When Brother Fought Brother...And Came Together In Thanksgiving©
(November 19, 2020 - The 157th Anniversary of the Gettysburg Address)
By Rabbi David Baum
Many of us were told the origin story of Thanksgiving in grade school, when the Pilgrims and Native Americans came together to share their bounty and eat a meal together.
President George Washington indeed created the holiday, but it never really took. Governors of states all set their own Thanksgiving dates, in November and December - no one could get on the same page.
The true father of the Thanksgiving holiday that we enjoy today as a national holiday was Abraham Lincoln who declared, on October 3, 1863: “I do therefore invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”
It was a day that expanded what gratitude meant. He said it was a day to ask God to take care of the widows, orphans, and mourners as a result of the Civil War that was still raging. He asked all Americans, on this day, to pray to God to heal our wounds, and bring us together.
On November 19, just seven days before the new national holiday was to be celebrated, President Abraham Lincoln delivered arguably the greatest, and shortest speech, in American history, the Gettysburg address, where he asked the country to recognize a rebirth of freedom. But more than anything, it was a call to unity and healing, on the blood-soaked grounds where brother fought brother.
The war was still raging, but President Lincoln could see that unity would be victorious - he knew that brothers who fought one another on battlefields would one day sit together at a meal.
This battle of brothers reminds me of the famous brothers from the Hebrew Bible, Jacob, and Esau, from Genesis chapter 33. They were at odds for most of their lives, but there came a point when they came together. Jacob did not know how this reunion would go; in fact, he split his family in two just in case he did have to go to war. But when they saw each other, the book of Genesis reports: "Esau ran to greet him. He embraced him and, falling on his neck, he kissed him; and they wept.”
Jacob tried to give his older brother gifts, but Esau refused them.
Esau said, “I have enough, my brother; let what you have remain yours.”
But Jacob said, “No, I pray you; if you would do me this favor, accept from me this gift; for to see your face is like seeing the face of God, and you have received me favorably.
And Esau accepted his gift.
It is one of my favorite stories in the Bible - it teaches us that gratitude is more than the physical harvest, but the emotional harvest, it’s about sharing our gifts with one another, and accepting those gifts.
Our Sages of blessed memory taught us that Jacob and Esau were not just individuals, but fathers of nations - Jacob was the father of the Jewish people, and Esau becomes the ancestors of Christianity.*
Coming together is not easy. Brothers can be enemies - they can do terrible things to each other, which we see over and over in the book of Genesis. But brothers and sisters can also see God’s face in each other.
I pray for us all when we see our fellow citizens, our brothers and sisters who are at odds with each other, who have fought for their ideals, to see what Jacob saw in Esau’s face after he received his brother favorably: for to see your face is like seeing the face of God.
Let us give this gift to each other, the gift that President Lincoln wished for Americans on October 3, 1863; a day of Thanksgiving for us all.
*Esau represented Edom, a people who lived to the Southeast of Judea, but the rabbis of the Talmud came to associate Edom with Rome, and subsequently Christianity. You can read more about this evolution here.
A reading of the Gettysburg Address from Ken Burn's the Civil War
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