Parasha of the Week

Beresheit (Genesis) is the Beginning of All.  In essence, it is the story of God.  It tells the tale of how the universe came into being and how one certain lineage was directed toward an amorphous goal.  Who knew what this young Abram might become? Or where he was being directed?  Or why he was chosen? The stories woven in Beresheit are powerful tales which are told and retold through the centuries of "becoming" but unless we know the end of the story they are just stories. This Shabbat we begin the second book of Torah, Shmot.  The first word of this second book of Torah is “v’eleh.”  The “v” (meaning and, or but) comes to show that it is connected to what came before, but only tangentially.  Something new is about to begin.  All human history has been leading up to this moment.   A nation is about to be born.  No longer just narratives about single people – Adam, Noah, Sarah,...

After 17 years in Egypt, Jacob called Joseph to him and made him promise that "when I sleep with my fathers, thou shalt carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their resting place."  Realizing that his father's days were numbered, Joseph brought his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, to be blessed by their grandfather, placing the former by Jacob's right hand to receive preference as the first born. The Patriarch, however, reversed the procedure, and said that while both would  proper, Ephraim would be the greater.  On both, he conferred the blessing  sanctified to this day.  Every  Shabbat a parent blesses there son with these same words, "God make thee as Ephraim and Manasseh."

Someone told a joke: “How can you tell when a politician is lying?”  “His lips are moving.”   This is a political Torah portion.  Joseph, viceroy to the Pharaoh, begins to collect all the grain in Egypt storing for the predicted famine.  Then once the famine begins, Joseph’s deliberate process handing out food so that it would last through the seven years of hunger.   “Joseph the Mashbir” the one who dispensed goods for the land was now confronted by his brothers who came to Egypt in a desperate need for food to stave off the ongoing famine. “Give us bread,” they begged twice. Each time Joseph took something from them in exchange for the bread, much as he did when handing out bread to the Egyptians.   In essence, Joseph the Mashbir was also Joseph the politician who saved the population while enriching the nation.    How does the story end?  Not with riches but with reconciliation .  Joseph ...

  “Pharaoh removed his signet ring from his hand, and Pharaoh put in on Joseph’s hand. He had him dressed in robes of fine linen, and put a gold chain around his neck.” (Genesis 41:42). Until now Joseph lay in a dank dungeon where he passed unrecognized by everyone.  He was just another filthy prisoner trying to stay alive in a jungle.  Now Joseph is elevated to vizier and all Egypt bows before him.     Question: Are they bowing at the man or the dress?   Ecclesiastes warns us, “Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain…” yet we seem to continue to venerate good looks and expensive dress.    What if Joseph had been recognized before he was brought before Pharaoh?  What if people saw the innate goodness that he carried?  Maybe this is the real lesson the Torah wants us to learn: look beyond the physical self.     Everyone is made in the image of G-d.  Everyone carries un...

“Jacob loved Joseph more than all his children….”   A man went to see his rabbi about making a will.  He told the rabbi that he wanted to leave most of his wealth to one child, his favorite. The rabbi urged him not to do this.    “But can’t I just give him something, anything, to show him how special he is to me?’   The rabbi responded, “We are taught in the holy Talmud that for a small amount of silk Joseph’s brothers became envious and sold him and his descendants into slavery for centuries.”   “Not only that,” continued the sage, “but the brothers disowned their own flesh.  Remember what they said when they presented the blood soaked coat to their father? They asked, “Do you recognize  your son’s  coat? “  They did not ask, “Do you recognize our brother’s coat?’  They utterly disowned Joseph for a piece a cloth.  

After decades of estrangement Jacob is about to meet his twin.  Will Esau accept his brother?  The last time he saw Jacob, Esau swore to destroy him.     What happens when your distant relative, whom you have not seen in may years (and have no wish to ever see again) shows up at the event you planned on attending?  Will it keep you up at night worrying about what embarrassing thing they will do this time? Should you just pretend that you do not see them?   This was Jacob’s prayer the night before his meeting: “G-d of my father Abraham, G-d of my father Isaac, G-d protects the pious and the unworthy. I do not merit mercy and to be truthful you have given me more than I deserve."    “Lord of the world, I have suffered in my life but I am here and I have come through stronger because your faith in me.  With whatever merit for past deeds I have done and whatever I deserve because of my ancestors, bless me wit...

Its is written, “ And Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “I know, the presence of G-d is in this place.”   To sustain ourselves in life we need to eat, sleep and work.  It is easy to get subsumed and even overwhelmed with what is our next meal, will we get the next raise whether, are we are exercising enough, organizing your clothes closet, getting the latest smart phone….  As soon as we wake in the morning we were assaulted by things too numerous to count that need to get done during the course of a single day…. and we forget why we are alive.   Rabbi Meir of Premishlan made the observation that the spiritual person thinks of G-d the very moment that he opens his eyes. The spiritual person is aware that sleep has restored his energy and gives him power to pursue his spiritual growth. Such energy makes food more palatable, makes love more meaningful and makes the day – each passing moment -much richer.   I can wake from sleep and then tur...