5771 פרשת מקץ

 In this week’s Parsha the Torah describes to us how the brothers of Yosef went down to Egypt due to the famine that had come to Eretz Yisroel. When they went to purchase the food by Yosef, he claimed that they were spies and told them that in order to prove to him that they were not spies they would have to bring their youngest brother Binyamin to Yosef. In the meantime Yosef kept Shimon as a prisoner in Egypt.

 When the brothers came back to their father Yaakov and told him what occurred to them in Egypt and how the viceroy in Egypt not believing them took their brother Shimon as a prisoner and told them that they can only get him back if they bring their youngest brother Binyamin to Egypt to prove their claims that they were not spies. Yaakov responded to them that you caused me to be bereaved, Yosef is not here and Shimon is not here and now you want to take Binyamin all of you are on me.

 The Siforno explains what Yaakov said to his sons with the words “all of you are on me”. He was telling them that since none of these things occurred to your children and only mine it means that without doubt the cause of all the problems are your infighting with one another.

 If we look at the Siforno a little more closely we can ask the following question. After Yosef was sold, the brothers did have some regret for their actions against Yosef and there was no apparent infighting among the rest of the brothers, so why would Yaakov think that the brother’s infighting was the cause of all the problems they were having.

 The answer could be that we don’t appreciate just how far the ramifications that infighting and machlokes reach. Even though Yaakov knew that there was no machlokes at this time between the brothers, nevertheless he knew that the previous machlokes with Yosef could have such lingering effects to cause such tremendous tzaros to Yaakov and his children.

 We can learn from here how carefully a person must be to avoid any sort of Machlokes. Machlokes does not only impact the people involved at that time but it can even have impacts for years after the original machlokes ended and could even impact people who were not even involved in the original machlokes but were connected to the people who were originally involved as Yaakov thought could have been the cause for Binyamin to have to go to Egypt even though he was certainly not the least bit involved in the original machlokes.

פרשת מקץ5768  

In this week’s Parsha the Torah tells us how during the period of the hunger when there was no food in Eretz Yisroel, Yaakov told his sons to go to Mitzrayim to buy food. The Torah continues to describe how Yosef recognized his brothers and treated them as spies. In the end Yosef sent the brothers back without Shimon and not only filled their sacks with food returned the money that they gave him to buy the food. Yosef also told the brothers that if they wanted to come down again and buy more food and get Shimon back they would have to bring down their youngest brother Binyamin. After being back in Eretz Yisroel and having their food supplies dwindle Yaakov agreed to send Binyamin down with his brothers to Yosef so they could buy more food and hopefully get Shimon released. The Torah describes to us the following list of things that Yaakov told the brothers to do to prepare to go down to Mitzrayim: 

1. Prepare a present to take to Yosef.
2. Take new money to use to purchase more food.
3. Take the money from the first purchase that the Egyptians returned to you.
4. Take Binyamin with you
5. Yaakov davened to God for their success.

 If we go through the list, all of them would seem to be prudent actions to take to help them achieve their purpose. Bringing a gift to Yosef is a way of removing anger just like Yaakov did when he sent the gift to Eisav. Taking money to buy the food shows that they are honest people and not spies which would be the same reason why they should return the original money that Yosef gave them back. Bringing Binyamin is an obvious requirement for without him they would not even be able to see Yosef and davening is what we always do in a time of Tzaros.

 However, the Rabbeinu Bechai when he brings down the list of five things, gives a different reason why Yaakov told the brothers to return the original money to Yosef which is that Yaakov wanted to make a Kiddush Hashem. Yaakov wasn’t at all afraid of the repercussions of not returning the money; he only wanted to create a Kiddush Hashem.

 We see an incredible idea from this Rabbeinu Bechai. Yaakov was in the middle of preparing his sons for the meeting that had the potential to lead to tragedy. As the Torah tells us, Yaakov put together a whole plan of action as well as praying to God to achieve the desired results. However, in the middle of all this, Yaakov had the wherewithal to think about the potential Kiddush Hashem the brothers could make by returning the money. Yaakov wasn’t afraid that by not returning the money, it could lead to tragedy rather the opportunity to make a Kiddush Hashem was there. He felt so strongly its importance that it took precedence in his thought process.

 We see an important lesson from here which is no matter what situation we are in we must always be aware of how we can make a Kiddush Hashem. Even if the actions we need to do in and of themselves are Kiddush Hashem neutral, sometimes there may be peripheral actions that we can take at the same time that can create a Kiddush Hashem. If we can focus on always trying to create a Kiddush Hashem we should merit seeing the greatest Kiddush Hashem with the coming of Mashiach. 

חנוכה/פרשת מקץ 5767

 This coming Shabbos is also Shabbos Chanukah, so let us discuss Al Hanissim, Chanukah, and Parshas Miketz.

 Let us ask the following 3 questions:

1. We all know the famous question of the Beis Yosef where he asks why do we celebrate 8 days of Chanukah since they had enough oil for the first day we should only celebrate 7 days?
2. We know that if a particular Parsha consistently comes out by the same Yom Tov, there is inherently a connection between the Parsha and the Yom Tov. Parshas Mikeitz always comes out on Chanukah what is the connection between the Parsha and Chanukah?
3. In Al Hanissim we say the following:

You gave over the strong in the hands of the weak and the many in the hands of the few. You gave over the impure in the hands of the pure and the Reshaim in the hands of the Tzadikim and the evil ones in the hands of those that are involved in Torah. 

The first half on this line is logical as it discusses the נס of a few lightly armed men beating a whole army, but the second half where it says that God gave the Reshaim into the hands of the Tzadikim that would be what you would expect. If Bnei Yisroel  were also Reshaim they probably would not have merited the military victory, so why do we bother saying it in Al Hanissim?

 The answer to all these questions is connected. First of all, to answer the first question about why we celebrate 8 days I once heard quoted in the name of Rav Moshe Feinstein Zt”l who said that the miracle of the first day is that oil burns. What he was saying is that we have to appreciate that everything that happens in this world is a direct result of the fact that God makes it work that way. Even things that look to be part of nature is constantly being run by God .

 We see a similar idea in the Nefesh Hachayin when he explains how we understand the concept of Hamakom. He explains that if it weren’t for the fact that God constantly being involved in the nature of the world, the world would disappear.

 This is in fact what we say every day in Birchas Krias Shema when we say:

 God renews the creation every day constantly.

The idea of ”constantly” is that of the Nefesh Hachayim, that without the hand of God involved every second of the day the world would not exist.

 Now let us take this idea and try to answer our other questions. If we say that a central idea of the holiday of Chanukah is to understand that everything that happens in the world only comes about through the hand of God, let us see if this concept is seen in Parshas Mikeitz.

We see this concept several times during the Parsha and it is the overriding theme of the Parsha. We see it as the brothers are put through the ringer byYosef they consistently say that this is all from God. Let us see just one example of this at the end of the Parsha in after the Egyptians found the cup of Yosef in the bag of Binyamin and the brothers were brought in front of Yosef, Yehudah said the following:

 What can we say to our master and how can we acquit ourselves as God has found the sin of your servants.

 Here we see the recognition of the Shevatim that nothing happens by chance, everything is from God. This is but one of several times in the Parsha where this theme is repeated.

 Now let us try to answer our last question. Why in Al Hanisim do we bother mentioning the fact that God caused the Reshaim to be destroyed by the Tzadikim, isn’t that obvious that God would not perform miracles for us if they were Reshaim?

 The answer is based on a similar idea. If all we said in Al Hanissim was that God helped the small and weak nation destroy the large and mighty nation then people might start saying you know it wasn’t really a miracle, they were great tacticians and they knew how to fight guerilla warfare. For this reason, we specifically say that God  helped the Tzadikim beat the Reshaim so people would always realize that it wasn’t their military prowess that helped them win the war but rather it was the heavenly assistance they received because they were Tzadikim that enabled their victory.

 Again a repetition of the same theme we were discussing earlier. One of the lessons we should learn from Chanukah is the importance of seeing the hand of God in every aspect of our lives.

 If we can take this lesson and try to see the hand of God more in our lives and to see how much good God does for us, we will only grow in ourlove of God and merit the building of the Beis Hamikdash soon where we can truly see the miracles of God revealed on a daily basis.