Our parsha opens up with Jacob fleeing before his brother Esau and heading into the warm embrace of good ol’ Uncle Lavan. But as Jacob arrives in Charan, he remembers that he had passed by the holy Temple Mount without offering up a prayer and without

For the Jew, "the Place" could only mean the Temple Mount.

bringing a sacrifice. He thought to himself: Could it be that I have bypassed the very foundation of creation, the place where my father Isaac and grandfather Abraham prayed, without taking the time to enter?
Immediately, he set his mind to return to the Land of Israel and go up to Mount Moriah: "And he encountered the place." Rashi enlightens us as to which place the Torah is talking about: "The verse does not mention which place, but it means 'the place' that has been mentioned elsewhere. This is Mount Moriah, of which it has been said: 'And he perceived the place from afar.'"
Clearly, when the Torah mentions "the place," it could only be talking about the site of our Holy Temple. For there are many "places" in this world, but for the Jew "the Place" could only mean the Temple Mount. After spending the night there and receiving a Divine prophecy telling him, "I am HaShem, G-d of Abraham your father, and G-d of Isaac, the ground upon which you are lying, to you will I give it and to your descendants," Jacob awoke startled and said: "Surely HaShem is in this place, and I did not know! How awesome is this place! This is none other than the House of G-d, and these are the gates of Heaven."
The Sfat Emet comments that Jacob, being the humble person that he was, could not fathom for a moment that a Divine prophecy would come to him; rather, he thought it must have been caused by "the Place", being that it is the "gates of Heaven", and anyone who passes over "the Place" can receive Divine inspiration there. In truth, it was both the greatness of Jacob and the holiness of the Place. Our Rabbis, of blessed memory, teach us in the Mishnah that there are ten levels of holiness that descended into the world: one came to the Land of Israel, making it holier then the rest of the world, and the other nine levels lead up from Jerusalem to the Temple Mount. One cannot begin to imagine the holiness of the site, making this truly a gateway to Heaven.
The nations of the world also enjoy their own place - quite different, though, from our place. As the parsha teaches us, when the time had come for Uncle Lavan to give his daughter Rachel over to Jacob, Lavan called up his good drinking buddies to make a feast: "So Lavan gathered all the people of the place and made a feast." Our rabbis teach us that all the people of Charan were in on the secret of exchanging Leah for Rachel and they all took part in the charade. No one stood up for Jacob. This, then, is their place, Lavan’s house - a "white house" - a place of deception, and as unholy as it can be.
The nations of the world are now preparing to assemble at "their place" in Annapolis to

The nations of the world are now preparing to assemble at "their place" in Annapolis.

discuss, plan and mobilize how to take away from us "our Place." It is only when we know "our Place," the greatness that lies there - the gates of Heaven - that we will be able to stop them from trying to take over our Place. For Jacob did not come all the way back from Charan in order to pray at a Kotel, the foot of the Temple Mount, but rather, went all the way up the mountain, to the site of the altar. And when all of this holiness and greatness of G-d’s Divine promise to His people await us, how is it possible that today, still, some two-thirds of the Jewish people have not come home to live in this great holiness and prefer to live in places of tumah?


Today we cannot say, like Jacob did, "Surely HaShem is in this place and I did not know." For today, we know of the Place, of the greatness and holiness. Only when we, like Jacob, return to her will the nations stay in their place and leave G-d’s House in the hands of the Children of Jacob.