The Houses of Lavan, Part 1

It is Motzei Tisha B'Av, and the American investor is coming to terms with the fact that American Lending institutions over the last five years have given about 100 billion dollars in bad loans. Sub prime mortgages have been given with predatory purposes in mind to borrowers whose credit rating disqualified them from getting a normal mortgage with reasonable terms. I have been sitting on this evolving story for a long time, about six months. I was not sure that this was the sign that the House of Lavan the Aramean, the United States in our time, was about to lose a part of its prosperity to indicate to the Yakovs that live there that it was time to jump ship on his two year journey home. This Motzei Tisha B'Av I am becoming seriously convinced that this is the sign. The stock market seriously contracted today for the first time on news that these sub prime mortgages and the resulting depression like glut in the housing market will spill over to the rest of the American economy. It is an evolving situation whose catastrophic effect of seriously decreasing the net worth of every American home-owner will be felt several months if not up to one year and then some in the future. It is a slow enough effect to give the Yakovs of America, the American Jews, time to quickly wrap of their affairs and move on up to the Holy Land. The text of Genesis is very clear in telling us that Lavan's wealth as measured by his holding of real property, his cattle and his flock, was intricately tied to Yakov Avinu's presence as a hired hand in Lavan's house. When Yakov left Lavan's house with Lavans's daughters and their maidservants, he took with him a significant portion of Lavan's net worth. Lavan was not impoverished completely by Yakov's leaving, but the blessing upon his prosperity from HaShem because Yakov was in his midst was removed from him. Later we learn that the nation of Aram would continue to prosper from foreign trade with the nation of Israel, but the extra blessing of having Yakov Avinu in its midst would cease.

Since the U.S. is the archetype for the nation of Aram today, we should expect a similar drop in America's real prosperity that is not tied to foreign trade since this is the Year of Yakov, the Third year of Sukkot. See my article on the Cosmic Clock for a lengthy explanation of this. Therefore, we would expect a falloff of the net worth of those Americans for whom the white stripes on the American flag exist. This economic earthquake could not affect the business climate in America in the short term because Lavan in particular and Aram in general continued to prosper from trading with Yakov and his descendants. Therefore we cannot expect immediate declines in durable goods orders, the strength of the service economy, and of course, the stock market, but we could expect a long term corrosive effect to be set in motion. This is so because the number one real asset that Americans have is their homes. Real estate today is the repository of real wealth in the way that heads of sheep, goats, and cattle were the repository of real wealth in the ancient world.

A discussion about why this is finally rearing its head on Tisha B'Av as a catastrophic weight on future American prosperity will bli neder be discussed later this week in a second installment of And Yakov Traveled on to Sukkot, Part 2. May we see the geulah shlaimah hurriedly in our day.