THE SAFETY LINE
This week’s Parsha, Vayigash, opens at the climax of the drama playing out between Yosef and Yehudah. In last week’s Parsha Benyomin was implicated in stealing Yosef’s goblet for which Yosef committed Benyomin to be his slave. The Parsha ended in the middle of a dialogue between Yehudah and Yosef in which Yehudah offered to serve as a slave instead of Benyomin and to allow Benyomin to go home to his father. Yosef, however, would not budge. He insisted that Benyomin serve as his slave and Yehudah return home. Our Parsha begins with the continuation of that dialogue as Yehudah tries to shake Yosef’s decision. The Torah’s opening verse states “And Yehudah approached him…” We must ask, Yehudah was already standing before Yosef and was already engaged in speaking with him, what is the intent of this additional “approach”?
The Ohr Hachaim Hakadosh suggests that Yehudah realized at this point that the only way to change this officer’s decision was to come close to him. Not the physical closeness as in closer proximity, but to an emotional closeness. As difficult as it was for Yehudah to draw himself close to this Egyptian idol worshiper, he forced himself to open up and draw himself close on an emotional level to him. This strategy is based on the principle that if you can draw yourself close to another person you will be able to reach that person on a deeper level and bring them closer to seeing your position.
Perhaps this was the reason why Yosef could no longer hide the fact that he was Yosef. Yehudah had touched Yosef so deeply that he drew the brotherhood out from Yosef. Perhaps this is the intent of the verse in last week’s Parsha “and Yosef recognized his brothers but they did not recognize him”. The pain that one experiences when they are not recognized by their brothers covers over the brotherhood. Now that Yehudah reached out to Yosef, albeit in an attempt to sway his decision, Yosef felt the recognition and the brother-hood flowed forth. He was no longer able to hold back from his brothers.
There are many Jews who feel foreign to their own people in spite of their awareness that they are Jewish. The reason for this is that they have never had the opportunity to meet their people. There are often misconceptions about what we are all about. They have simply not recognized their Jewishness. However, once they encounter someone who recognizes their Jewishness and draws themselves near to them, a flame of awareness flares up. This flame can express itself in the most beautiful ways.
This is exactly what happened just a few weeks ago when I received a call from a young woman, Jennifer, from Manhattan. Jennifer and Josh are a fine Jewish couple who have two beautiful children and have nothing at all to do with the Jewish community. Jennifer’s 97 year old grandmother, Blanche, a Holocaust survivor, fell ill and lost the part of her memory that knows English. Her aides, who did not know Yiddish or Russian were suddenly helpless. Naturally, Jennifer panicked; who was going to care for Grandma? When an acquaintance of Jennifer who is a member of the Jewish community heard her dilemma she immediately made a few calls which led her to Rabbi Gavriel Horan who heads the RAJE program here in Baltimore. He, in turn, suggested that Jennifer call me since I work with the Russian speaking Jewish community. In a matter of these several phone calls Jennifer was being helped by Alex Berezin who runs a home care service with Russian speaking caregivers and Grandma was in good hands. I also had a chance to visit Blanche. Jennifer was overwhelmed by the outpouring of help and concern shown to her by her own people, none of whom she knew outside of the first contact.
I received a text from Jennifer accompanied with a picture of her Shabbat table with challah and candles on it. “Thanks to all you wonderful people. I will do my first Shabbat ever with my two little kids tonight. Thanks to you and to all the wonderful people (who I never met) who helped Grandma for reminding me it is wonderful to be part of a Jewish community. Shabbat Shalom”
How fortunate we are! No matter how far the distance between us and our people is, there is always a safety line available to draw ourselves back in. We need only to show others where that line is.
Have a very safe and very wonderful Shabbos.
Paysach Diskind