This week’s parsha continues with Yaakov leaving home and traveling to his mother's family in Charan, at her request to save him from the anger of his brother. Normally, at the point where a new parsha begins, there is a space which the commentators tell us was to allow Moshe to have some time to think about what he just learned and to delve into it. The Baal Haturim tells us that our parsha is closed, meaning there is no space between this parsha and the last one because Yaakov had to sneak out to run away.
Reb Chaim Shmulevitz asks what does the fact that Yaakov had to run away have to do with Moshe having time to understand the parsha?
The next posuk states, ויפגע במקום וילן שם, he encountered the place and spent the night there. Rashi tells us a few pesukim later that this incident with the ladder did not happen on his way, but a little later. Originally, Yaakov had passed the place where the Bais Hamikdash would be built without stopping. Once he realized that he had passed the place where his father and grandfather had prayed, he started going back for he regretted not having stopped. The gemara tells us that Hashem then uprooted that mountain and brought it toward Yaakov where they met in Beth-el. The Torah uses the word ויפגע, he encountered, for that connotes two parties moving towards each other. As Rashi explains, Hashem didn't cause him to stop when he passed by the first time since he didn't think about it and decide on his own, Hashem wasn't going to force him.
The sefer Zichron Meir writes that we see how far reaching are the words of chazal. The Gemara tells us הבא ליטהר מסייען אותו, one who comes to be purified we help him. When Yaakov passed by the holy site and had no feeling on his own to stop and pray, there was no heavenly intervention to get him to stop. However, when he himself had the thought and wanted to go back and he started on his way, then came an aberration of nature where the land came to meet him.
There are two places in the Torah where we are told that a person was able to cover a long distance miraculously. One is in the current parsha when Yaakov was on his way to the house of Besual to find a wife and the other one was when Eliezer went to find a wife for Yitzchok. The Torah tells us that, miraculously, he reached the well the same day he left. The Bikkurei Aviv tells us that this is a lesson for all time. He says many people fear when their children come of age to get married that they, on their own, won't be able to pay for a wedding or help their children get on their feet to start a new home. The Torah teaches us never to despair for when it comes to marriage, the Torah makes a seemingly long journey go very quickly. We must be like our forefathers to put our trust in Hashem; before we know it, we’ll have arrived at our destination.
Perhaps with this concept we can answer Reb Chaim’s question why this parsha is closed. Didn't Moshe have to think and contemplate this parsha, too? Perhaps not, for he's teaching us that when it comes to things that we won’t understand anyway: how it will work; how we will be able to do it; it's closed, which means, don't think about it too much. If one thinks too much, he'll never do it. When Yaakov decided to go back, Hashem helped him immediately in a supernatural way. So, too, when we need to do something and take the first step without thinking it through too much, Hashem will be there to take us the rest of the way!