Vayeshev

“Vayeshev Yaakov Ba’aretz – and Yaakov settled in the land” – It says in Midrash Rabbah (84:3) “Rav Aha said ‘At the time that the righteous sit in tranqulilty and try to sit in tranquility in this world, the Satan comes and testifies against them and says ‘Is it not enough that they that they are set for The World that is Coming that they also seek to have tranquility in this world?’’” The midrash is pointing out that this world is not intended for tranquility. What, then, is it intended for?

R’ Daniel points out the difference between shalvah, tranqility, and shalom, peace. Tranquility connotes ease, being free from challenge. Peace involves conciliation. Tranquility implies satisfaction, while peace, the word shalom, implies fullness. There is a difference in standards – tranquility suggests wanting to maintain a level of satisfaction that was attained, while peace suggests striving for a level of satisfaction that is total because all ends are tied, and none are left dangling. Tranquility will allow for dangling ends so long as they do not interfere with th feeling of well-being. Peace will not be achieved until all factors are looked into and resolved.

Yaakov sought to sit in tranquility. He was surrounded by his family in his home land, the land of his fathers – and he wants to keep his family together in that land. As soon as he sought this tranquility, the satan began to testify against him. “He’s got Olam Habah, the Coming World, which is a promise of tranquility, and he also wants it in this world?” So the problem of Yosef and his brothers arises. Yaakov watches the strife between the brothers develop as Yosef (his favorite son) reveals his obviously prophetic dreams. He sees how the brothers hate him more and more; yet he keeps his silence. Finally there comes a breaking point – he sees that he must let go of the idyllic dream he had of a nice, happy family, and allow history to take it’s course. So he sends Yosef to see to the shalom of his brothers. He knows full well that the brothers hate Yosef, as it says “They were unable to tell him shalom.” Yosef knows full well the brothers hate Yosef. Yosef knows that Yaakov knows – but he trusts his father. He goes. They both show amazing emunah.

How is Yaakov able to allow his favorite son to go? Yaakov has experienced shleimut, fullness, before, as it says in last week’s parsha, after Yaakov encountered and parted from Eisav, “And Yaakov came shalem, full, to the city of Schem.” (Interesting that he must send Yosef to Schem to see to the shalom of his brothers.) (Also interesting that it was after he came shalem to Schem that the whole matter with Dinah his daughter came up.) Since he has experienced shleimut, there is something innate in him that demands shleimut. He cannot really settle for shalvah, tranquility. When the tsaddik wants to have tranquility, the Satan comes and testifies against him. As we said last week, the Satan is IN Yisrael (as, mathematically, Yaakov + Satan = Yisrael). If he settles for tranquility, he’s fooling himself.

R’ Daniel compares Yaakov’s situation to that of Adam and Chava. When they (we) were created in this world, they were created first as one being, as it says (Gen 1:27) “And Elokim created the Adam in his image, in the image of Elokim He created him, male and female He created them.” And then they were separated, as it says ‘And Elokim took the tzelah (side/rib/face/tail) that He had taken from the adam and built it into a woman and He brought her to the adam.” Because they have already existed as one being, they cannot experience real shleimut until they are reunified. But the fact of their separation makes the reunification necessarily on a higher, more profound level. They have become estranged from each other, and therefore must reach different understandings of how to connect. Thus their reconnection has more of an impact. So, too, with Yaakov. Though he once knew fullness, it is now gone. If he is to experience fullness again, it must be on a more profound level to be satisfying. Yesterday’s shalom is today’s shalvah. Were he to gather up his sons in the same room, there would still be hatred. Were Hashem to rejoin us all with our soulmates to be again one flesh, there would be strife, anxiety, issues. There must be a real separation; all factors involved must be allowed to play themselves out entirely. The man and woman must each seek their own identities – only with real self-awareness can they actually consider the possibility of once again becoming a unit. The brothers must act upon their hatred of Yosef to the fullest extent of real expression in order for the will of Hashem, being their more profound unity, to be fulfilled.

Let us see how this applies to us. We reach a point of satisfaction – we have passed through some barrier and reached a new plateau in service of Hashem. It lasts a while – but one day, doubt creeps in. What we have been doing so well is now insufficient. The tendency might be to try to attain what we had yesterday – this is shalvah. In order to have shalom this doubt must be admitted to and given center stage. It must be allowed to express itself. This doubt is not a “fall” to a lower place – rather it is an ascension to a higher place. We now have a higher standard that must be satisfied. What once could be glossed over must now be reexamined and fulfilled. This requires a great amount of faith – enough to let go. As much faith as Yaakov had to let his son, or even order his son, to go out into the field to see about the shalom of his brothers. Faith in one’s self and Hashem that the new peace is really attainable and completely worth the angst and pain of attaining it.

A dream is 1/60th of prophecy, while sleep is 1/60th of death.

A free translation from the teachings of Rebbe Ashlag on Yosef, after he has been sent by his father to find his brothers and he encounters a man in the field. “ ‘And a man found him wandering about in the field and he asked him, saying, ‘what is it that you (will) seek?’ And [Yosef] answered ‘I seek my brothers. Please tell me, where are they grazing the flocks?’” Behold, when a man wanders about in the field, and as the Ba’al Ha’Torim says, wandering in the field is a mental wandering looking for the way of truth, he comes to think that he will never arrive at the result he needs to arrive at. “And the man asked him, ‘what is it that you (will) seek?’” meaning, how can I help you? And Yosef said, “I seek my brothers,” that is, I seek to be in a society of loving friends, for through being in a group of loving friends, I will be able to ascend to the path which goes up to the House of Hashem. This path is called the way of hashpa’ah, of providing for others. Being that this is against our nature, as we are generally self-serving beings, the only way to attain the level of being mashpiah, providing, is being in a society of loving friends, in which everyone can help everyone else attain this level of giving. But the man responded to Yosef, “They have travelled from here.” Rashi interprets, “they have left brotherhood,” meaning they do not want to join you in your pursuit. And this separation is what caused the exile in Egypt. And in order to leave Egypt we must accept upon ourselves to enter in a society of loving friends, and through this we will merit to leave Egypt and receive the Torah.”

It says in Brachot a dream uninterpreted is like a letter unopened.

From Eliyahu –Directly after the story of Yosef’s brothers selling him into slavery, we learn about the mitzvah of levirate marriage (i.e. when a man dies, his brother is obligated by the Torah to cohabit with the newly widowed woman to carry on the brother’s seed). If the story of Yosef and his brothers is the antithesis of brotherly love, then levirate marriage is the fixing of it.

This mitzvah has many puzzling aspects to it. Our sages have since forbidden levirate marriage, forcing those for whom it would be relevent to perform an intentionally degrading ceremony called halitzha, which involvethe woman spitting in the man’s shoe. How can our sages forbid the performance of a Torah requirement? The answer is even more puzzling – our sages felt that we are not on the level to perform this levirate marriage without having thoughs of forbidden relations. The forbidden relations they are trying to protect us against are exactly those which the Torah commands us to have. How can the Torah generally forbid relations with one’s sister-in-law and yet command them here?

We see in the case of Yehuda and Tamar (gen. Chapter 38) that they, being father-in-law and daughter-in-law, have relations, despite the fact that the Torah forbids it. It is reasoned that, since this happened before the giving of the Torah, the prohibition did not apply to them. If you use that logic, then you could say that the laws of levirate marriage were also not binding – yet everyone in that time seemd to be aware of the requirement of levirate marriage. In all of the Tanach we have two examples of levirate marriage. The first is Yehuda and Tamar; the second is Ruth and Boaz. It is interesting to note that levirate marriage is incumbent upon the brother, yet in both cases in the Tanach it is not the brother who performs the act.

It might be said that this mitzvah is about going into a place of darkness, even forbiddenness, to salvage sparks of holiness that are there. In both cases, the people upon whom the mitzvah is most incumbent (Onen, the brother of the deceased in the case of Yehuda and Tamar, and Ruth’s dead husband’s relative Tov). Perhaps they avoid it because they know the child born is the actual offspring of the deceased (actual, not “considered to be” – see Rashi on Ruth 4:16). If a younger brother with children performed this mitzvah for his older brother, the offspring would then be first in line to inherit from the brothers’ common father, taking the inheritance away from the children of the younger brother. In the case of Ruth, the close relative Tov refused to perform the mitzvah because it would endanger the inheritance of his sons.

The magnitude of the mitzvah is apparent in the fact that Onan, upon whom it was incumbent to perform the mitzvah, was killed for not doing it. Tamar risked her life to perform it, though the requirement was not upon her. Why is this mitzvah so enormous? It is a mitzvah of chesed shel emes, true loving-kindness. True loving-kindness refers to an act performed for one who has died and therefore cannot in any way repay in this world for the deed done. The concept of chesed is commanded, but its rules and parameteres are not prescribed – it is up to the individual. Tamar engages in an act which could be considered either harlotry or incest, but was in fact a great act of self-sacrifice. Boaz marries Ruth despite the fact that marrying Moabites was (apparently) expressly forbidden in the Torah. As a result, Boaz and Ruth were great-grandparents of King David. Tamar also merited to be an ancestress of David. Redemption and Moshiach are the results of acts of selfless chesed. Chesed might require someone to go outside the rules. This is because it requires a powerful connection to Hashem that can be deeper than the established parameters of mitzvot. The Maharal writes in Netiv Olam “Whoever does acts of chesed, Hashem will do chesed and forgive his sins, because chesed is beyond judgement.” Mitzvot can seemingly be quantified and judged; chesed is beyond quantification and therefore removes a man from judgement. May we all merit to have the will to perform acts of chesed to help bring about the days of Moshiach, which are purely good.

It says in the Zohar “R’ Yehuda said a man does not need to tell of his dreams except to one who loves him.” We learn from our sages that the telling of a dream and the interpretation of that telling are as important as the dream itself. We should be careful to tell our dreams to someone who can help us make them real.

Rav Gavriel Goldfeder

Rav Gavriel Goldfeder is one of the first semicha recipients of the yeshiva. A graduate of Drew University in Religious Studies, he came to Bat Ayin after stints in other yeshivot and found a spiritual and intellectual home. Here he met his wife, Ketriellah, who was a student in our short-lived Women's Yeshiva. Upon graduation, Gavriel took the position of rabbi of the Aish Kodesh Congregation in Boulder, Colorado and together with Ketriellah and their growing family, they are busy creating (in Gavriel's words), "a community infused with Torah values, passion for learning and prayer, consideration of one another, and action, as well as deep celebration of the joys of life."