Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s ‘Unlocking The Torah Text: An In-Depth Journey Into The Weekly Parsha- Shemot‘, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers 

A Healthy Distance

Context

The physical posture of the Israelites during the Revelation at Sinai is clearly delineated in advance when, preparatory to Matan Torah, God instructs Moshe: “Set a boundary for the people roundabout saying, ‘Beware of ascending the mountain or touching its edge; whoever touches the mountain shall certainly die…”

This commandment of hagbala (setting a boundary), however, will not be divinely enforced. Instead, God commands the Israelites to execute anyone who crosses the mandated perimeter.

Questions

Even the most familiar scenes of our history warrant critical assessment.

Why is the moment of closest contact between man and God marked by divinely mandated distance, on pain of death? Why must the Israelites remain at the foot of Mount Sinai during Revelation?

Furthermore, in a setting marked by monumental supernatural miracles, why does God leave the enforcement of the boundary around Mount Sinai to man? God can certainly protect the perimeter surrounding the mountain through any number of divinely ordained means.

What are the lessons to be learned from this God-orchestrated scene at Sinai?

Approaches

A

A fascinating rationale for the phenomenon of hagbala is offered by Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch. The physical setting at Sinai, says Hirsch, is designed to prove that the word of God came “to the people” rather than “out of the people.” By insisting that the Israelites remain at the foot of Sinai to receive divine law, God clearly demonstrates for all to see that the people themselves are not the authors of that law.

The foundations of Jewish law are objective, eternal and not subject to changes wrought by time and circumstance. The Torah is not the product of a nation contemporary with the time of Revelation, but a divinely ordained document speaking to all times and places.

B

Moving beyond Hirsch’s suggestion, the decree of hagbala also reflects a fundamental dialectic lying at the core of man’s connection to God. At the moment of Revelation, as God launches His eternal relationship with His chosen people, He uses the scene at Sinai to define the very parameters of that relationship.

The God-man relationship will be forged out of a tension between distance and familiarity.

On the one hand, God is certainly remote, existing in a realm beyond our comprehension and often acting in ways we simply do not understand. On the other hand, as the psalmist maintains: “God is near to all who call Him, to all who call Him in earnest.” We are meant to see God as accessible, interested and involved in our daily lives, near enough to be “found” if we only seek Him out.

This balance between distance and familiarity in our relationship to God is reflected in many ways within our tradition. Three of them follow.

1. Each day, at climactic moments of our prayer service, we recite the Kedusha, a proclamation of God’s holiness. Central to this proclamation is the vision of the prophet Yeshayahu, who witnesses the heavenly hosts exclaiming, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of Hosts; the whole world is filled with His glory.”

To be holy within Jewish thought means to be separate, removed. Three times, in the prophet’s vision, the heavenly beings declare God’s separateness. In Jewish law, the repetition of an event or phenomenon three times creates a reality. God’s absolute remoteness is thus mirrored in the threefold proclamation of the angels.

In the very next breath, however, these very same celestial beings declare, “The whole world is filled with His glory.” God, the angels say, is apparent and easily reached in every aspect of our physical surroundings. We need only look around us to find Him.

The Kedusha thus reflects the dichotomy created by a God who is beyond our ken and who, at the same time, fills the world with His splendor.

2. Two seemingly conflicting elements are essential to the formation of a personal relationship with God: yira and ahava (fear and love): “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His paths, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.”

You can only love and fear the same being when you embrace the complexity inherent in the bond between you.

This truth is perhaps best demonstrated by focusing on the human associations which, in their own small way, most closely mirror our relationship with God. Consider, for example, the contradictory currents that course through a healthy parent-child relationship or a strong teacher-student bond. These relationships are not one-dimensional. A parent who tries to become his child’s friend (a phenomenon which is unfortunately much too common in our own day) will simply not be an effective parent. A rabbi or teacher who forgoes the respect and authority due his position loses some of his ability to successfully educate. Yet, while maintaining the space demanded by the relationship, both the parent and the teacher must still remain – each to different degrees – accessible, warm and caring.

The complexity of the parent-child bond is, in fact, codified in halacha through two distinct sets of laws that are designed to mold and govern the attitude of a child to his parent.

The laws of kavod (honor) speak to the personal care that must be shown to parents during times of need, such as infirmity and old age.

The laws of yira outline the respect that must be shown to parents at all times. Included are the prohibitions of calling a parent by his first name, sitting in a parent’s seat, contradicting a parent in public, etc.

Through the laws of kavod and yira, the halacha reflects the balance meant to be struck between the warmth a child should feel towards his parent and the awe in which that parent must be held.

In a different realm but somewhat parallel fashion, our relationship with God must be forged out of a similar tension.

God, therefore, mandates distance at the moment of His closest contact with man, striking the balance upon which their eternal shared relationship will be built.

3. The Kohanim (priests) are fixtures within the Temple service, representing the nation through the performance of sanctified rites and rituals before God. Even the Kohen Gadol (High Priest), however, is prohibited from entering the Kodesh Kadashim (Holy of Holies), the centerpiece of the Temple, except on the most sacred day of the year, Yom Kippur.

Why shouldn’t the highest Temple functionary be allowed free access to every part of the Temple at all times? Why limit his entry to the holiest site in the world?

Once again, the answer would seem to lie in the balance at the core of our relationship with God. Even the Kohen Gadol might become too familiar in his attitude towards the Holy of Holies and fail to treat this site with the reverence it so richly deserves. By severely limiting the High Priest’s entry into the Kodesh Kadashim, the Torah ensures that he, and by definition the entire nation, will never lose sight of the Temple’s sanctity.

Through these sources and others, our tradition reminds us that we must continually struggle to maintain the balance – rooted at Sinai – between distance and familiarity, so critical to our relationship with God.

If we lose the sense of awe meant to be present in our approach to the divine, our worship becomes pedestrian, rote and uninspired. If, on the other hand, we view God as unreachable and inaccessible, we will never succeed in truly experiencing His personal presence in our lives.

C

Finally, the commandment of hagbala at Sinai reiterates a message conveyed by God to Moshe earlier on this very same spot. During the vision of the burning bush, God ushered Moshe into leadership with the charge: “Do not come nearer to here. Take off your shoes from your feet, for the place upon which you stand is holy ground.” Do not look for Me, Moshe, in esoteric visions of a burning bush. Stand where you are, rooted to the ground. There, sanctity will be created, wherever you stand, as you work My will within your world.

By commanding the Israelites to remain at the foot of Mount Sinai during the onset of Revelation, God now transmits the same message on a national scale: As our shared journey begins, understand full well where and how My Divine Presence will be found. Do not search for Me in the mist-enveloped summits of Sinai. Do not seek Me in lofty, mysterious realms removed from the reality of your lives.

Stay at the base of the mountain, rooted with your neighbors in your world, and there receive My Torah. Remember always that I will enter your lives as you obey the Torah’s laws and pursue its goals. Partner with Me in the creation of sanctity in your world, and through that partnership you will discover and discern My Divine Presence.

D

We can now also understand why God hands the enforcement of the edict of hagbala to the Israelites, rather than maintaining the designated perimeter Himself, through divine intervention.

The partnership established at Sinai invests the Israelites with immediate personal and societal responsibilities.

As God transmits the law during Revelation, He also launches the process of legal jurisprudence. Included will be the people’s obligation to judge and to punish transgressors, to the best of their ability, as mandated by divine decree.

This responsibility begins immediately. God, therefore, does not enforce His own ruling of hagbala. He instead relegates that task to His new partners, the people themselves.

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s ‘Unlocking The Torah Text: An In-Depth Journey Into The Weekly Parsha- Shemot’, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers

Context

After recording the triumphant song offered by “Moshe and the children of Israel” on the banks of the Sea of Reeds, the Torah states: “And Miriam the Prophetess, the sister of Aharon, took the drum in her hand; and all the women went out after her with drums and with dances. And Miriam sang unto them: ‘Sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted; the horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea.’ ”

Questions

Although Miriam has appeared in the text before, this marks the first time that she is mentioned by name. She must, therefore, be clearly identified.

Why, however, is she referred to specifically as “the prophetess, the sister of Aharon”? According to rabbinic tradition, Sara was also a prophetess; yet, the text never identifies her as such. Also, why isn’t Miriam described as the sister of Moshe as well as the sister of Aharon?

What is the nature of the song offered by Miriam and by the women on the banks of the Reed Sea? Is this a separate paean, different from the one chanted by “Moshe and the children of Israel”? If not, why does the Torah mention it?

If Miriam’s song is unique, what is its message?

Approaches

A

Concerning the designation of Miriam as “the prophetess, the sister of Aharon,” a number of explanations are offered by the commentaries.

Rashi, quoting the Talmud, maintains that Miriam’s prophetic ability was evidenced before Moshe was born, when she was only “Aharon’s sister.” At that time, she predicted, “My mother is destined to give birth to a son who will be the redeemer of Israel.”

Alternatively, continues Rashi, Miriam is identified as Aharon’s sister because Aharon is destined, at a later time, to struggle on her behalf. When Miriam is punished with leprosy for speaking ill of Moshe, Aharon pleads with Moshe to intercede for her welfare.

The Rashbam, as is his wont, adopts the path of pshat and maintains that Miriam is referred to as the sister of Aharon simply because Aharon is the firstborn.

The Ramban entertains the same approach as the Rashbam but prefers a different explanation: the text wants to ensure that all three siblings – Aharon, Miriam and Moshe – are mentioned in conjunction with the song at the Reed Sea. Miriam is therefore specifically referred to as the sister of Aharon, who would otherwise not be cited.

Finally, Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch argues that Miriam occupied the same position among the women that Aharon occupied among the men. They both acted as Moshe’s emissaries, carrying his messages to the people. Miriam is, therefore, referred to as the sister of her counterpart, Aharon.

B

While the above commentators discuss why Miriam is referred to as Aharon’s sister, they fail to explain why she is specifically identified as a “prophetess” in this context.

Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin suggests that Miriam’s prophetic vision centered on the redemption of the Israelites from Egypt. The Torah therefore refers to Miriam’s prophetic ability only now, after that redemption is complete.

C

Perhaps the key to Miriam’s identification as a prophetess lies in the nature and significance of her “song.”

Does Miriam’s song add a new, prophetic dimension to the events at the Sea of Reeds?

A review of the traditional sources would seem to indicate that the answer is no. Most scholars do not envision a substantial difference between the song of Moshe and the song of Miriam.

Some commentaries, for example, such as the Chizkuni, reflect an earlier Midrashic tradition that Miriam led the women in a repetition of the entire text of Moshe’s song after the men had finished.

Other scholars, including the Ramban, maintain that Miriam and the women did not sing a separate song, at all. Miriam instructed the women to echo the words as they were chanted by Moshe and the men.

D

A careful reading of the following hints in the text, however, reveals another possible approach.

1. Only one sentence is recorded in the Torah as the text of Miriam’s song; it is a subtle variation on the first sentence of Moshe’s song:

Moshe: “I will sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted; the horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea.”

Miriam: “Sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted; the horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea.”

2. As soon as Miriam concludes her song, the text states, Vayasa Moshe et Yisrael mi’Yam Suf, “And Moshe caused Israel to journey from the Sea of Reeds.”

As a rule, when the Torah speaks of the nation’s journeys in the desert, the text simply states, Vayisu B’nai Yisrael, “And the children of Israel journeyed.” Why does the Torah specifically state at this point that Moshe “caused Israel to journey”?

E

Perhaps Miriam “the prophetess,” the individual who, according to rabbinic tradition, was instrumental in convincing her father to move forward in the face of Pharaoh’s decrees, now plays a pivotal role in urging the Israelites to move forward from the site of their full redemption from Egypt?

Miriam’s admonition could be imagined as follows: “Sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted; the horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea.” Moshe, you and the men sing eloquently of future dreams:

I will sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted…; Peoples heard and they were agitated, terror gripped the dwellers of Philistia. Then the chieftains of Edom were astounded, trembling gripped the powers of Moav, all the inhabitants of Canaan melted away. May fear and terror fall upon them…until Your people passes through, Lord, until this people that You have acquired passes through. Bring them and plant them on the Mount of Your Sanctuary, the foundation of Your holy place that You, Lord, have made – the holy place, Lord, that Your hands established. The Lord shall reign for all eternity!

These dreams will only be realized, however, if we stop singing and move on. After all, all that has happened so far is, “the horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea.”

Have we achieved our heritage? Has God given us the Torah? Have we entered our land? All of these challenges yet lie before us; and they will only be met if we move forward from the banks of this Sea.

So sing, yes, but with open eyes: “the horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea.” Then, let the song end and let us move on.

In response to Miriam’s song, the text relates: “And Moshe caused Israel to journey from the Sea of Reeds.” Understanding and acknowledging his sister’s message, Moshe forces a reluctant nation to end their celebration and move forward from the sea.

Had it not been for Miriam and her song, perhaps we would still be dancing and singing at the banks of the Sea of Reeds.

Points to Ponder

As the initial phases of our nation’s journey continue to unfold, eternal lessons are transmitted with each step.

The ability to move on, to celebrate but not be paralyzed by achievement, will prove to be a critical skill, essential to our success across the ages.

For example, in our time, the creation of the State of Israel, after centuries of diaspora existence and in the shadow of the Holocaust, was nothing less than a monumental, miraculous achievement. Acknowledgement and celebration are certainly warranted. Sometimes, however, you can celebrate too long…

A number of years ago, however, during a discussion on Israel-diaspora relations, an official of the Israeli government complained to me: “Too many American Jews think that we are still dancing the hora and draining the swamps. They are blind to the changes taking place within the Zionist enterprise and to the complex internal and external challenges that we currently face.”

No matter how great the achievement, celebration must invariably yield to challenge. If we “celebrate” too long, if we remain rooted in the glow of past accomplishments, we endanger those very accomplishments.

Only by moving forward, only by discerning and meeting new challenges that develop by the day, can we preserve the past even as we secure the future.

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s ‘Unlocking The Torah Text: An In-Depth Journey Into The Weekly Parsha- Shemot‘, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers

Context

As the intensity of the afflictions increases over the course of the plagues, Pharaoh offers three compromise positions to Moshe and the Israelites: worship your God in Egypt, depart Egypt temporarily with some of the people while others remain, depart Egypt temporarily with the entire nation but leave your cattle behind.

Moshe emphatically rejects each compromise in turn.

The second of these potential compromises appears towards the beginning of Parshat Bo, in the following puzzling conversation between Moshe and Pharaoh:

Pharaoh: “Go and worship your Lord! Who are they that shall go?”

Moshe: “With our young and with our old we will go! With our sons and with our daughters! With our sheep and with our cattle! For it is a festival of the Lord for us!”

Questions

How can Pharaoh ask, after all that has taken place, “Who are they that shall go?” Hasn’t God made it abundantly clear that He demands the release of the entire people?

Why, in addition, does Moshe answer Pharaoh in such confrontational fashion? He could simply have said, We all must go. Why risk further antagonizing the king with the unnecessarily detailed proclamation “With our young and with our old we will go…”?

Approaches

A

Much more is taking place in this conversation than initially meets the eye. The negotiation between Moshe and Pharaoh overlays a monumental confrontation between two towering civilizations, as Pharaoh and his court begin to face, with growing understanding, the true nature of the new culture destined to cause Egypt’s downfall.

B

Pharaoh is, in reality, being neither deliberately obtuse nor intentionally confrontational when he raises the question “Who are they that shall go?” His response to Moshe is, in fact, abundantly reasonable in light of Moshe’s original request of the king.

As we have already noted, God did not instruct Moshe to demand complete freedom for the Israelites. From the very outset, the appeal to the king was, instead, to be, “Let us go for a three-day journey into the wilderness that we may bring offerings to the Lord our God.”

In response to that request Pharaoh now argues: All right, I give in! You have my permission to take a three-day holiday for the purpose of worshipping your Lord. Let us, however, speak honestly. Moshe, you and I both know that religious worship in any community remains the responsibility and the right of a select few. Priests, elders, sorcerers – they are the ones in whose hands the ritual responsibility of the whole people are placed. Therefore I ask you, “Who are they that shall go?” Who from among you will represent the people in the performance of this desert ritual? Let me know, provide me with the list and they will have my permission to leave.

C

Moshe’s emphatic response is now understandable, as well: You still don’t get it, Pharaoh. There is a new world a-borning and we will no longer be bound by the old rules. No longer will religious worship remain the purview of a few chosen elect. A nation is coming into existence that will teach the world that religious participation is open to all.

“With our young and with our old we will go, with our sons and with our daughters….” No one and nothing is to be left behind; our “festival of the Lord” will only be complete if all are present and involved.

D

Moshe’s ringing proclamation reminds us that the Exodus narrative chronicles not only a people’s bid for freedom, but the beginning of a new chapter in the relationship between God and man. Step by step, a nation is forged that will be based upon personal observance, study and spiritual quest – a nation that will teach the world of every human being’s right and responsibility to actively relate to his Creator.

With the Exodus and the subsequent Revelation at Sinai, the rules will change forever. The birth of Judaism will open religious worship and practice to all.

Excerpted from Rabbi Menachem Genack’s Letters to President Clinton: Biblical Lessons on Faith and Leadership Click here to buy the book

Exodus

Menachem Genack, April 15, 1997

Historic greatness often emerges from seemingly insignificant acts of hope.

The story in Exodus of the redemption from Egypt begins with the inconspicuous verse “And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi” (Exod. 2:1). Generally the Bible, when introducing major figures, delineates their genealogy, yet here the parents of Moses are introduced anonymously. According to classical Jewish tradition (Talmud, Sotah 12a), Amram had separated himself from his wife, Jochebed. “Why bring children into the oppressive bondage?” he asked. Yet his daughter Miriam prophesied that the redemption would come, and she cajoled her father to remarry her mother — and from that union was born the redeemer, Moses. Miriam… never gave up hope, and communicated that hope to her parents. The Bible wants to emphasize that one couple rebuilding their family — what at the time seemed so insignificant and with such little prospect of success — sowed the seeds for the ultimate redemption. Courage and faith can infuse unnoticed events with historical significance. There are never impossible hurdles, only man’s limited dreams; for behind the veil of history is God’s hidden, loving hand, shaping and driving the human chronicle.

April 23, 1997

Dear Rabbi Genack:

Your letter to me was wonderful and its message inspired. I will try to take the lessons of Exodus to heart and will continue with courage and faith to do the job the American people sent me here to do.

Thank you for your prayers, your counsel, and your friendship. I cherish them all.

Sincerely,

Bill Clinton

Pharaoh’s Irony

Menachem Genack, April 7, 1998

God’s plans always account for – sometimes in ironic ways – efforts to thwart His plans.

The ancient Jewish Midrashic tradition teaches that Pharaoh’s astrologers glimpse the future and predict that Pharaoh’s ultimate nemesis will be subdued by water. Indeed, Moses, who will redeem the Jews from the bondage in Egypt and bring Pharaoh and his empire crashing down, will be punished by God: He is not allowed to enter the Promised Land, because he hit, rather than spoke to, a rock while trying to get water out of it.

Pharaoh, hoping to sabotage his future antagonist in a way that also fulfills the vision of his astrologers, brutally orders that all male children be drowned in the waters of the Nile (Exod. 1:22).

Moses’ parents save their new infant by hiding him in a basket among the reeds at the edge of the Nile, where he is watched over by his sister. Pharaoh’s daughter, while bathing in the Nile, finds this baby and adopts him and raises him as her own (Exod. 2:2–10).

The extraordinary irony is that Pharaoh, in his cruel attempt to destroy a future threat, brings that threat even closer to himself. As a result of Pharaoh’s terrible decree, Moses is placed in the basket, to be found by Pharaoh’s daughter and raised in the royal court. There he learns, as a prince of Egypt, safely ensconced in Pharaoh’s house, the skills of leadership needed to ultimately challenge Pharaoh and save his people, the Israelites.

Pharaoh arrogantly tries to force God’s hand, but as events unfold, he is entrapped by his own evil devices.

There are many devices in a man’s heart; nevertheless the counsel of the Lord, that shall stand. (Prov. 19:21)

Excerpted from Dr. Mandell Ganchow Coming of Age: An Anthology of Divrei Torah for Bar and Bat Mitzvah, co-published by OU Press and Ktav Publishers

Parashat Vayechi

By: Rabbi Elozor M. Preil, AWMA

Can there be a better parashah to celebrate becoming bar mitzvah than Parashat Vayechi? It is a parashah filled with blessings—from father to sons and from grandfather to grandsons. Let us analyze these blessings and try to discover what they say to us.

Yaakov Avinu blesses his grandsons Ephraim and Menasheh before he blesses his own children. Perhaps this is indicative of the special bond that exists between grandparents and grandchildren, a very different relationship than that which exists between parents and their own children.

When it is time for Yaakov to bless the two young men, Yosef arranges them in front of his father so that Yaakov’s dominant hand, his right hand, will rest upon Menasheh, the eldest, and his left hand upon the head of Ephraim, the younger son. Yaakov, however, crosses his hands so that his right hand is upon the head of Ephraim and his left hand upon Menasheh, as the pasuk states, “He directed his hands, for Menasheh was the firstborn” (Bereishit 48:14).

This verse presents us with a conundrum—it says that Yaakov crossed his hands and placed his left hand upon Menasheh specifically because Menasheh was the firstborn. Was being firstborn a reason to denigrate Menasheh?

Rav Zalman Sorotzkin in his commentary Oznayim la-Torah suggests that Ephraim received the more prestigious blessing precisely because Menasheh was the bechor. After all, it was an old family tradition! Yaakov’s father Yitzchak was chosen over his older brother Yishmael, Yaakov himself claimed the birthright from Esav, and Yaakov had just transferred the birthright of Bnei Yisrael from Reuven to Yosef, one of his youngest sons. The lesson is that being first-born is no guarantee of success or greatness. It is a challenge to be met, and one that many firstborns in the Torah failed to fulfill.

My dear bar mitzvah, this message of Yaakov Avinu speaks to you today. It does not matter where in the family line-up you happened to have been born. Whether you are the oldest, the youngest, or anywhere in between, your destiny is in your own hands. You can achieve your goals to the degree that you are willing to dedicate yourself to achieving those goals. It is all is up to you.

But why of all of Yaakov’s grandchildren were only Yosef’s sons chosen to receive a special blessing from their grandfather? The answer is that of all of Yaakov’s grandchildren, Ephraim and Menasheh were the only ones to be born and live their entire lives outside of Eretz Yisrael—and worse, under the degenerate and immoral influence of Egypt. Therefore, they needed a special blessing from Yaakov, who lived for over two decades in the home of the wicked Lavan. Yaakov prayed that the angel who protected him from all the evil influences of Lavan should extend the same protection to these young men in Egypt.

This, too, speaks directly to you growing up in America. True, the United States is a malchut shel chesed, a government and a society that treats Jews far better than we have ever been treated in galut. Yet therein lies our great challenge. For even as we are accepted into the broad mainstream of American life, it is critical that that we build a solid foundation of Torah and yir’at shamayim to be able to differentiate between what is proper and what is not, what is Jewish and what is not. In addition, we need to develop the moral and spiritual courage to be able to act upon that knowledge and make the right choices.

Another lesson is gleaned from the far more extensive section of the parashah which describes Yaakov’s detailed blessings to his sons. Yaakov blesses each of his sons individually; no two blessings are alike. Each son, each tribe, is an indispensable part of the mosaic of Israel, not in spite of their differences but because of them. Each tribe is blessed by Yaakov to succeed at what it does best. Each tribe has its own unique gifts to contribute to the success of the nation of Israel. Just as we rely upon the kings and leaders from Yehudah and the talmidei chachamim from Yissachar, we are equally dependent upon the business acumen of Zevulun, the armed might of Gad, and the agricultural bounty of Asher. Yaakov Avinu is teaching his sons, and us, that we are not identical—nor should we be. We all have different strengths and interests, and we all have our individual and unique contributions to make to the Jewish people.

And so, my dear bar mitzvah, you too have your unique role to play on the stage of Jewish life. You may already know what interests you and what you would like to do as your life’s work. More likely, you are still trying to figure it out. Whatever your eventual decision, as long as you focus upon making your unique contribution to Torah and Am Yisrael, you will be blessed.

Rabbi Preil has been in chinuch for over thirty years and is currently an Adjunct Professor of Bible at Stern College for Women. He is also Managing Director at Wealth Advisory Group, LLC.

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s ‘Unlocking The Torah Text: An In-Depth Journey Into The Weekly Parsha- Bereishit’ co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishing

Context

After the descent of Yaakov’s family to Egypt, Yosef prepares a delegation of his brothers for an interview with the Egyptian king.

He counsels them to specify that they are shepherds so that Pharaoh will settle them separately in the region of Goshen, “since all shepherds are abhorrent to the Egyptians.”

Questions

Why does Yosef specifically counsel his brothers to identify themselves with a profession that the Egyptians find repulsive?

Approaches

 

A

Some commentaries believe that Yosef is simply trying to ensure that his brothers will be able to continue practicing a beneficial profession.

The Abravanel, for example, maintains that Yosef could well have appointed his brothers to positions of authority and power. He desires, however, that they eschew such leadership in favor of a simple, humble, “sacred” livelihood.

According to Rabbeinu Bachya, shepherding was an intrinsically advantageous profession with clear physical and spiritual benefits. Producing a number of profitable materials (meat, milk and wool) for relatively little physical effort, shepherding also provided the opportunity for periodic isolation from civilization and its influence. Through seclusion the shepherd found time for self-examination and spiritual growth. Not coincidentally, continues Rabbeinu Bachya, many great figures of Jewish history, including Moshe, Shmuel, Shaul and David, were shepherds at some point in their lives.

B

Numerous other commentaries, however, see Yosef’s efforts in a totally different light.

Yosef, they claim, deliberately instructs his brothers to identify with a profession that will distance them from Egyptian society. Forced to live separately, the members of Yosef’s family and their progeny will have a greater chance of maintaining their own identity.

In the words of the Netziv: “Yosef’s intent was to ensure that his family would dwell apart from the Egyptians. Although [Yosef’s plan] would cause his father and brothers to be degraded in Pharaoh’s eyes, nonetheless, all was worth sacrificing to guarantee the preservation of Israel’s sanctity.”

Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch adds: “The disgust of the Egyptians for their [the brothers’] profession…was the first means of preservation of that race which was destined for an isolated path through the ages…. That is why Joseph acted with the express purpose of obtaining a separate province within which his family would settle.”

Yosef, the cosmopolitan Hebrew, the paradigm of success in an alien culture, becomes the architect of our people’s first ghetto.

C

Why is Yosef, viceroy of all of Egypt, accomplished beyond measure in a foreign world, so determined that the members of his family not follow his winning path?

What motivates him to personally construct a plan for their isolation?

Perhaps he is driven by the recognition of the price that he has had to pay for his own success. The years in Egypt have taken their toll. By the time he meets his brothers after their long separation, the Torah states: “Yosef recognized his brothers but they did not recognize him.” Yosef is no longer recognizable as a Hebrew, even to his family. Moved by this knowledge, and apprehending the devastation that would be caused if generation after generation of Hebrews paid this same price, Yosef acts to preserve his family’s identity.

Or, perhaps, Yosef is motivated by the pain of his personal isolation in the face of his rise to power (see Vayechi 2, Approaches b) and tries to spare his family from similar disappointment and loneliness.

Or, finally, perhaps this cosmopolitan Hebrew simply understands that what he has accomplished as an individual cannot be duplicated by his family as a whole. Talents are not uniform. Yosef’s enormous success could only be paralleled by a select few. Fewer still would be able to maintain the spiritual balance that had sustained him throughout his turbulent personal odyssey.

One way or the other, as Yosef orchestrates the descent of his family to Egypt, he clearly does everything he can to ensure their separation from the Egyptians. As will be the case throughout Jewish history, the delicate balance struck during Avraham’s lifetime (see Chayei Sara 1) is front and center, decades later, in the thoughts and planning of his great-grandson. Yosef realizes that for the members of his family to retain their status as “strangers and citizens” over generations and in the face of an overwhelming Egyptian culture, they will have to live in our people’s first ghetto.

D

Yosef’s careful plans are ultimately put to the test.

While the sojourn in Egypt should have been viewed by Yaakov’s family as temporary, the Torah testifies that: “Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the region of Goshen, and they secured a permanent foothold and they were fruitful and multiplied greatly.”

And, although the Jews were meant to remain in Goshen, the text continues: “And the children of Israel were fruitful, multiplied, increased, and became strong…and the land became filled with them.”

Building upon an earlier Midrashic tradition, the Netziv comments: “They filled not only the land of Goshen which had been especially assigned to them, but the whole land of Egypt…. Wherever they could purchase a dwelling, there the Israelites went…. They wished to be like the Egyptians.”

Given the opportunity, in spite of Yosef’s careful planning, the Israelites begin to assimilate into Egyptian culture and society. A tragic pattern, however, emerges – a pattern that is destined to be repeated over and over again across our long national journey. The harder the Israelites try to fit in, the more assiduously they try to be like those around them, the more they incur the enmity of their neighbors and set the stage for their own persecution. They are soon enslaved and pushed back into Goshen.

Yosef’s implicit urgings are ignored by later generations. His efforts, however, may well have saved his people from oblivion. First by choice, than by force, the Israelites remain a population separate within Egypt. Within the “ghetto” of Goshen they remain identifiable and, therefore, redeemable when the moment of the Exodus arrives.

Excerpted from Rabbi Norman Lamm’s ‘The Megillah: Majesty & Mystery’, co-published by OU Press and Ktav

The Progressive Candles: A Commentary on Jewish Life

Perhaps the most significant aspect of the most important feature of Hanukkah — the Hanukkah candles — is the increase in the number of candles from day to day. The lighting of the candles is progressive; that is, we proceed from least to most. The first night we light one candle, the second night two candles, the third night three candles, and so until the eighth night, when the candelabrum is ablaze with all eight candles. What we have is growth and increase and progress. It was the House of Hillel which gave this order its legal form when it said that mosif ve-holekh, the number of candles is to be increased each night, because ma’alin be-kodesh, because one must rise, increase, or progress in holiness.

In a sense, this idea of increase, of addition, of the progressive candles, is a very deep and incisive commentary on Jewish life and what it should be. The Hanukkah candles represent more than merely the military victory of the Jewish Maccabeans over the Greek Antiochus. They symbolize as well the clash of cultures, the war of world-views. There was the Greek world, steeped in its oriental idolatry, pitted against a Jewish minority stubbornly proud of its pure belief in one God.

One should not dismiss the Greek world lightly. The world’s greatest philosophers were nursed in the cradle of Greek culture. But the great difference between Hellenism, as the Greek culture is known, and Judaism, lies in this: The Greek world glorified contemplation, the Jewish world glorified behavior, mitzvot. The Greeks stressed creed, while we insisted upon deed. The Greeks were inclined to inactivity — the perfection of form, while the Jew insisted upon activity. The Greeks had many philosophers but few saints; many thinkers but few doers. With the Jews this was reversed. Our world was not one of cold thought, but one of warm action. And this Jewish attitude is best represented by the progressive candles — increase, growth, action, progress. I have no doubt that if the Greeks had won the war, and decided to celebrate it by the lighting of candles, they would have constructed one gigantic, beautiful candle in front of the statue of Zeus, or a thousand smaller ones all around him — but it would have remained that way. With us Jews, however, Hanukkah is celebrated by progressive candles. Ma’alin be-kodesh.

In human terms, we could call the Greeks sitters or standers; that is, in their cold inactivity they confined themselves, insofar as ethics and good deeds are concerned, to one place and there stagnated. They were sitters or standers who rarely chose to help a fellow man. And if the Greeks were sitters and standers, we Jews were walkers and goers. And when one of us decided to “sit it out,” and not participate actively in the good life, then our Rabbis were merciless in their criticism.

The Torah tells us, “Va-yeshev Ya’akov ba-aretz megurei aviv,” which is usually translated as, “and Jacob dwelt in the land of his father’s residence,” but which literally means, “and Jacob sat in the land of his father’s residence” (Genesis 37:1). Even Jacob — who was all his life a great and dynamic “doer” and “goer” — was at times a “sitter.” And listen to the Rabbis’ biting remark: “Wherever man sits, Satan jumps; wherever man becomes inactive, Satan raises his ugly head and becomes active” (Bereishit Rabbah, Va-Yeshev 84). Here was Jacob, an old man who was tired and weary of a life of wandering and running away. He felt that his energies were spent in wrestling with angels, in warding off Laban, and in protecting himself from Esau. He now had twelve children and he was ready to retire. “Enough done in one lifetime,” he thought. “Now is the time to get a little nahat, the time to sit back and relax.”

And so Jacob sat back and relaxed where his father had once lived. And what happens? Satan becomes active. Once a Jacob sits, jealousy invades his home, and his sons begin a struggle with each other over a mere colored shirt. Once a Jacob sits, then one son speaks evil of another. Once a Jacob sits, then he finds that his son Joseph, as the Rabbis relate, spends more time combing his hair in front of a mirror than in poring over his schoolbooks, and he soon begins to dream high-handed dreams of conquest and royalty. Indeed, once a Jacob sits, then his family is torn apart and some sons sell other sons down the river and into slavery.

And sitting, in this sense of inactivity, leads not only to family dissension, but also to downright immorality. Here was Israel, a “holy nation and a kingdom of priests” (Exodus 19:6), wandering in the desert, and suddenly “Israel sat in the plains of Moab” (Exodus 22:1). What happens when a nation sits? The children of Israel entered into immoral relationships with the daughters of Moab. So sitting leads to immorality as well. Indeed, once stagnation sets in, once there is only sitting or standing but no going or progress, then Satan jumps and becomes ferociously hyperactive.

What is the Jewish way? Certainly not sitting or standing, but going and walking. In the great vision that Abraham beheld, God’s command was clear and to the point: “Walk before me and be perfect” (Genesis 17:1). When a man walks, not sits, then he has a chance of becoming perfect. When Joshua the high priest stands before Almighty God, and Satan is at his right hand, God promises Joshua the ultimate redemption of Israel and tells him, “If you will walk in my ways, then I will give you places to walk among those that stand” (Zechariah 3:7). Yes, the world is full of sitters and standers, those who in their inactivity and stagnation invite the company of Satan. But the Abrahams and the Joshuas are committed to a policy of walking and going, of constant activity and positive, helpful deeds. For such is the active policy of Jews in all ages, an activation symbolized by the progressive candles of the Hanukkah menorah. Ma’alin be-kodesh.

How unfortunate, therefore, that so many of our modern Jews, while lighting the candles, forget their meaning. How often a rabbi hears the following remarks: “You see, Rabbi, it’s true I am not an Orthodox Jew, I don’t put on tefillin, I don’t observe Shabbat, I don’t observe the dietary laws; but, Rabbi, let me tell you that I have a good heart; it’s all in here.” And this is followed by a thumping of his chest.

Of course, that is precisely what Rabbis are afraid of — that it’s all in here, that the good heart is something which lies buried between the ribs and behind the diaphragm, and whose warm heartbeats cannot be heard without the aid of artificial instruments. The “good heart” is the excuse of the sitter or the stander. The “good heart” excuse is in the tradition of Greece, and not Israel. I am very wary, indeed, when all a person has to offer is a good heart; whose good intentions cannot be reflected in good limbs and good pockets and good deeds. Imagine what would happen if we would translate that “good heart” idea into actual medical terms. If all the blood were to be drained from your body, from the fingertips to the tips of your toes, and concentrated in your heart, it would certainly be a good heart because it would contain all the blood in your body. But such a situation can only lead to death, because a good heart is not enough; we must have a heart which can circulate this goodness all over the body.

Good intentions without good deeds and good actions are characteristic of the Greeks and not of the Jews. I feel sure, for example, that our synagogues were not built by good intentions or good hearts alone, but by good deeds and good actions. The UJA and Yeshiva University were not built by good hearts alone. They required sturdy hands and sharp heads and noble actions.

With this in mind, we can understand part of the special Al ha-Nissim prayer. In the course of that prayer we praise God and thank Him for assuring us of victory over the Greeks, who, we say, wanted to cause us to forget the Torah and to transgress God’s commandments. This statement is, seemingly, not true from a historical point of view. We know that Antiochus promulgated only three harsh laws against the Jews: He forbade the observance of Shabbat, the festival of Rosh Hodesh, and the rite of circumcision. But nowhere do we find that this mad emperor prohibited the study of Torah.

The answer, however, lies in the idea we have been trying to convey; that is, if the Jew is forbidden to observe the practical commandments, the hukkei retzonekha, if the study of the Torah cannot lead to resolute action, then it is the same as if he were prohibited from even thinking about the Torah — and it must lead to forgetting the Torah. Of what use is Torah if it does not lead to concrete action and noble deeds? If Antiochus did not allow the Jews to observe their commandments, then he stands accused in the eyes of history of destroying their study of the Torah. For the Jew, study without implementation is of slight value. Creed must give birth to deed; contemplation must result in behavior; thought must end in action. Ma’alin be-kodesh.

The light of the progressive candles is, therefore, for us, an enlightening commentary on what Jewish life should be. They inspire us to better behavior, challenge us to greater deeds, and urge us on to new and broader horizons, with that ever-valid commandment, “Rise in holiness.”

Excerpted from Rabbi Norman Lamm’s ‘The Megillah: Majesty & Mystery’

America, Bless God

I am pleased to occupy a pulpit celebrated both because of its historic past and its present distinguished spiritual leadership in a congregation rightfully famous in our city. I am doubly happy because Shearith Israel is not only an illustrious synagogue, but also a good neighbor of my congregation, The Jewish Center. In this context, I prefer to translate the word she’arit of “Shearith Israel” not in its primary signification of “remnant,” but rather in its secondary meaning, as in the Biblical words she’er basar or sha’arah — “relative,” or “close friend.” For indeed both our congregations are part of the larger family of Orthodox Jewry on the West Side of Manhattan.

The Thanksgiving Day Services at the Spanish-Portuguese Synagogue are not only a fine patriotic gesture as loyal American citizens; they are also an authentic expression of Judaism. The source for this judgment is the Sephardi scholar of the late Middle Ages, Abudrahm. Why is it, he asks, that during the repetition of the Amidah by the cantor, the congregation joins him for only one blessing, in the course of which it expresses the same sentiments in modified language? Abudrahm was referring to the Modim blessing, for while the cantor chants the Modim, the congregation recites, in an undertone, the Modim de-Rabbanan. The reason for this, says Abudrahm, is that the other blessings consist of petitions for various benefits: We ask God for wisdom, health, prosperity, peace. Such prayers can be delegated to a representative of the congregation, which the cantor, in effect, is — the shaliah tzibbur. But when it comes to offering our thanks to the Almighty — and this is the essence of Modim — there, no delegation suffices, for the expression of gratitude is too personal, too intimate, too significant for substitutes.

In the same sense, when our fellow Americans repair each to his own house of worship to offer thanks to our Heavenly Father for the blessings of life, freedom, peace, and bounty which we enjoy in our beloved land, we Jews feel quite naturally obliged to turn to God and, in our own way, to thank Him. No real Jew can hear others say Modim and remain silent! The very name “Jew” derives from the expression of gratitude to God. The word derives from “Judea,” or from “Judah,” the fourth son of Jacob and Leah, who was named thus because ha-pa’am odeh et Hashem, “this time I will thank the Lord” (Genesis 29:35).

Yet it is not enough merely to approve of Thanksgiving Day. Judaism has, as well, an original approach to the phenomenon of gratitude that is analytic and profound in nature, and in which there is implicit a remarkable spiritual insight. We err if we imagine that the offering of thanks to God is a kind of religious courtesy, a form of spiritual politeness, of good manners to a good God. Thanks may be the sort of good taste that lubricates the machinery of human relations, but certainly God transcends the limits of cultivation and good breeding. The Merciful One desires the heart; God looks to the depths of a man’s soul and is unimpressed by ceremonial compliments. Surely the Lord prefers piety over polish, genuineness over gentility, the broken heart over the soft tongue. Obviously our thanks are not made to flatter God. What then does the Torah tradition mean when it emphasizes the importance of thanking Him?

I believe that the true Jewish conception goes to the existential roots of man himself. It addresses itself to the human situation in all its rawness and starkness, and to the human being in his anguished feelings of solitude, terror, and worthlessness. It tells us that an appreciation of God’s greatness must be accompanied and enhanced by an awareness and acknowledgment of our pettiness and inadequacy. True thankfulness is coupled with the knowledge that without God we would have nothing and be nothing. When we contemplate God’s greatness and beneficence, we realize our own worthlessness; and when we understand our own pettiness and inferiority, we begin to appreciate the divine perfection and the majesty of His loving-kindness. That is why we bow at the Modim prayer — in thanking Him for His goodness, we declare our own insufficiency.

The Hebrew language itself reveals this insight. The word hodayah means two things: thankfulness — and a confession of guilt. In line with this double meaning, one can give two parallel interpretations to the Modeh Ani prayer that we recite every morning. One is the usual translation, in which modeh is rendered as “I thank.” “I thank thee, O King, who lives and endures, who has mercifully restored my soul unto me; great is Your faithfulness.” The other would follow the second meaning of the word, thus: “I confess, or acknowledge, that as a human being I have no real sovereignty, I am mortal and frail; I keep myself alive only with the greatest difficulty, and often find myself sorely lacking in mercy and compassion; small is my faithfulness.”

When man sleeps he is unconscious, close to death, defenseless, prey to the terrors of the night and disease that stalks unseen, a potential victim of nature’s cruel whims. Modeh ani! In the special prayer of thanksgiving that we are obligated to recite upon deliverance from certain specific occasions of danger, the Birkhat ha-Gomel, we explicitly mention this same idea. We thank God ha-gomel la-hayyavim tovot, who bestows kindness upon the undeserving. God is good, we are undeserving: both elements are merged in one blessing. Here lies the true significance of thanksgiving in Judaism: the contrast between divine infinity and human finitude; between God’s eternity and our transience; His endless might and our helplessness; His all-encompassing wisdom and our pervasive ignorance.

Our gratitude is deepened when we face the fact that we are hayyavim, undeserving. For this reason, we American Jews are in a unique position to offer meaningful thanks to the Almighty.

Our hodayah consists of both the elements we mentioned. For it has already been pointed out that the Holocaust in Europe has left deep wounds on the collective psyche of American Jewry. We think of the precious individuals, families, and whole communities that perished in the flames that engulfed one-third of our people. What marvelous Jews, what sterling human beings they were! Can we in all honesty say that we are in any way superior to them? Yet, if not, why are we alive and they not? We know ourselves and we knew them. And we know that they were not deserving of their bitter fate, and that we are not deserving of any better destiny than they. It is a feeling of perplexity and also inner worthlessness, a knowledge of being undeserving of being saved, that informs our state of mind. We know that, comparatively, we are hayyavim — and therefore how much more grateful ought we to be to Almighty God for having spared us and our families! So our thanks to our Father in Heaven for this beloved haven called America stem from a unique historical experience and the cumulative vicissitudes of centuries. The distinguishing moral failure of the contemporary world, Jews no less than others, is that we have forgotten both elements: that God is gomel tovot and ought to be thanked, and that we humans are hayyavim. As a matter of fact, we have all but forgotten Him completely. Modern man contemplates his felicity, his abundance, his surpluses, and he thanks anyone but God except in his speech, and that is but a verbal vestige of ages past. He thanks his stockbroker, labor union, government, the UN, his own shrewdness or luck, or science and medicine, or mankind as such.

And here, speaking as an Ashkenazi rabbi to a Sephardi congregation, is an area where all Jews can benefit from the Sephardi historical experience, Let me explain by referring to a law codified in the Shulhan Arukh (Orah Hayyim 219). We mentioned before the special thanksgiving prayer, the Birkhat ha-Gomel. One of the four occasions when this prayer is mandatory is after one has safely crossed the midbar, the desert or wilderness. Here the author of the Shulhan Arukh notes a divergence between Ashkenazi and Sephardi practice: In Germany (Ashkenaz) and France, he writes, the practice is not to recite the blessing when journeying from city to city, for it was intended only for those who travel in the desert, which is frequented by hayyot ra’ot, wild beasts, and listim, bandits. However, in Spain (Sepharad) the custom is that we do recite the blessing, because all the highways are presumed to be dangerous.

No doubt historians will find good historical reasons for this difference in religious practice. Probably intercity traffic in Spain was far more dangerous than in Germany and France, where highway robbery was less frequent. Yet there is more than a sociological difference between them. The commentators see a halakhic principle in issue. And even more the difference in approach has a larger significance; it is a parable for modern men. For modernity was born in Ashkenaz, in Germany and in France, the whole modern cast of mind, the contemporary celebration of human might and ingenuity and independence from God, the age of humanism — these were sired by the French Revolution and German Enlightenment. Here there took place the collective apotheosis of man, and the dethronement of God. And all too many of us Jews went along with the tide. We hailed the Encyclopedists as our prophets, Goethe as our psalmist, and Marx as our messiah. We all but cried out, “Science is my shepherd, I shall not want …” We deluded ourselves with that nineteenth-century tranquilizer called “progress.” We thought we had conquered the midbar and had substituted for it the city, symbol of human achievement. Our journey was from city to city, from one level of culture and civilization to another yet higher. We were making “linear progress” and there was nothing or no one who would or could impede us. With the midbar of life and the world vanquished, we were confident that we no longer had any reason to fear the “wild beasts” and “bandits” that once afflicted the human race. Universal peace and justice were, after all, just around the corner — thanks to
man’s new ways and great knowledge.

We forgot the experience of the Sephardi Jews. We should have learned from them that you can have a Golden Age and great universities and cultural centers, Barcelonas and Toledos and Cordovas — and yet, so short a time afterwards, expulsions, dispersions, and inquisitions! We should have learned this — but we did not. We ignored the fact that where there is no sense of submission and responsibility to a Higher Power, there are can be no occasion for gomel, for there are no tovot. And where there is no thankfulness to God, where there is no humility, there man becomes ruthless, he turns into bandits, and all of society abounds in wild beasts.

We of the twentieth century thought that all the world was one “city,” one giant, united, cultural human unit. Then suddenly, and to our dismay, we learned that it was really only a midbar, a desert, and that the vision of a civilized city was just another mirage in the wide, terrifying desert. We discovered that we were prey to the wild beasts of Hitler and Mussolini, and that decent men and women were being victimized by the international bandits operating out of the Kremlin and Cairo. Oh, how we looked for new ways, new derakhim! We tried the “scientific way of life” — and discovered not only penicillin and radio, but also nuclear bombs, fallout, and leukemia. We thought nationalism was the best way and learned that with independence can come new tyrannies undreamed of, and terror more fierce than ever imagined. We tried the way of humanism and found that the ringing declarations soon hung like limp clichés, leaving our youth rootless, psychologically unstable, devoid of ideals or enthusiasm, interested in nothing but themselves — and these selves were morally diminutive.

Kol ha-derakhim be-hezkat sakkanah, as our Sephardi scholars taught: Where there is no Godliness, where man arrogantly asserts his absolute independence, all ways are corrupt and dangerous. Where man fails to acknowledge that he is of the hayyavim, where he maintains that he is guiltless and master of his own destiny and need not thank the divine gomel tovot, his ways wind through wilderness and wasteland, and he is at the mercy of the bandits and the wild animals. What we learn, therefore, is a marvelous paradox: When man begins with self-assertion and self-confidence, he ends with self-destruction and annihilation; when he begins with self-abnegation and distrust, he ends with a ringing self-affirmation and ennoblement.

It is this thoroughly Jewish idea — the dual nature of hodayah and the inexorable failure and mortal danger of human ways without God that should be our specific Jewish contribution to the American experience of Thanksgiving. It is for this reason that, to my mind, Thanksgiving Day is so much more precious than other national holidays. Other patriotic occasions, such as Independence Day, valuable though they are, can easily degenerate into national self-idolatry and collective self-glorification. In order to reestablish the proper harmony we need the kind of corrective of humility inspired by Thanksgiving Day. For if July 4th is Independence Day, then Thanksgiving is our Dependence Day — our dependence upon the Almighty. Let this, then, be our prayer: Almighty God, as we rely upon Thy guidance, recognizing our unutterable debt to Thee as hayyavim. You lead us out of the midbar, spare us from the listim who would unleash unspeakable terror upon all men, and from the hayyot ra’ot that lurk unpredictably in the hearts of each of us. May all our derakhim (ways) be safe from sakkanah (danger), and may they all lead to a greater and better future for all of us, all America, and all mankind.

For all this we thank You, O Lord. And even as during the rest of the year we pray “God, bless America,” today we turn to our own hearts and to the soul of our country and declare, “America, bless God.”

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s ‘Unlocking The Torah Text: An In-Depth Journey Into The Weekly Parsha- Bereishit’, co-published with Gefen Publishing

What Frightens a King

Context

After dreaming of seven lean cows consuming seven healthy cows and of seven thin ears of grain consuming seven robust ears, Pharaoh awakens deeply troubled. He commands “all of the sorcerers of Egypt and all of its wise men” to interpret his visions but receives no satisfactory response.

The butler recalls Yosef’s ability to interpret dreams and mentions him to the king. Pharaoh orders Yosef released from prison and brought to the palace. Pharaoh then repeats the content of his dreams to Yosef.

Questions

Why is Pharaoh so deeply troubled by his dreams?

Does the text offer any hint as to the source of Pharaoh’s fears?

Approaches

 

A

The narrative before us is strangely repetitive. First the text describes Pharaoh’s dreams in detail as they occur. Then the dreams are described, again in detail, when the king recounts them for Yosef. The Torah could simply have stated, “And Pharaoh told the content of his dreams to Yosef.” Why the redundancy?

The Torah, as noted before (see Bereishit 3 and Chayei Sara 3), never repeats a conversation or an event without reason. In this case, the repetition within the text provides a glimpse into Pharaoh’s mind. When Pharaoh speaks to Yosef, he conveys not only his dreams but his perception of those dreams.

Specifically, two addenda appended by Pharaoh to his first vision may provide the key to the fears of this mighty king.

1. The king dreams: “And behold out of the river emerged seven cows, of beautiful appearance and healthy flesh…. And behold seven other cows emerged out of the river after them, poor of appearance and gaunt of flesh…”

The king recounts: “And behold out of the river emerged seven cows, of healthy flesh and beautiful form…. And behold seven other cows emerged after them, scrawny, and of very poor form and emaciated flesh.

Never have I seen such in all the land of Egypt for badness.”

Pharaoh is clearly disturbed by the possibility that “scrawny, emaciated cows” could even appear in Egypt at all. Like so many monarchs before and after him, Pharaoh prefers to live in a fantasy world of absolute power and success. There is no place in the king’s lush, rich empire for “weak cows.” Pharaoh, therefore, emphatically declares that no such cows have ever before appeared in his land, as he desperately attempts to avoid the ramifications of his vision.

2. The king dreams: “And the seven cows of poor appearance and gaunt flesh consumed the seven cows of beautiful appearance and good health, and Pharaoh awoke.”

The king recounts: “And the emaciated, inferior cows consumed the first seven healthy cows. And they came inside them and it was not apparent that they came inside them – for their appearance was as inferior as before; and I awoke.”

The world in which Pharaoh lives is governed by clear rules. In this world nations conquer other nations with regularity. Through subterfuge and cunning, the seemingly weak can even defeat the seemingly strong. The king can therefore accept the possibility of lean cows eating healthy cows.

What Pharaoh cannot accept, however, is the possibility that the victor in a battle should remain unchanged. In the king’s world, conquest invariably bestows upon the victor increased physical power and strength. This rule is the basis of Pharaoh’s own supremacy. When, in his vision, the lean cows remain visibly unaffected after consuming the healthy cows, Pharaoh’s world is threatened and he awakens abruptly, sorely troubled and distraught.

B

Yosef sets the king’s mind at ease by explaining both the existence of the lean cows and their unchanged status in symbolic terms. Pharaoh’s visions, he asserts, represent natural challenges which can be overcome through proper planning.

Little does Pharaoh know, however, that his fears are actually wellfounded. There is, unbeknownst to Pharaoh and perhaps even to Yosef, a hidden subtext to these visions. Pharaoh is about to be threatened in ways he could scarcely begin to imagine.

The king’s dreams set in motion a series of events which eventually give rise to the birth of a unique nation within his very realm. This eternal Jewish nation will not be bound by the rules governing Pharaoh’s world. Spiritual fortitude will overcome physical strength as this seemingly weak people outlasts the most powerful empires in the history of mankind. Pharaoh’s kingdom will be only the first to fall in the face of the Jews’ march across the face of history.

The victorious Jewish nation, however, will not change overtly for generations. We will measure our success, not in terms of increased physical strength, but in the unbroken maintenance and development of our enduring spiritual heritage.

“Lean cows” will consume “robust cows.” The seemingly weak will overcome the strong, yet remain unchanged.

Pharaoh’s world is about to crumble; he has good reason to be troubled by his dreams.