|
Parashat Vayehi
Essays and Articles:
|
Joseph’s
Brothers
Joseph / Jacob Truth and Judgment
Versus Truth and Love Or Love’s Power Neutralizes Brute Force Jacob Turns Quantity Into Quality
Translated from Hebrew by S. NAthan l'ilui nishmat Esther bat mordechai
“Simon and Levi…tools of robbery are their weapons…Cursed is their rage for it is fierce, and their fury for it is harsh. I shall divide them…I shall scatter them among Israel.”
Rashi: “I shall separate them from each other, so that Levi will not be counted among the tribes, and thus they are effectively divided. Another interpretation: You will not find poor people, or scribes, or teachers of little children who are not from [the tribe of] Simon, so that they will be scattered; and the tribe of Levi - [Jacob] had him roaming from granary to granary for the Levite gifts and tithes, thus giving him his state of dispersion in an honorable way.”
Jacob blesses Joseph and Joseph's children before blessing the remaining tribes. Jacob appears here to be continuing his preference for Joseph over his brothers, and in no way retracting his previous position of preference, as shown by the striped coat, despite all the entanglements and hazards that were caused to his preferred son by this show of preference.
It begs – “darsheni” – explanation. It is overly simplistic to attempt to explain Jacob’s attitude with the excuse that he actually never knew and never discovered the truth, that to the end of his days, he remained ignorant of the fact that Joseph had been sold by his brothers, and therefore never realized the danger of preferring one child over the other children.
It appears that a deeper secret lies hidden here – for it is not only the preference for Joseph that continues. Jacob continues in the same vein with Joseph's children, preferring Ephraim to Menashe the first-born, thus repeating the maneuver he himself had employed in order to acquire the blessing of the firstborn from his father, despite his being younger than Esau.
Jacob stands on his convictions, despite Joseph’s attempt to correct his father and to change the positioning of his children under his father’s hands.
Jacob prefers to bequeath to his children – not the blessings, not the key to blessing which he himself received from his fathers Abraham and Isaac, for these he passes on to Joseph alone.
To the rest of his children he bequeaths a profound insight into their own character, a sharply discerning view, and a definition of the original quality that is unique to each one of them, that sets each one apart from the others. He also conveys the message to them – that unity is more important than uniquenesss.
Why is Jacob doing this? Jacob is preparing his children for a long, harsh exile, which could cause the blurring and erasing of each one's unique image. The overall character of this exile will be one of brute force, which will blur individual uniqueness.
Joseph is the only one who knows the true secret of love.
“I have given you one shechem over your brothers – and this I took from the hand of the Emorite, bekashti, with my sword and my bow.” I have turned instrumental, brute force into quality, “through my prayer and supplication.” (Bekashti, my bow, = bakashati, my supplication.)
Also, Jacob wishes his children to know that the blessings do not possess a merely instrumental, utilitarian value. Rather, and chiefly, they reflect the person receiving them, far more than they reflect the person giving them. Furthermore, if the giver of the blessings would bless someone unworthy of them, they would bring that person no benefit.
It appears that this principle is in itself sufficient to explain Jacob’s priority over Esau in receiving Isaac’s blessings. Chronological order, which reflects a quantitative/instrumental perspective, does not determine the quality of each child. Menashe the first-born reflects a quantitative order of things. He is the first of… Whereas Ephraim reflects quality.
Thus Simon and Levi have yet to shake off the plague of brute force, and therefore Jacob seeks a cure that will turn their quantity – brute force – into quality.
Brute force is created by unity among individuals. Quality is created by the uniqueness of each individual. Therefore, one must divide and conquer. “I shall divide them among Jacob, I shall scatter them among Israel.”
After Joseph’s death, the Children of Israel in Egypt began to trade quality for quantity: “And Yosef, and all that generation, died, and the children of Israel multiplied and spawned and increased very very much.”
Only the tribe of Levi did not merge with them, thus preserving its own quality, and constituting an example to all the other tribes, whose uniqueness had blurred, to become just the children of Israel, as a result of a blurring and obscuring enslavement.
Only someone who has not been devoured by a brute-force framework (military service?) is capable of preserving his own unique quality – his own style of clothing, his own language, his own name. Only such a person can avoid assimilation (promiscuity).
Systemic Failure: The instrumental dimension is created under conditions of quantitative pressure. When the individual is devoured by the mob. As a substitute for relating to the individual, to the individual's uniqueness, unique needs, and human sensitivity – the system comes instead, the mechanism. This is true not only at the level of practical bureaucratic application, but even in the realm of education.
The situation in Israel today: Conditions of pressure - in military security, economics, immigration, etc. The systems and mechanisms intensify, increase and proliferate, becoming substitutes for individual doing and being. Entertainment and culture have lost their quality, becoming a function of popularity and “ratings.” Our leaders and governors are supplied by the system of military security. A “Sabra” past replaces personal quality, even controlling intellectual endeavor. (The Department for the Investigation of Antiquities is a perfect example.)
|
|