing the maturing process of every soul from superficial and external to deeper and deeper internal levels.

In this way, Esek, the well of contention, speaks to the external battles with which our soul contends-- our most basic behaviors and actions and drives. The negative connotation in the name Esek stems from the fact that this level of the soul is vulnerable to the yetzer hara, the evil inclination, and must struggle with it and stand guard for it. Yet, yetzer hara is not an external or demonic force that pushes a person to do evil, but rather an inner drive toward pleasure or property or security at the expense of all else. If left unchecked, these unbalanced drives can lead to evil. When properly controlled or channeled by the yetzer hatov, the good inclination, the yetzer hara leads to friendship, marriage, business,  community, and other good things.

It is important to note that yetzer hara is not the seeking pleasure and acquisition per se; rather, it is the unchecked desire and unlimited appetites for pleasure and acquisition and selfish motives and interests without limits, controls, or channels, without the balance of the good inclination. Put another way, money is not the root of all evil; the LOVE of money is the root of all evil. This means the unbalanced, unchecked, unbridled, unlimited, drive to acquire is the issue, not the money itself.

Sitnah, the well of hatred, speaks to the emotional levels of soul. When we dig deeper into the soul, we manifest a deeper, emotive level. While surface emotions are superficial, stunted, and very passive, the attributes of the soul at this second, emotive level are deep love, awe, and true heartfelt compassion for all. This is the level where real emotion enters the soul. The emotion that Isaac’s second well aroused was deep hatred, sitnah. Hatred is, indeed, a very strong emotion. Every person feels it at some time or another, and unless we uncover it and face it and name it, we cannot get past it. Hatred and other negative emotions like anger will rule our emotive soul level unless we dig even deeper. Strong emotions are not the deeper soul emotions.

Finally, Isaac left Gerar. Gerar means lodging-place. It is where he had settled in. But G!d had not asked Isaac to settle in. G!d had asked Isaac, just as Isaac's father Abraham had been asked, to be a sojourner, a tent dweller. Our spiritual journey is never done. We don't settle and move in; we keep moving and doing the work. To live is to grow, to keep digging our wells.

When Isaac left Gerar and traveled to another place where he dug his third well, I would say that he hit pay dirt, but that would be mixing metaphors. Once Isaac knows that his well is not a display of land ownership, not another acquisition to be gained, it was no longer contended.

So what was it that happened between well 2 and well 3? Isaac's perspective shifted from a narrow focus of settling and owning and possessing, level one of the soul, and then moving further still beyond the surface emotions, to when Isaac finally became a true spiritual pilgrim, and therein he expanded his vision, and his heart. He included others. He learned to share. He learned to be a humble pilgrim rather then a greedy landowner. In his new vision, there was room for all.

He had dug his first well from a place of being stopped up in so many ways – pain, fear, despair, fatigue, trauma – and as he keep digging deeper and deeper, he became the channel through which flows the hidden living waters of life. We, too, can become holy, beautiful work and keep the well of living waters flowing through our lives. That is when he become Rechovot, which means expansiveness. This is where we live beyond our small egos and expand our hearts and souls and compassion into the world around us.

Midrash and mystical traditions understand Isaac's well-digging as his spiritual search for G!d and a sign of his spiritual maturity. Though Isaac broke no new ground, nor climbed the heights of mountains to receive sacred words, Isaac did the important, and quieter, work of digging deep and hitting the life-giving waters flowing forth from the spiritual depths of the Holy Infinite. In order to tap that flow and be sustained by it, we must dig down, remove the rubble that impedes our connection to it, and create openings so that those ever-present living waters can “well up” to the surface.

When your well runs dry, go dig another well. And keep digging until you get through all those layers of rocks and dirt and contention and hatred and anger, and find those sweet waters that will help you live a truly authentic, deeply emotional, and spiritually mature life.

It's not easy work. We all fail from time to time. And we despair, too. Isaac reminds us not to give up. The more we expand our hearts, the more kindnesses we freely give to others, the more we uncover our own souls and that of the entire world.

When the well runs dry, keep digging.