TorahParsha

How We Find Freedom

for Passover

 

Joseph is sent by his father to see his brothers as they tend the flocks.

But Joseph’s brothers hate him. When they see Joseph, they throw him into a pit. They leave him to the elements to die. They dip Joseph’s garment in goat’s blood. This rending of family begins the chain of events that comes to four hundred years of slavery.

*

When God saves Israel from Egypt, He tells the people to slaughter a lamb of the flocks.

They are to dip hyssop into the lamb’s blood.

They are to partake of the lamb by family.

That dipping of hyssop is reminiscent of another dipping ceremony: that of the leper. When the leper is cured, the priest dips hyssop in bird’s blood on the cured man’s behalf. And the cured man rejoins his people.

*

This first meal of Exodus is a meal of family, a meal of dipping hyssop—of bringing the outcast in.

It is a reversal of the break in the family that sent Joseph away.

It is a welcoming of all.

It is in this welcoming that freedom comes.

 

___

Chag Sameach,

Abe

Note that the ceremony of the leper is introduced significantly after the Exodus; however, I am assuming a single set of symbols applied throughout the Torah.

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What if we cannot talk to each other?

for Parshat VaYeishev

 

i

There is no record of any words

between Cain and his brother

whom Cain hates

until Cain said to Abel, his brother—

but what Cain said is not written;

then Cain murders Abel.

*

And Cain’s line of children dies in the Flood.

 

ii

Judah promises his childless,

widowed daughter-in-law—

Tamar—

that she will marry Judah’s surviving son.

But Judah does not make good on his word.

He never tells Tamar why.

*

Tamar dresses as a prostitute.

Judah impregnates her,

not knowing it is her.

*

In exchange for their meeting, Tamar takes

Judah’s ring, cord, and staff.

*

Judah hears that Tamar, unmarried, is pregnant

—a capital crime in that day.

Tamar tells Judah:

the father is the owner

of this ring, this cord, this staff.

Judah says:

She is more righteous than I,

let us spare her.

*

The child they birth

is the ancestor of David,

whose kingdom is everlasting.

 

iii

If we cannot communicate we die

(like Cain and Abel).

If we find something of ourselves in each another

(as Tamar taught Judah)—

then we learn to speak,

we move beyond death

we last forever.

 

 

___

Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

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What do Dreams Mean?

(For Parshat VaYeishev)

 

i

Joseph is his father’s favorite son

and his father gives him a special coat.

Joseph lives a charmed life.

*

At night Joseph dreams  

and his dreams imply that his brothers will bow to him.

But Joseph is taken into slavery

and from slavery to prison.

 

ii

In prison Joseph meets a cupbearer and a baker.

The cupbearer dreams

and Joseph says: your dream means that you will be a cupbearer again.

The baker dreams

and Joseph says: your dream means that you will be hanged.

*

And Joseph says: dream-interpretations are from God.

*
These predictions come true.

 

Pharaoh hears of Joseph’s dream-interpretation

and makes Joseph ruler over Egypt

and Joseph’s brothers do bow to him.

 

iii

In security Joseph thinks that dreams are promises,

But the promise never takes hold. 

 

Then Joseph sees  

that dreams are the signs of changing fortune:

—for good (a return to cupbearing), or for suffering (a hanging);

only God will say which.

 

Then dreams speak Truth through Joseph

and his dreams come true.

 

Because he has learned the heart of dreams, the core of Truth:

that life is changeable,

that God is the only Master of this tenuousness.

 

 

Inspired largely by Rabbi Alex Israel’s reading of Joseph, and other sources.

 

 

____

Shabbat Shalom, Abe

 

For a printer-friendly version of this piece,  click here (word document).

 Please pray for the premature infants Kalev Ezra and Baer Yakov ben Emunah. Please continue to pray for  Achinoam Rina bat Avital Hodaya, Ahuvah Rachel bat Orah and for Rachel Tovah bat Yehudit Esther

 

 

Life of Dreams (for Parshat VaYeishev)

i

Joseph dreams that his brothers will come to bow to him.

 

He tells his brothers of these dreams. His brothers hate him.

 

They cast him into slavery.

 

Later, Joseph becomes a prisoner.

 

Joseph has no more dreams that are mentioned in the text.

 

*

In prison one morning Joseph comes to his prison-mates, and he saw that they were distraught.

 

He asks them: Why do you appear downcast?

 

They tell him of their vexing dreams. Joseph listens to their dreams and interprets their dreams for them.

 

These interpretations come true.

 

*

Pharaoh learns that Joseph will hear a dream to interpret it, and Pharaoh comes to tell Joseph of his own dreams, and Joseph interprets Pharaoh’s dreams for him.

 

Pharaoh makes Joseph ruler over Egypt.

 

Ruling Egypt, Joseph keeps his own family alive during famine.

 

And his brothers bow to him.

 

ii

First Joseph makes the world listen to his dreams. But then Joseph suffers: at the hands of his brothers, in slavery, in prison.

 

Then Joseph stops telling the world of his dreams.

 

Joseph listens to the dreams of distraught people.

 

Joseph learns to hear.

It is only then that Joseph’s own dreams come true.

 

_________

Shabbat Shalom, Abe

(I may have heard this idea elsewhere.)

Please share this thought with one friend. www.TorahParsha.com.

____

Quoted verses: Gen 40:6, 41:15

Tamar, Judah, Joseph, Symbol

i
Joseph dreams prophetic dreams. His father dresses him in a special many-colored coat. His brothers hate him for his coat, these dreams.

Joseph's brothers attack him. They call him the dreamer. They  strip him of his coat. They cast him in a pit, from which he is sold into slavery.

*
Tamar, Judah's daughter-in-law, reveals her identity (she had been disguised) by means of the cord, the staff, and the ring that Judah had given her when she was disguised.

*
Joseph becomes ruler of Egypt. He hides his identity from his brothers when he meets them again. He pretends not to speak the same language as they do: the translator is between them when they speak.

*
Finally it is Judah who approaches Joseph and causes Joseph to reveal himself to his brothers; and the brothers are reconciled.

ii
A symbol is meant to be a communication: it is meant to bind people together. A cord, staff, and ring, for instance, tells Judah that Tamar is Tamar.

Symbol can also overshadow its own meaning, making communication impossible, tearing people apart. It is language, for instance, that lets Joseph pretend he does not know his brothers.

And it is Judah, who has learned from Tamar, who approaches Joseph, who encounters Joseph face-to-face, who takes the veil of symbol away.

iii
This story holds in it the same lesson as Isaiah's chastisement to all religious hypocrites:

Bring Me no more vain offerings, says God; incense of abomination they are to Me: but cease to do evil, learn to do good: seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

Based partially on the writings of Avivah Zornberg, and on a teaching of the Ishbitzer relayed to me by Raquel Sanchez.

~~~~~~~~~~

Kings from Empathy

i
Tamar marries Yehudah's two sons in succession. In succession, both sons die.

Yehudah promises to marry Tamar to his much younger son, when that son grows older. But Yehudah also fears that Tamar has caused his other sons' death (which is not what happened). And so Yehudah does not marry Tamar to his youngest son.

Instead, Yehudah leaves Tamar a widow in his household.

*
Tamar tricks Yehudah. She dresses as a harlot. She covers her face. So Yehudah does not know, when he hires her and makes her pregnant, that she is Tamar.

*
For payment, Tamar takes collateral: Yehudah's chord, and his staff, and his ring.

Much later, Yehudah condemns Tamar for being pregnant through harlotry (not knowing that she carries his child). And Tamar shows him his chord, and his staff, and his ring, saying: The man to whom these are, I am with child.

Then Yehudah relents of everything, saying: She is more righteous than I.

*
Then Tamar gives birth to twins. One of the twins is Peretz. Peretz is the ancestor to the line of David, king of Israel.

ii
One son is replaced with the next. And one husband is replaced with the next. And a daughter-in-law is swapped for a harlot with no face.

Everything is exchangeable in Yehudah's world. Everything is a commodity.

*
A world of pure economics is a world of cruel power.

Tamar needs a supply of husbands; Yehudah owns the supply. So Yehudah can keep Tamar husbandless, if he chooses.

iii
Tamar does not take money for her act. She takes a chord, and a staff, and a ring. And she says of these objects: The man to whom these are, I am with child.

Nothing is a commodity for Tamar. For her, everything is connected to someone. For her, everything implies empathy. Everything implies responsibility.

A chord and a staff and a ring do not mean payment: they mean a specific man, who is Yehudah, who is a father.

*
In saying: She is more righteous than I, Yehudah accepts Tamar's view. Empathy enters Israel.

With this empathy, Peretz--the ancestor of the line of the kings of Israel--can be born.

~~~~