Parsaht Balak: Use the Energy; Don't Fight It!

Use the energy; don’t fight it or squash it. The energy may be manifesting in a negative form, but it can be turned to good.

At first, God forbade Balaam from going to curse Israel. No, you stay home and don’t prophesy at all rather than use your talents to harm My people.

But God could see how much Balaam wanted to go. Bederekh she’adam rotzeh leilekh bah molikhin oto. “ It is on the path that a person really wants to go that they are directed to go.” So, rather than fighting with Balaam’s desire and squashing it, God uses it. God moves forward with Balaam, with the energy, not against it, ultimately using that energy, Balaam’s gifts, his words and his passion, to bring forth blessing upon Israel instead of curse.

This is a model for us of how to deal with what appear to be negative forces inside us. The Talmud tells us that someone who has great sexual passions should turn those passions into a strong love of God. Don’t squash; redirect; make use of the energy rather than fighting it. We are to love God bekhol me’odekha – with all of our inclinations, both good and evil; they all have power and energy and need to be directed into service of God.

A story is told of a fight between the sun and the moon. They both looked down on a human wearing a jacket and each claimed they would be better able to get that jacket off. The wind blew and blew, sending large gusts down to the poor human below, trying to rip that jacket off him. The human only huddled and drew the jacket tighter around him, as the wind became more and more frustrated, trying to wrestle the coat off, but with no success. The sun then came out and shone brightly. The person started to get hot and took the jacket off of his own accord.

It is hard to fight the human will and we won’t succeed. It is better to go with the energy, to make use of the will and the drive that already exists and learn to use it well.

There are many parts of us that we dislike or are ashamed of – parts that make us suffer deeply or even harm us like Balaam wanted to harm Israel. We often have inner fights with these parts and try to squash them – Stop being so angry! Stop being so sad or selfish or anxious! We admonish ourselves. But maybe this is precisely the wrong approach. Maybe we need to go with the energy, to follow it and respect its power and gifts and learn to redirect them. Fighting only wastes energy. Respecting and redirecting brings us the gifts of blessing like the words of Balaam – Mah Tovu ohelekhah Yaakov. How beautiful are your tents, O Jacob.