Vayigash 5784 Dec 22

Have you ever found yourself in a moment where the world around you stops and what you believed was a truth, is not? In this week’s Torah portion, after Joseph reveals himself to his brothers and they return to tell their father Jacob that Joseph is still alive, the Torah tells us that “Jacob’s heart went numb, for he did not believe them.” (Genesis 45:26.)

One commentary, Sforno, suggests that what surprised Jacob was not just that his son Joseph was alive, but that the brothers had mentioned Joseph’s name.  We must assume then, that after the brothers reported to their father, Jacob, that Joseph had been mauled to death by a wild animal, Joseph’s name was never mentioned again in the household. No one mentioned his name, so as not to bring further pain to their father. Or perhaps might it be that no one mentioned his name out of a sense of guilt for their lie that they had told to their father.

Sforno suggests that at the moment Joseph’s name was mentioned and that he was alive, Jacob’s heart stopped beating, in the sense that he had no desire to be fooled by his sons once again. He didn’t want to believe what most likely was, once again, a falsehood. He couldn’t take the chance of being deceived by his sons. Perhaps that might have been the reason why each time throughout the narrative, Joseph provides his brothers with proof that what they were saying should be believed. In the first instance, when they returned from Egypt with sacks full of grain, the money that they paid for the wheat was returned to them. When they came to tell Jacob that Joseph was alive, they came with fancy clothes and with wagons and other items that had to be provided by one who controlled Egypt.

Sforno suggests that “the spirit has a habit of contracting when one suffers worry, etc., whereas it expands when one experiences joy, sometimes even beyond the boundaries of one’s body so that the body faints.” For Jacob, this moment occurred when he recognized that the words of his sons were truthful. 

Some of us have actually experienced the same, such as when something in our lives changes, as when we might have heard from a medical professional that we are now in remission, or the lab tests came back and everything is back to normal. It happens occasionally during a marriage proposal or when someone presents you a gift that you were not expecting or when someone is surprised by an honor or a complement that might be least expected. At that time, our heart might skip a beat or even go faint from the joy.

And then there are the moments when one’s heart contracts, as Sforno states, when one suffers and worries. Imagine, for the three elder Israeli hostage families, how they must have felt to see, in this week’s video from the terrorist group Hamas, that their loved ones were still among the living? Romana Strochlitz Primus is one of those whose loved one was one of the three. The pain of seeing a loved one having to beg for his life, yet at the same time seeing that he was still alive, brought some hope.  It is as Sforno comments regarding Jacob, both the contraction of the heart and its expansion, both at the same time. Just as Jacob was able to see his son once again, we pray for Romana’s cousin and all the hostages that they may be reunited soon with their families.

Bex Stern-Rosenblatt is a teacher this year at the Fuchsberg Center, Conservative Yeshiva in Jerusalem. She provides us with another truth in explanation of life. “Jacob finally learns that he has not in fact lost Joseph. This could be a moment of jubilation. This could be the revival of Jacob, the happy, long-imagined, hardly thought to be possible reunion. But it is not. Jacob has been broken by unbearable pain. Even upon learning the cause of the pain is gone, even knowing that Joseph is still alive, all Jacob can think of is death.

In the moment that he hears the news, Jacob’s heart stops. Some think he faints, some think he suffers a heart attack. He has been so consumed by grief that when he learns that there is no cause for grief, there is nothing left in him that can celebrate. He needs a restart, a reawakening, in order to be able to leave his grief behind. Even so, he still thinks only of death. Jacob has been pushed to the point of breaking. He cannot change; he cannot heal. It is fitting then that we are B’nei Yisrael, descendants of Jacob. We know unbearable grief. But our kings come from Judah. We aspire to follow Judah’s example, to rise up from grief and choose life.”

Shabbat shalom.

Rabbi K