וַיַּעַן לָבָן וּבְתוּאֵל וַיֹּאמְרוּ מֵה’ יָצָא הַדָּבָר לֹא נוּכַל דַּבֵּר אֵלֶיךָ רַע אוֹ טוֹב: הִנֵּה רִבְקָה לְפָנֶיךָ קַח וָלֵךְ וּתְהִי אִשָּׁה לְבֶן אֲדֹנֶיךָ כַּאֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר ה’: (24:50-51)
Then Lavan and Besuel answered and said, “The matter stemmed from Hashem! We are unable to speak to you either bad or good. Here Rivkah is before you, take her and go, and let her be a wife to your master’s son as Hashem has spoken. (24:50-51)
Rashi explains: We are unable to speak to you – to refuse about this matter neither by responding with a bad thing nor by responding with a proper thing, for it is obvious that the matter stemmed from Hashem according to your words, that He prepared her for you.
When one contemplates these posukim that speak about the conversation and dealings of Eliezer, the servant of Avraham, with Lavan and Besuel, we can see that aside from the fact that the Torah benefits the people of Israel in the World to Come, it also benefits them in this world. For it is the Torah that elevates them from all forms of baseness and transforms them into people of form, crowned with every proper trait, and peace and tranquility are their lot.
For behold, in the posuk before us, Lavan and Besuel presented themselves before Eliezer as upright people who believe in Hashem and who greatly marvel at His Providence. For thus they said to him: it would have been proper for us to take some time to consider your proposal and then decide whether we wish it or not. But after hearing and perceiving with our own senses how HaKadosh Baruch Hu governs His world and how He arranges all causes, we truly feel how HaKadosh Baruch Hu stands before us and says to us: “You are not permitted to question My decree.” And indeed, we nullify our own will before His will, and we immediately “decide” and “promise”: “Behold, Rivkah is before you, take her and go, and let her be a wife to your master’s son.” And even after their decision, their lips were still murmuring “faith,” as they added: “As Hashem has spoken.”
If not for what the Torah reveals to us later, it would have been difficult to suspect that perhaps they were not true believers. For they had good reason to believe after Eliezer had told them a wondrous story of Divine Providence [for Eliezer certainly proved to them that he was speaking truth and not inventing stories from his heart]. However, the Torah tells us that not in the least was it so—they were not believers at all, but great deceivers. For after only one night they already sought to annul their words. Only yesterday they had decided and clearly promised: “Behold, Rivkah is before you, take her and go,” and immediately the next morning Lavan changed his mind and sought to delay her, as it is said (24:55): ’ויאמר אחיה ואמה תשב הנער אתנו ימים או עשור אחר תלך’ - “And her brother and her mother said: Let the maiden remain with us days or ten, afterward she shall go.” And if one would wish at least to find merit in Besuel, Rashi does not permit it, for he says: “And where was Besuel? He wanted to delay, and an angel came and killed him.”
In his words Rashi reveals that Besuel was an even greater deceiver and swindler than Lavan. For with Lavan we see that even after he revealed his true face as a liar, Eliezer was still able to compel him to stand by his initial words, as we see that in the end, he was unable to delay Rivkah. But Besuel was so absolute in his falsehood that HaKadosh Baruch Hu knew Eliezer would not be able to compel him to the truth and was therefore forced to kill him.
Since we see that they were not at all upright, we can also understand why Lavan sought to retract the agreement. For at first, they assumed that Eliezer would pay a handsome price for their consent, befitting a wealthy man such as Avraham. And besides agreeing for this reason, they also feared that perhaps in the end Eliezer would reconsider and not desire them. For Lavan himself revealed to Eliezer that he served idolatry, saying (24:31): ’ואנכי פיניתי הבית’ - “And I have cleared the house,” and Rashi explains: “from idolatry.” Perhaps he feared that Eliezer might find more defects while in their home, and therefore they also sought to appear as believers, to show that they were not so deeply attached to idolatry and that they too believed there is a G-d in the world. But in the end, Eliezer honored them only with a few “precious things” (see posuk 53), and therefore they wanted to retract.
Yet there still remains to ask: how did Lavan dare to put on the appearance of innocence, as if nothing had happened, and begin renegotiating about Rivkah only twelve hours after the deal had been concluded? It is true that he did not merit the Torah and was drawn after baseness—to falsehood and deceit—but as a human being among humans, he should have been ashamed before Eliezer, who had conducted himself with such honesty, and not act as one of the empty-minded, devoid of decency and awareness of others’ feelings, who are pained by the violation of agreements.
The answer to this is that without Torah there is no humanity and no good character traits. As Chazal have already said (Bava Metzia 114b): “You are called ‘Adam,’ but idol worshippers are not called ‘Adam.’” Regarding them one can truly say, “Man has no superiority over the beast,” in the literal sense. Just as an animal follows only its own benefit and pleasure, so too does a gentile pursue only his own benefit and pleasure. Honesty and the feelings of others find no place in his heart. Only the Jewish person who has merited Torah is capable of taking others into consideration; he is the one who understands that there is honesty in the world. And beyond behaving honestly when justice obligates him, he also acts with compassion and performs deeds that go beyond the letter of the law.
All the mitzvos of the Torah train a person to understand that he did not descend into this world in order to benefit himself. He is not the master over his own will; he is subservient to the will of the Torah. This itself already accustoms him not to be so obsessed with his own good, and thus there is room in his heart to think of others as well. In addition, the Torah teaches a person many laws that concern the relationship between man and his fellow. Through this, the Torah teaches him that he is obligated to recognize that there are other beings in the world, and he must understand that they too suffer, just as he does, when they are harmed. Therefore, he must restrain himself from performing actions that cause them distress, and he must perceive and understand what may trouble them and why. Moreover, the Torah instructs a person that he must do good to others even when he is not obligated by law to do so. Through all this, the Torah implants within the Jewish person the understanding that the feelings of others are something real.
But the gentile, from the day of his birth, was never shown that besides himself there are other souls in the world; he is driven solely by his own desires and inclinations.
Perhaps it is to this Chazal referred when they said (Eichah Rabbah 2:13): “If one tells you there is wisdom among the nations, believe it; if he tells you there is Torah among the nations, do not believe it.” For if someone tells you that he has found upright and decent people among the nations—as indeed one may see with physical eyes that there are among the gentiles those who represent themselves as honest people, with integrity before them—say to him that this is not because they are truly “upright.” Such a thing you will find only among Israel, who are “sons of Torah.” For only one who accepts upon himself the yoke of Torah merits that the Torah refines his soul, and through that he recognizes that honesty is his obligation. What you find among the nations is nothing but “wisdom”—they have devised and reasoned that by such behavior they will improve their own condition, for it will be a means to increase their wealth and benefit.
