24:1,2. VeHashem Beirach es Avrohom bakol..., avdo...hamosheil bechol asher lo. Avrohom was granted all he could possibly have, and Eliezer, his servant, ruled all that was Avrohom’s.
The Netziv here brings a Medrash on Bakol that says it means that Avraham was mosheil beyitzro, he ruled over all his human desires. He brings another Medrash that explains Eliezer's Hamosheil bechol asher lo the same way, that Eliezer ruled all his human desires. He asks, how can the Torah use the same praise for Avrohom and on Eliezer? If it is a shevach for Avrohom Ovinu, the one who thoroughly realized the truth of monotheism, the father of Klal Yisroel, the one who passed the ten nisyonos and called Eliezer a 'domeh lechamor,' how can the same thing be said of Eliezer? Does this imply parity or equivalence?
Harav Mordechai Eisenberg of Marlboro, New Jersey, added to the Netziv’s question: the Medrash says that when Eliezer came to see Lovon who said “bo beruch Hashem,” Lovon thought Eliezer was Avrohom because the klaster ponov, the glory of his appearance, seemed just like that of Avrohom.
The Netziv answers (with our hosofos) that the yeitzer of an Av Hamon Goyim is not the same as the yeitzer of an eved. The gadlus of being ‘shalit beyeitzer’ depends on how great that yeitzer is. An Av Hamon Goyim has to deal with all different kinds of people and he has enormous power. Both of these elements are corrupting influences, and threaten gadlus of middos. An eved, on the other hand, has a very circumscribed universe, and his yetzer hora and his control of it are on a much smaller scale. Avrohom ruled 'bakol'. Eliezer ruled 'bechol asher lo,' which is a far more circumscribed universe. Harav Eisenberg shtelled tzu the story about the Dubner Magid’s mussar to the Gaon, that if he had been more involved with people, he would have had a harder time being the Gaon. “Es iz nisht kein kuntz zayen a gaon in vinkaleh” (it is no trick to be a holy scholar if you stay isolated in your corner), to which the Gaon answered “Ich bin nisht kein kuntzmacher” (I am not a performer of tricks).
But Reb Mordechai asked an interesting question: how do Chazal they see from the word ‘Bakol’ that Hishlito beyitzro? So he said the following insight. This will help us understand the difference between the two shalitim be'yitzrom, and what Chazal mean when they say "bechol levovcho- bishtei yetzirecho."
The Rambam in Deiyos that says that the mesora of Avrohom is to serve Hashem in the derech hamemutza, the Golden Mean, the middle path. The Rambam adds that if a person who is fighting his bad middos finds himself going too far to one side, he should use his innate middos to pull himself back to the middle. We see that one can use the yetzer hora- the traits that are viewed as negative- in the service of good, such as when they are needed to temper excess in middos. So we can say that the difference between Avrohom and Eliezer was that Avrohom was at peace with his yetzer hora, he had enlisted it in avodas Hashem, he co-opted it. For Avrohom, beirach es Avrohom Bakol was a global brocho that enhanced all his traits- even the yetzer hora had a brocho— that it became more powerful, more effective. He was able to use his yetzer hora for avodas Hashem, so a brocho to the yetzer hora is a true brocho. Eliezer, on the other hand, reached the same madreiga through constant battle with the yetzer hora, a series of battles which never ended. So by Eliezer, it was not a brocho, it was hishlito. He did not co-opt his yeitzer hora, he vanquished it.
Also, the Rambam in the end of the first perek darshens derech hamemutza from the passuk “ki yedativ lema’an asher yetzaveh...”, so you see that Avrohom was a Rebbi in the derech hamemutza, and that was his great lesson in addressing the improvement of middos.
He looked in the Medrash, and by Avrohom it says “hishlito beyitzro;” by Eliezer Zkan Bayso, shehoyo domeh leAvrohom, and by Hamosheil bechol asher lo, shehoyo mosheil beyitzro kemoso.
On Chanukah 06/67, my shiur gave me the Tzofnas Pa’anei’ach ahl Hatorah, and I found a wonderful thing there that is precisely on point. See parshas Vayeishev, Breishis 39:2. He has a whole discussion about the two ways of becoming a tzadik; by making the yeitzer hora good, or by fighting and killing it. He brings the Yerushalmi Brochos 9:5 that says that Avrohom Ovinu made the yeitzer hora “tov.” But, the Yerushalmi says, Dovid Hamelech was not able “la’amod bo,” and so he killed his yeitzer hora– libi cholol b’kirbi. He says that Yosef, like Avrohom, ruled over his yeitzer hora, and was “sholeit” on it.
By the way, someone pointed out to me that Eliezer was the son of Nimrod. He had the chance of having a life of immediate gratification of any conceivable lust or desire for power. He abandoned this life for the chance of being a slave of Avrohom; Avrohom trusted him to find a wife for Yitzchok. So we have to appreciate who he was and what he accomplished. The fact that he was called an “orrur” was a matter of fate and yichus.
UPDATE 1 14 25
I came across this article in Atlantic Magazine. I do not know if he has anything to offer, but I am putting it here for safekeeping until I get to read it.
Why a Bit
of Restraint Can Do You a Lot of Good
An uninhibited quest for authenticity sounds great. But if
that just means acting out, you’re unlikely to be so happy.
By Arthur C. Brooks
The Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor has described our
times as the “Age of Authenticity,” meaning an era when people are willing to
publicize their secrets and indulge their urges, even if such a drive for
personal truth involves transgressing traditional boundaries of self-control.
Once, this type of exhibitionism was the preserve of a few celebrities, but now
anybody can get in on the act: The quest for authenticity has spawned salacious
memoirs, reality-TV shows of escalating disinhibition, and cathartic
self-disclosure on social media.
Such revelations are supposed to be good for us, because
suppressing our thoughts and desires is considered unhealthy and unnatural. In
psychology, this way of thinking is sometimes called self-determination theory,
according to which we are happiest when we obey our inner drives.
I would grant that living inauthentically and being
repressed do not sound like a recipe for well-being. But the age of
authenticity does not seem to have made us happier, either. Quite the reverse.
Some scholars, such as Taylor and the historian and theologian Carl R. Trueman,
have argued that American society has become far more expressively
individualistic over the past few decades. Yet the average level of happiness
has consistently fallen, even as reported levels of depression and anxiety have
exploded.
One possible explanation for this paradox is that the
lowering of self-control was an understandable but significant error in our
collective thinking, and it took us in exactly the wrong direction where
happiness is concerned. Although understanding how this happened won’t turn our
whole culture around, it can help you be happier in your own life.
From a psychological perspective, a useful hypothesis of how
self-management works is that two systems in the brain govern it: the
behavioral activation system and the behavioral inhibition system. The first
one excites the desire for rewards and other positive stimuli, and arouses your
interest in doing things. The second one creates an aversion to punishment and
negative consequences, and tells you not to do things.
Generally, you can think about each system in this way: If
the activation system rises or the inhibition system falls, self-control may
decrease. Alternatively, if the inhibition system rises or the activation
system falls, self-control may increase. And what works for an individual also
scales by analogy for the group or community.
So which combination makes us happier overall—more of the
behavioral activation system and less of the behavioral inhibition system, or
the other way around? The answer is that both combinations are effective. A
team of eight psychologists showed this in a 2018 study on self-control in the
Journal of Personality. The team fielded a series of undergraduate surveys. The
researchers found that low levels of self-control were associated with the
lowest levels of subjective well-being. Moving to a higher level of
self-control increased the undergraduates’ happiness.
Interestingly, in a separate study within the paper, the
researchers also found that low-to-moderate levels of self-control—that is, a
slightly below-average level of self-control—were associated with the lowest
levels of momentary well-being. Yet a complete lack of self-control was
associated with slightly higher momentary well-being. This is no wonder:
Letting completely loose is commonly associated with very short-term bouts of
pleasure.
This implies that if you are a somewhat reserved,
self-controlled person, you can raise your sense of well-being in one of two
completely contrasting ways: by being more authentic and impulsive or by being
more punctilious and modest. Given that choice, the former sounds a lot more
fun. The idea that most people would choose disinhibition and that authenticity
would become the spirit of the age makes intuitive sense.
The trouble is that the let-it-all-hang-out approach is
restricted to momentary well-being, and has consequences for others. In 2011,
scholars at Arizona State University studied the correlation of low
self-control with irresponsible behavior that makes life worse for others. They
found that low self-control, although potentially enjoyable to the one shedding
inhibitions, is associated with criminal offending, academic fraud, binge
drinking, drunk dialing, public profanity, and (weirdly) public flatulence. All
of these behaviors have negative social consequences, some more serious than
others, but any will affect the well-being of others.
I would hazard this as a partial explanation at least for
our national happiness funk: American culture has gone the wrong way about
getting happier—by encouraging each of us to relax self-control to get happier,
the unfortunate result is that we have become unhappier as a whole, and are now
stuck that way. By seeking the short-term mood payoff that comes from
disinhibition, we have become unapologetic, drunk-dialing, cussing, farting
fraudsters who make one another miserable.
That is a broad statement, and not intended to be taken
literally. But if you think the characterization is preposterously extreme,
have you looked at your social-media feed lately?
For your own well-being, and everyone’s, increasing
self-control might be much better than lowering it. To propose this at a
societal level is nothing new; writers have been doing so for centuries.
Benjamin Franklin, for example, exhorted “all well-bred people” to “forcibly
restrain the Efforts of Nature to discharge that Wind.” But he had a broader
vision, too, for how to realize greater collective happiness. “Educate your
children to self-control, to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and
evil tendencies subject to an upright and reasoning will,” he advised, “and you
have done much to abolish misery from their future and crimes from society.”
As Franklin suggests and the aforementioned research shows,
even if others don’t mend their ways, controlling yourself more is a strategy
that will raise your individual well-being. It can be hard to go against
unfortunate social trends, so here are a couple of helpful things to keep in
mind.
First, be aware of the forces around you that may lower the
activity of the inhibition system in your brain and thus push you toward lower
self-control. According to scholars at the University of Toronto and
Northwestern University, three bad influences to watch out for are excess
alcohol, anonymity, and social power. None of these necessarily leads to
antisocial behavior, but they easily can—and so take you in the wrong direction
for happiness. (For instance, have you ever come across someone who’s happy to
have said or done something drunk that they would have been embarrassed to say
or do sober?)
Similarly, who expects to find people being their best, most
magnanimous selves when posting anonymously on social media? In fact, scholars
who have studied anonymity on social media have found that although most users
behave benignly, a small subset may demonstrate antisocial, even psychopathic,
behavior. If you’re seeking to boost your self-control, shun any social media
forum where your identity is hidden. Instead, accept responsibility for
everything you say.
Social power—meaning, your capacity to influence others—is a
trickier subject. If you possess, say, an ability to publish material that many
other people will read, see, or hear, you should ask yourself whether your
desire to attract and retain an audience is leading you to abandon your
privacy. Does what you reveal about yourself evoke in people a frisson of
interest but also lead them to hold a low opinion of your taste and manners?
How much better to err on the side of self-control.
And consider the social influence we invest in leaders. We
reduce our own well-being when we hand power to vulgarians. Just as it feels
freeing to shed self-control but ultimately leads to negative consequences, so
following leaders who act without constraints and break norms might feed our id
but inevitably takes us individually and collectively down a dark path.
You might think that because I am arguing that the happiest
path is one in which we sublimate our true feelings and desires through greater
self-control, I am advocating in effect for inauthenticity. But that’s not my
intention; rather, I am arguing for authentic self-improvement. The choice to
act in a particular way boils down to a choice of who we will be as people—the
famous “As If Principle” in psychology shows that we become a certain way by
acting as if you already are that way.
This is what Aristotle meant when he wrote that “virtues are
formed in a man by his doing the actions.” One important choice we have is to
behave with either controlled grace or uncontrolled entitlement. Neither option
is in reality more authentic than the other because, in becoming who we are
through our choices, both paths are equally authentic; both embody who we’ve
chosen to be as people. But only one path, that of controlled grace, leads to
greater happiness for one and all. So the beautiful truth is that we can elect
to become authentically better than we were—and happier to boot.
About the Author
Arthur C. Brooks (Not Jewish.)
Arthur C. Brooks is a contributing writer at The Atlantic
and the host of the How to Build a Happy Life podcast. To receive his weekly
column “How to Build a Life” in your inbox, sign up here.