Parshat Vayigash

And the lord said to israel in a night vision

And he said: yaakov yaakov

And he said: here i am.

(Bereishit 46b)

 

Yaakov Yaakov - The name appears twice, because a number of years had passed without the spirit of prophecy resting upon him, and therefore He addressed him twice so that he should know that it is the spirit of prophecy which is summoning him.

(RaDaK, ibid., ibid)

 

And He said Yaakov Yaakov - After God had told him that 'your name will no longer be Yaakov, but Yisrael shall be your name', it was proper that He address him with that honorable name, and so is he termed in this parasha three times, but He calls him Yaakov to allude that now he will not 'wrestle with God and with man and will prevail', but he will be in a house of servitude until he will surely ascend, for the exile begins at this moment, and this is the reason for "And these are the names of the children of Yisrael arriving in Egypt, Yaakov and his sons..." (verse 8), for they will arrive there carrying the name of Yisrael, for the sons will be fruitful and multiply, and their name and honor will grow, but now, descending into Egypt, he is Yaakov.

 (RaMBaN, ibid. ibid.)

 

 

The dream, its interpretation and realization

Basmat Hazan

Interpretation. A relative concept. Sometimes different interpretations of the same text or the same narrative can lead in completely different directions, to different beliefs, to different attitudes, to different occurrences. In Parashat Vayeshev we find Joseph dreaming two dreams. These famous dreams lead, in some degree, to the intensification of the hatred of the brothers for Joseph. True, this hatred was grounded in Yaakov's overt and obvious preference for Joseph over his brothers and in the deteriorating relations which existed because of this differentiation and aloofness ("And Joseph brought ill report of them to their father", "And Yisrael loved Joseph more than all his sons, for he was the child of his old age, and he made him an ornamental tunic. And his brothers saw it was he their father loved more than all his brothers, and they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him"). The dreams added fuel to this fire of hatred, bringing it more into the open.

It is interesting to note how the dreams are described in the parasha. Already at the time of their telling they are interpreted by Yaakov and the brothers - and perhaps even by Joseph himself - as condescending dreams which presume superiority of the dreamer over all the others - including those who, even in a dream, should not be legitimate targets of haughty attitude - his father Yaakov and his departed mother Rachel ("Do you mean to reign over us, do you mean to rule us?", "And his father rebuked him and said to him, "What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall we really come, I and your mother and your brothers, to bow before you to the ground?")

Joseph, renowned as a master of dreams, does not only dream. He also interprets dreams. He is able to read them. Were someone to examine Joseph's two dreams using Joseph's keys, he would save himself considerable distress. The Talmud (Tractate Berachot, Chap. 9) teaches "All dreams follow the mouth [=interpretation]"; "A dream not interpreted is like a letter unopened" - the interpreter of the dreams clearly has great influence. This influence may be considered to be psychological influence or cosmic influence, but in any case, ultimately, the interpretation affects reality. Such is certainly the case against a background of highly charged relationships; every word and every nuance of a word becomes dramatic as it contributes to existing tension.

Every time that Joseph interprets a dream for someone else, and in the dreams appears a numerical function, Joseph interprets the dream as time-dependant. Three baskets, three days (the dreams of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker) seven cows, seven sheaves, seven years (Pharaoh's dream).

As we study Joseph's two dreams, we see that in his second dream appear thirteen heavenly bodies, the sun, the moon and eleven stars. He was seventeen years old when he dreamt his dream. He is thirty years old when he stands before Pharaoh. Thirteen years pass before his dream is realized. Yaakov, captive to his love for Rachel even after her death, sees only her when her beloved son comes and relates his dream. Her and himself. He and Rachel and eleven sons. And so, into his son's simple dream he weaves his own dream, Yaakov's dream. And so he weaves his son's prisoner tunic, the ornamental tunic.

Let us return for a moment to Joseph's first dreams. The dream is about sheaves, about bread, food, sustenance. His brothers' sheaves are bent. They cannot bear the burden. He stands in the center. One can also understand the picture as sheaves bowing, and this, of course, is how the brothers understood this dream, but, in the overall perspective of the story, one can see Joseph becoming a provider thirteen years from the day he dreamt his dreams.

When Joseph finally reveals himself to his brothers, he said: "I am Joseph your brother whom you sold into Egypt... do not be pained... because for sustenance God has sent me before you." In other words, in the atmosphere which existed between us then, we understood the dream as delusions of grandeur and a desire to rule over you (which you attempted to disrupt through extreme and violent measures, also perhaps because of our family history) but now, the "divine" interpretation of the dream is the mission, the responsibility "to make you a remnant on earth and to preserve life"; this is to say, a complex responsibility primarily of being a provider - to attend to your sustenance. A ruler, but not necessarily a ruler over you in the sense in which we "read" the dreams in our youth.

Joseph is a complex figure. He is a handsome man who finds favor in the eyes of those who see him and because of this, he arouses powerful envy, Envy so intense as to endanger his life. He is forced to mature and ultimately he merits deciphering that which is hidden in his dreams also as a powerful ruler who understands the divine dimension within himself. Thereby he turns the dream once again into an open letter which facilitates dialogue and forgiveness.

Basmat Hazan is a theatre director ("L'shem Yichud" - Acco Festival, "Bruno" - Kibbutz Seminar, Tel-Aviv, "Akeida: - Festival Solo Nova New York, "Shatuach V'nifla Lehafli" New York) Authoress ("Mayim Hafuchim" Hakkibutz Hameuchad Press) and facilitator in Bet Midrash for artists - Lava - Laboratory for Jewish Culture. She lives in Manhattan with Stephen and their four children.

 

Yosef could no long control himself - out of mercy or because of other reasons?

"Yosef could no longer control himself before all his attendants" - He could not tolerate having the attending Egyptians witnessing his brothers' embarrassment as he informed them.

(Rashi, Bereishit 45:1)

 

"Could no longer" - As he [Yehuda] mentioned a number of times the misfortune which may befall his father, Yosef was overwhelmed with pity, and could not refrain from crying, and because of all the attendants he called "Have everyone withdraw from me!"

(Radak, ibid., ibid.) 

 

The intention is to say that he wanted to control himself and to maneuver Yaakov into realization of "The sun and the moon... bowing down to me." There was no reason for him to pity his brothers, for they paid him no heed as he pleaded with them, but it was not proper before all the attendants who were not aware of the whole story; to them he would appear as a cruel person, with merciless, evil heart. He could not control himself because of the attendants.

(Meshekh Hochma, ibid., ibid.)

 

Is man responsible for the direction of his actions and their results?

"It was not you who sent me here, but God" - But they sold him of their own volition, in order to harm him! And even if it developed that some benefit derived from the sale - their sin still stands, for a person is judged not by what happens to evolve from his actions, but only on the basis of his action and his intent; what happens to develop later neither adds nor detracts.

(Abarbanel 45:8)

 

It is very clear that everything that is produced in time must necessarily have a proximate cause, which has produced it. In its turn that cause has a cause and so forth till finally one comes to the First Cause of all things, I mean God's will and free choice. For this reason all those intermediate causes are sometimes omitted in the dicta of the prophets, and an individual act produced in time is ascribed to God, it being said the He, may He be exalted, has done it...

Know you, that all proximate causes through which is produced in time that which is produced in time, regardless of whether these causes are essential and natural, or voluntary, or accidental and fortuitous - I mean by the voluntary cause of that particular thing produced time, the free choice of a man - and even if the causes are ascribed in the books of the prophets to God, may He be exalted. And according to their manner of expressing themselves, it is said of such an act that God did it or commanded it or said it...

(Guide for the Perplexed, II 48)

 

All the souls coming to egypt with jacob, those descended from him, excluding the wives of jacob's sons, all the souls were sixty six. And joseph's sons, who were born to him in egypt, two souls; all the souls of the house of jacob who came to egypt were seventy.

(bereishit 46:26-7)

 

Abba Halifa Keruya asked R. Hiyyz bar Abba: The sum you find [written] is seventy, but [when counting] individuals you find seventy less one!. He said: I had a precious pearl in my hand and you want me to lose it, so said R. Hama bar Hanina: It was Yocheved; she was still in the womb during the journey and was born between the walls [of Egypt], as it says: who gave birth to her for Levi in Egypt (Bamidbar 20) - her birth was in Egypt, but her mother did not go through the pregnancy in Egypt.

(Bava Batra 123a-b)

 

...there is one who says that the number seventy is an approximation, and that there were sixty-nine. That exegete is mistaken, since we find that he had thirty-three sons and daughters, but they were [only] thirty-two. The midrash that Yocheved was born between the walls is also strange. Why didn't Scripture mention the wonder performed for her sake - that [if we assume that Yocheved was born as Jacob's family entered Egypt] she gave birth to Moses at the age of one hundred and thirty!? [After all,] it is mentioned that Sarah gave birth when she was ["only"] ninety years old! As if this were not troubling enough, the authors of the piyutim [hymns] wrote in a song for Simhat Torah, "My mother Yocheved, be consoled for my death, and she was two hundred and fifty years old [when I - Moses - died], and Ahiya lived so and so many years." This is [merely] an aggadah or a lone opinion. I think that Jacob is included in the calculation [of the seventy souls], as if to say all of his sons and daughters plus himself were thirty-three. The proof for this is that it first says Jacob and his children. If someone argues against me that it says, Now all those descended from Jacob were seventy souls (Shemot 1:5), it is enough [to answer him] that Scripture did not hesitate to leave out one from seventy when it said, These are Jacob's sons who were born to him in Padan Aram (Bereishit 35:26) even though Benjamin was not born there. There are two additional [textual] witnesses to this matter. One is that it says, And these are the names of the children of Israel who were coming to Egypt: Jacob and his sons Jacob's firstborn was Reuben (Bereishit 46:8); here Jacob is mentioned as belonging to the children of Israel, since Scripture used language appropriate to the majority [of the people involved]. The second witness is all the souls of the house of Jacob who came to Egypt were seventy (Bereishit 46:27); but Manasseh and Ephraim did not come to Egypt - they were already there and had been born there; later it is written With seventy souls, Your forefathers descended to Egypt (Devarim 10:22), but those two had not descended. This verse also serves as evidence that Jacob was included in the calculation, because he had a soul, and that is main thing.

(Ibn Ezra Bereishit 46:23)

 

"Now it will be, when Pharaoh has you called and says: What is it that you do?" In a land such as Egypt, where a person is judged only on the basis of his labor, where a person is born not as a person but as an artisan, a farmer, soldier, etc. - the question regarding occupation would naturally be the first question. But they will fearlessly declare the unpleasant truth; the Egyptians' abhorrence of their occupation, and the nations' general loathing of the Jews, are the primary means of survival for this tribe which is destined to pass the days in isolation. As long as the light of morality has not dawned upon the nations, the barriers which the nations raised against Yisrael protect him from contamination by the corruption of the peoples among whom he will walk for centuries.

(Hirsch, ibid., 46:33)

 

Even In Situations of Great Distress, There Is No Justification For Slavery "Acquire us and our lands"

Yosef, however, detested slavery, that a person should rule over another to his detriment. Therefore it is written, "And Yosef acquired all the lands of Egypt for Pharaoh" but he did not purchase them as slaves; the land alone became Pharaoh's property, whereas they were temporarily drafted to work for their bread, becoming day laborers in field work. Therefore Yosef said "Now that I have acquired you… today" - This is to say: (You) temporarily, and your lands forever for Pharaoh. Therefore he transferred them to the cities, lest they continue to hold their land, for how can one discern that he acquired their lands if they (the sellers) were not sold and they continue to live on their land.

(Meshekh Hochma, Bereishit 47:19)

 

"Let the poor be members of your household" - and not that he purchase servants to serve him."

(Rabbi Ovadiah of Bartinura, Avot 1:5)

 

"Let the poor be members of your household" Said the Tur (Yoreh Deah 251): "It is a mitzvah that his household include indigents and orphans, and better that he take of them into his service than that he take many servants - and this will be considered as a charitable act." But he should speak with them kindly, and when mealtime approaches, he should treat them respectfully, feeding them at his table, and with good cheer. And when takes them to serve him, he should think: 'Master of the Universe, I take these and not others in order to fulfill you command "And let your brother live with you." And so in all matters, even when a person does something in his own interest, if he can elevate his action to the level of 'in honor of His Name' he should bear this in mind, and be stimulated, and do it in joy.

(Shelah, Megillah 24)

 

 

The Fast of the Tenth of Tevet: Remembrance of the Event or the Report?

The fast of the tenth is the tenth of Tevet (the tenth month), when the King of Babylon set himself against Jerusalem, as it says; Again in the ninth year, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, the word of the Lord came unto me saying, Son of man, write thee the name of the day, even of this same day: the King of Babylon set himself against Jerusalem this same day (Ezekiel 24). And I say the fast of the tenth is the fifth of Tevet, but in Judea they fast on account of the event, and in the Diaspora they fast on account of the report, as it says: And it came to pass in the twelfth year of our captivity, in the tenth month, in the fifth day of the month, that one that had escaped out of Jerusalem came unto me saying, The city is smitten (ibid. 33), and they heard, and made the day of the report as the day of the burning, and I prefer what I say to what he says.

(Sifri Va'et'hanan, 31)

 

 

 

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