Why does the Torah seem to tolerate cheating esp. with Ya'akov and his sons?

Question

I'm a bit puzzled that the concepts of cheating and deception seem to repeat themselves in almost every weekly parsha from Toldot through Vayechi.

Ya'akov apparently takes advantage of a tired Esav by having him sell the birthright so that he can eat some food. One could argue that a tired starving person isn't exactly thinking straight. Or, even if he knew what he was doing, he didn't expect that selling the birthright meant that he would forfeit the blessings from his father.

Then, Ya'akov deceives his own father to get the blessing and tells him that he is Esav, wears Esav's clothes to fool him, etc.

Yes, we see that Lavan deceived Ya'akov by having him marry Leah first instead of Rachel. But, Ya'akov takes revenge against Lavan with the way he dealt with the sheep. (Doesn't the Torah teach that one should not take revenge or bear a grudge?)

The brothers deceive Ya'akov by convincing him that Yosef is dead.

The brothers deceive Shchem and Chamor telling them that they will live with them providing that they will circumcise themselves and all males in the city. All knowing that they planned on killing everyone, there.

Yosef deceives his brothers by initially jailing them and accusing them of being spies.

Why does the Torah decide to resolve each of these incidents of deception and, apparently, does not depict any charge or wrong-doing for that? Couldn't each of these people have resolved their differences via negotiating or some other means? Or, if G-d is supposed to protect our forefathers, he could have performed a miracle or just altered events so that such deception would have been unnecessary.

Answer 1

To address the questions about Yaakov's trickery, note that these were all cases in which he was attempting to collect his dues. These events are consistent with the dictum: אם ללצים הוא יליץ, ולענוים יתן חן (Mishlei 3, 34). There is a place for deception, it is only wrong when used wrongfully. As we must surely assume that all these episodes that you mention are justifiable, the deception itself is a non-issue.

Answer 2

I would challenge your hypotheses, as stated in the question: "Why does the Torah seem to tolerate cheating".

We see that all the cheaters were punished eventually for their cheating.

To analyze a few that you mention:

Ya'akov apparently takes advantage of a tired Esav by having him sell the birthright so that he can eat some food.

This example of yours is not a good one.

Yaakov does not take advantage of a tired Esav, but rather provides him with bread - that he didn't ask for. Esav had the choice of eating the bread gratis, and then negotiating for the lentils he so coveted.

Then, Ya'akov deceives his own father to get the blessing and tells him that he is Esav, wears Esav's clothes to fool him, etc.

And then he is punished in kind when his own children sell Yosef and dip Yosef's robe in blood to fool him.

Yes, we see that Lavan deceived Ya'akov by having him marry Leah first instead of Rachel. But, Ya'akov takes revenge against Lavan with the way he dealt with the sheep. (Doesn't the Torah teach that one should not take revenge or bear a grudge?)

Another no-so-good example.

Where do you see revenge? A simple reading shows that he's simply protecting himself from Lavan's constant switching of the conditions of the deal they made.

The brothers deceive Ya'akov by convincing him that Yosef is dead.

They regretted this, as stated later when Yosef imprisoned them, even stating it was a punishment for the sale.

The brothers deceive Shchem and Chamor telling them that they will live with them providing that they will circumcise themselves and all males in the city. All knowing that they planned on killing everyone, there.

Here the Torah seems to explicitly state that they delt cunningly, yet the Targum already tells us they dealy with foresight and cleverly.

This was the only method they had to punish an entire evil village where raping a 6-year-old was considered acceptable.

Yosef deceives his brothers by initially jailing them and accusing them of being spies.

Ignoring the explanation that he was trying to get his prophecies to come true, this can be seen as a simple punishment for his brothers. After all they had sold him into slavery.

He wasn't tricking them by jailing them, he was being kind by later releasing them.

Answer 3

Addressing the ones including Yaakov, where deception is used for seeming financial gain:

The firstborn right was the right to serve as the family Cohen. Eisav was not exactly the right type. Thus Yaakov was ensuring the right thing happened. As for the 'deception':

One could argue that a tired starving person isn't exactly thinking straight.

And indeed, the Torah tells us that Eisav abused the firstborn right after eating.

As for they blessings, they come with the firstborn right - look how Yitzchak, once that is revealed, is perfectly happy with the status quo (even reaffirming according to Chazal (see Rashi there) that the blessings should be Yaakov's

Yaakov did not take revenge with the sheep - he was avoiding Lavan's attempt at swindling him, and his 'stick' trick was only to enable a neis to happen - sheep's colour is not really determined by sticks.

Answer 4

I saw you already accepted an answer, but anyway, I'd like to address a general approach of examples of clear overriding Torah's commandments by Tzaddikim.

1. You are absolutely right, noticing that the Torah not only 'tolerates' openly forbidden behaviors, but explicitly allows overriding the Torah commandments when needed - "עת לעשות לה' הפרו תורתך".
2. Rashi on the spot (תהלים קיט קכו) - "ורבותינו דרשו ממנו שעוברין על דברי תורה כדי לעשות סייג וגדר לישראל"
3. THe Talmud in many places offers this doctrine (see Temura 14b): "רבי אבא בריה דרבי חייא בר אבא א"ר יוחנן: כותבי הלכות כשורף התורה, והלמד מהן – אינו נוטל שכר. דרש ר' יהודה בר נחמני מתורגמניה דריש לקיש: כתוב אחד אומר "כתוב לך את הדברים האלה", וכתוב אחד אומר "כי על פי הדברים האלה", לומר לך, דברים שעל פה – אי אתה רשאי לאומרן בכתב, ושבכתב – אי אתה רשאי לאומרן על פה. ותנא דבי רבי ישמעאל: כתוב לך את הדברים האלה – אלה אתה כותב, אבל אין אתה כותב הלכות! אמרי: דלמא מילתא חדתא שאני דהא רבי יוחנן ור"ל מעייני בסיפרא דאגדתא בשבתא, ודרשי הכי: "עת לעשות לה' הפרו תורתך" (תהלים קיט ) אמרי: מוטב תיעקר תורה, ואל תשתכח תורה מישראל."
4. That means that occasionally, when fighting Evil, the only way (בדיעבד) to succeed in doing good is to use evil against it. It's like negative times a negative resulting in a positive.
5. We are very used to it in the Torah or in our society, for example killing a serial killer, or stoning a Shabbos transgressor. Killing or hurting are clear prohibitions, but there's no "Kosher way" of dealing with them otherwise.
6. A spin-off of this question is very popular on Quora, for example: "How does the merciful G-d kills seemingly innocent people throughout the Torah?"
7. Examples are so numerous, just to wit: Yaakov marrying two sisters, tribes fooling Yaakov with goat blood, Moses braking the Tablets, Eliyaho on mount Carmel and more. The best examples, in my understanding, would be the emerging of the Moshiach lineage as pictured in Torah: through Lot's daughters, Yehuda & Tamar's, Elimelech going out to Hutz Laaretz, his sons marrying gentiles, Rith's story with Boaz etc. Why, you would ask, the Moshiach can't come the most Kosher way around. He can't. Not in this world.
8. The examples you've brought, show that the Tzaddikim realized that the mission simply could not be completed the Kosher way. And Hashem completely approved it retrospectively. It does not say we would all prefer not to לכתחילה, but if there's no choice - הפרו תורתך!