From: Netvort@aol.com
Sent: Friday, December 10, 2004 1:21 AM
To: JoshHoff@aol.com
Subject: Netvort : parshas Mikeitz, 5765





                                          What's That You're Saying?

                   By Rabbi Joshua (subtextually known as The Hoffer) Hoffman



When Ya'akov realizes that his family is running out of food due to the famine sweeping the earth, and he learns that food is available in Egypt, he tells his sons to go there and buy what they need. When they come to Egypt, they are directed to Yosef, whom Pharaoh appointed as his second in command, in charge of the economy and the food supply. Yosef, upon seeing and recognizing his brothers, acts as a stranger towards them by speaking to them harshly. The Torah then again tells us that Yosef recognized his brothers, perhaps telling us, as some of the commentators explain, that he now recognized each one of them separately. However, we are told, they did not recognize him. We are then told, "And Yosef remembered the dreams that he dreamed about them, and he said to them, "You are spies!" (Bereishis 42:9). What is the connection between the two parts of this verse? How does Yosef's accusation that the brothers are spies relate to the fact that he remembered his dreams? Ramban explains that Yosef recalled that according to his dreams, his entire family was supposed to bow down to him, and that had not yet happened. Therefore, he used the accusation of spying as a way of bringing Binyomin and Ya'akov down to Egypt, so that the dreams would be realized in full. This does not explain, however, why Yosef specifically used the accusation of spying to accomplish this goal, rather than some other ruse. Why, then, did he use this form of accusation? Although one could simply answer that this was the simplest, most effective option available to Yosef, under the circumstances, to achieve his goals, there seems to be, beneath the surface, another motivation that was directing his actions.


Rabbeinu Ya'akov ben Asher, in his commentary Ba'al HaTurim, writes that Yosef was actually alluding to the incident of the spies that occurred in the time of Moshe, when the men sent out by Moshe to scout the land came back with an evil report and were able to convince the nation that they would not be able to conquer the land. Yosef, says the Ba'al HaTurim, was saying to the brothers that he would have no part in that incident, since Yehoshua bin Nun would descend from him, and Yehoshua, though he was one of those who was sent to scout the land, came back with a good report. The response of the brothers to the accusation, that they were not spies, was according to the Ba'al HaTurim, voiced by Yehudah, from who descended Caleiv ben Yephuneh, who was the other scout who came back with a favorable report. Rabbi Hillel Lieberman, Hy"d, in his posthumously published Ahavas HaAretz, does not mention the comment of the Ba'al HaTurim, but notes that in the teachings of the great kabbalist, Rav Yitzchok Luria, known as the Ari, we find the notion that Yosef was alluding to the incident in the time of Moshe. Rabbi Lieberman then goes on to interpret the entire conversation between Yosef and his brothers concerning the accusation in a way that reflects this allusion. This notion is also developed in the writings of another Ari, my friend Rabbi Ari D. Kahn, in his Meoray Ha'Aish to parshas Shelach 5762 (available at aish.com). I would like to offer a more limited explanation of this allusion, focusing on the verse we cited above, in which Yosef first makes his accusation.

As we have seen, the verse says that Yosef remembered the dreams he had dreamed, and then told the brothers that they were spies. Actually, however, a literal translation of the first half of the verse yields, "And Yosef remembered the dreams he had dreamed for them." Rabbi David Kimche, known as the Radak, explains this to mean that Yosef's dreams were actually for the benefit of his brothers, although they did not recognize this, and repaid him for his good intentions with bad. Yosef dreamed of supplying his family with sustenance at a time of need, while the brothers viewed the dreams as a wish on Yosef's part to rule over them. The message of the dreams was that a time would come when the family would be in need of sustenance, and Yosef, in the leadership position which he would then have in Egypt, would have the opportunity to supply them with their needs. What seemed to them as something bad, then, was really good. In fact, this was exactly the mistake that the scouts sent by Moshe made. As they surveyed the holy land, they noticed that local people were constantly dying. In light of this, they came back and told the people that it was a land that 'devoured its inhabitants' (Bamidbar 13:32). The midrash, however, says that these people died so that those who remained would constantly be busy with burials during the time that the men sent by Moshe were traversing the land. In that way, their presence would not be noticed, and no suspicions of their being scouts would arise. I believe that was the underlying kernel in Yosef's story that indicates an allusion to the incident of the spies in the time of Moshe.

The Talmud (Berochos 5a) tells us that Eretz Yisroel is one of the three 'good gifts' that God has given to the Jewish people that can only be acquired through suffering, or afflictions. One way to understand this statement is that if a gift comes to someone too easily, it is not really a good gift, because he does not appreciate it sufficiently. Only when one has undergone some form of suffering in the process of acquiring something does he have a sense of its importance. However, we can also explain this Talmudic statement to mean that since Eretz Yisroel is the place where God exercises His special divine providence, we need to understand that, ultimately, whatever we must go through to acquire the land is, ultimately, meant for the good. The entire process of Ya'akov's family coming down to Egypt appeared, at first, to involve much that was bad, but, as Yosef told his brothers at the end, "You meant to harm me, but God meant it for the good" (Bereishis 50:19). Yosef knew, from his prophetic dreams, that the entire process was part of the exile that would lead to redemption, culminating in the entrance of the nation into Eretz Yisroel. This process was guided by divine providence throughout. Any suffering that was endured by the nation was, thus, ultimately for its benefit, and, in retrospect, educated the nation to appreciate God's special providence in Eretz Yisroel. The supreme importance of Eretz Yisroel, in fact, is that it is, in a sense, the seat of the divine presence in this world, as Rabbi Yehudah HaLevi so beautifully expresses in his poems to Zion. Yosef understood that the process leading to the acquisition of that land was totally guided by divine providence, and was thus all done for the benefit of the nation. His brothers did not appreciate this fact as the process was unfolding, and, therefore, Yosef's accusation that they were spies in Egypt evoked, as a subtext, an allusion to events that would occur hundreds of years in the future.



Please address all correspondence to the author (Rabbi Hoffman) with the following address - JoshHoff @ AOL.com.

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