In this week's section, Vayeji and lived, we find the blessings of Jacob to his sons that would later extend to their descendants, reaching us as twelve different styles of service to God, each valuable and meaningful, but different from the other.
Each tribe (son of Jacob) was distinct from the others (and therefore received a different blessing). Thus, each individual of the Jewish people has a path in serving God, according to the tribe from which they descend. However, each of the other tribes also offers lessons in their specific way of serving God, according to the blessing of Jacob. Furthermore, before his death, Moses also blessed the Jewish people according to their tribes, adding explanation and details to the blessings of Jacob himself.
Regarding Asher, Jacob his father blesses him with oil, saying (Bereshit 49:20) "From the land of Asher his food will be oily," while Moshe specifies further, saying (Devarim 33:24) "And he shall dip his foot in oil.".
What is the significance of the oil, and what is the significance of the foot? In the service of God, oil symbolizes wisdom and understanding in the observance of Torah and mitzvot, while the foot symbolizes unconditional and irrational surrender to the observance of Torah and mitzvot. Asher's blessing is that he will dip his foot in oil, which leads one to think that the foot has an advantage over the oil, that is, irrational surrender over rationality. However, it seems better to understand than not to understand...
The advantage of rationality is that the individual understands what they are doing, for whom they are working, and what benefits the work has for them and for the "boss," so to speak, or the company. On the other hand, the advantage of irrationality is that, not being limited to one's own understanding, the individual reaches a much deeper level of connection with the overall objective of "the company." Translated into more technical terms related to service to God, rationality is confined to the intellect, which is cold and calculating, and relates to the fixed system of worlds, with concrete and predetermined rules (seder ishtalshelut), where the sensation of God is limited and regulated according to the recipient of that sensation and the merit of their action. The virtue of irrationality is that, by encompassing the individual completely and not having a specific form (its service is neither intellectual nor emotional), it relates directly to the essence of God, which also has no specific definitions, this level being far superior to the former.
In short, the irrational servant goes further than the rational one. Based on this, Asher's blessing of dipping his foot in oil teaches us the virtue of the irrational over the strictly rational. May God grant us the merit to serve Him in every detail of our lives—in the rational, the emotional, and the irrational.