Vayigash: Greenhorns

 

This week's parsha deals with the decision not to live in the Promised Land. For the past two years, Jacob and his family have needed to come to Egypt, with its vast grain stores (thanks to Joseph) for life sustaining provisions. The Canaan earth was not supporting them, they had to move and trade to avoid starvation.  

The actual move to Egypt is based upon Joseph's insistence. Joseph informed Pharaoh that his family was in Canaan, a famished area dependent upon the silos of Egypt.  A caravan  was sent to help migrate the family to the Egyptian borderland: Goshen. Goshen derives from the same root as title word of the parsha, Vayigash, it means approach. The name of the place registers ambivalence. They are not really going to Egypt, they  are going to a place nearby, approaching Egypt. Perhaps they have qualms about living in Egypt proper. Perhaps Joseph does not want them in his new home, just nearby. 

The brothers, and what they reveal about Joseph's origins is not entirely comfortable. He feels that he must prep his brothers before the brothers are presented to Pharaoh. He tells them to bend the truth, present themselves as cowboys, not shepherds. The Egyptians have an aversion to shepherds. If they are cattlemen, they will blend into the society, they will assimilate and prosper.  

וְהָיָ֕ה כִּֽי־יִקְרָ֥א לָכֶ֖ם פַּרְעֹ֑ה וְאָמַ֖ר מַה־מַּעֲשֵׂיכֶֽם׃ 

So when Pharaoh summons you and asks, ‘What is your occupation?’

וַאֲמַרְתֶּ֗ם אַנְשֵׁ֨י מִקְנֶ֜ה הָי֤וּ עֲבָדֶ֙יךָ֙ מִנְּעוּרֵ֣ינוּ וְעַד־עַ֔תָּה גַּם־אֲנַ֖חְנוּ גַּם־אֲבֹתֵ֑ינוּ בַּעֲב֗וּר תֵּשְׁבוּ֙ בְּאֶ֣רֶץ גֹּ֔שֶׁן כִּֽי־תוֹעֲבַ֥ת מִצְרַ֖יִם כׇּל־רֹ֥עֵה צֹֽאן׃ 

you shall answer, ‘Your servants have been breeders of livestock from the start until now, both we and our fathers’—so that you may stay in the region of Goshen. For all shepherds are abhorrent to Egyptians.”

Joseph instructs his brothers to utter statements that will facilitate their integration into Egyptian society.  For some (possibly long) time, his family will be in Egypt. Bending the truth in this way, presenting themselves by their secondary occupation first, will help them integrate. Joseph's dream will again be fulfilled. 

The brothers announce that they are shepherds, like their ancestors. 

וַיֹּ֧אמֶר פַּרְעֹ֛ה אֶל־אֶחָ֖יו מַה־מַּעֲשֵׂיכֶ֑ם וַיֹּאמְר֣וּ אֶל־פַּרְעֹ֗ה רֹעֵ֥ה צֹאן֙ עֲבָדֶ֔יךָ גַּם־אֲנַ֖חְנוּ גַּם־אֲבוֹתֵֽינוּ׃ 

Pharaoh said to his brothers, “What is your occupation?” They answered Pharaoh, “We your servants are shepherds, as were also our fathers.

They will not make this compromise with the truth. Perhaps they do not want to assimilate. Their view of Egypt is a temporary sojourn, until conditions allow return to Canaan. 

This conflict between the newcomers and the assimilated plays out over the generations. When my parents came to America, the more assimilated American cousins tried to teach them how to be American: the right phrases and gestures. My parents were lost. Europe would not support them anymore. The world of their childhood was a dreamlike legend to their American host-peers. Jokes in Yiddish recalled the filth and outhouses. Yiddish was now reserved for witticisms; otherwise, it was to be forgotten along with the traditions it recalled.

Settled immigrants and newer immigrants are in a  dance. Those who came earlier sacrificed their pasts and endured the hardships of pioneers. They were forced to adapt and found appealing aspects in the new ways. Those who prospered were  in a position to host their kin, sometimes rescuing their relatives from imprisonment and adversity. Along with the welcome came a mixture of advice and dominance. The acclimatized, now naturalized citizens, want to keep the wealth and power they have acquired at a price that might be magnified by memory. The newcomers dredge up the old jokes and resentments about the origins of this "other" people. They remind the assimilated of things they may have lost. 

My parents tried to become American, but there were limits to how much they could change .  . American non-kosher food was too foreign, they never lost their accents.  I could feel the embarrassment of the more Americanized relatives. It combined with the subtle messages from television ( from cartoons to the  Molly Goldberg show) to feed  my own embarrassment at the accented, unsophisticated language and ways of the greenhorns. They could never become cowboys, not even people who appreciated cowboys. It is only now that I see how intelligently they selected from the menu of possible Americanisms, along with the clever rejections. Those choices are most of what I am. 

I married an Americainer, a woman whose roots in the uppermost corner of the West coast, the most American place in America, stretch back to its colonization by Europeans, five generations. Her parents spoke perfect English, no Yiddish. But the spark of the memory of the abandoned traditions was re-awakened in her. She was sent to Jewish school, exposed to our history in a favorable light. She grew to love it.  Now our children have it, in their own, hybrid, ways.

The traditions are modified by the environment. The traditions color how we see the ambient culture and how we try to change it.

 

 

Miketz: dreams come true

The parsha ends with the discovery of  the planted chalice.  Joseph's complaint is not that an object that has great value on the open market has been stolen. His complaint is: 

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר לָהֶם֙ יוֹסֵ֔ף מָֽה־הַמַּעֲשֶׂ֥ה הַזֶּ֖ה אֲשֶׁ֣ר עֲשִׂיתֶ֑ם הֲל֣וֹא יְדַעְתֶּ֔ם כִּֽי־נַחֵ֧שׁ יְנַחֵ֛שׁ אִ֖ישׁ אֲשֶׁ֥ר כָּמֹֽנִי׃ 

Joseph said to them, “What is this deed that you have done? Do you not know that a man like me practices divination?”

The object he used for looking into the future had been taken. 

We know this is a ruse. We heard Joseph set it up.  He told his chief servant to plant the chalice in Benjamin's food sack  Benjamin did not steal anything, he was framed and we know it.  I hear the  story of Benjamin's mother stealing Lavan's crystal ball in the background; an appeal to a family tradition 

But did Joseph mean it when he implied that he uses this chalice for divination? Did Joseph indeed practice this idolatrous art? Or was the statement  part of the show? 

One meaning of divination involves foretelling the future.  It would seem to be an activity that is on the spectrum from probabilistic  reasoning about future outcomes to  intuition and dreams.  It echoes the start of the story the Joseph's dreams of dominance. Were these "prophetic" dreams divinations? As the parsha ends, the dreams  come true:  Joseph dreamed that all 11 of his brothers, represented as stalks of wheat, would  bow to him,. Now they do exactly that: 

וַיָּבֹ֨א יְהוּדָ֤ה וְאֶחָיו֙ בֵּ֣יתָה יוֹסֵ֔ף וְה֖וּא עוֹדֶ֣נּוּ שָׁ֑ם וַיִּפְּל֥וּ לְפָנָ֖יו אָֽרְצָה׃

When Judah and his brothers reentered the house of Joseph, who was still there, they threw themselves on the ground before him.

The wheat in young Joseph's dream is apt.  Food security is the issue that drives the subservience. 

Circumstances - Joseph's ascent to viceroy of Egypt, the famine - allowed the plot to play out. But Joseph assured that the dream would be fulfilled in detail. He arranged to have his brothers captured with the chalice in the bag of Benjamin. They are brought back to the home of viceroy, Tzafnas Paneach, nee Joseph, in a state of terror and guilt.  The first thing they do is show obeisance to the powerful accuser. They all bow to Joseph.  The dream comes true.

 There is no mention of the collateral damage: the prolongation of Jacob's suffering. Joseph could have ended it years earlier had he sent a message back home. He did not. The bothers are, of course, primarily to blame. The story would have unfolded differently had the brothers told their father the truth. It would have expiated a part of the guilt, it would have helped with the ongoing suffering.

Joseph fulfills that great meta-fantasy, he makes  dreams come true.

The parsha opens with Pharaoh awakening from his dream of seven scrawny cows eating seven beefy cows; and seven withered ears of grain eating seven robust ears. Joseph's interpretation leads to his ascent. I have considered the possibility that  Joseph's forecast actually contributed, or caused, his interpretation of Pharaoh's dream to come true. Joseph predicted years of plenty, when grain would need to be stored  to provide for the upcoming  years of  famine. This motivated increased production.  The increased production lowered prices, leading to more production to maintain income at the lower price. The land was farmed without mercy.  After seven years it was depleted.  Production fell. The famine begins. 

Was Pharaoh aware of this cause and effect aspect Joseph's vision ( within his own vision)? He gave dominion over 20% of the national output to this foreigner, plucked from prison.  Did he really do it based on the interpretation of some dreams? Perhaps he saw a way to consolidate his power, to change the nature of his rule.  He would move from power based upon might and enforcement to become the feudal lord, the owner of his subjects and their land. That was the dream.  Joseph made it come true, in detail. 

Chanukah  celebrates the Hasmonean dream of political and religious independence. The Hasmoneans  were also upstarts who seized power and made their dream come true.. for a while. That is how dreams are: possibly true  for a while. 

Even when circumstances are favorable, dreams come true only with great effort. 

Vayeshev :Why are dreams prophetic? 

Speech, including the way we express ideas to ourselves, is  a  highly edited product. The path from the motive to the action goes through  numerous filters.  Some are conscious, others can be realized on reflection; (probably) most are obscure. Dreams have a different set of editors, maybe some of the proofreaders are asleep. Seeing thoughts and motivations in this divergent form is revealing.  The personal reality of the dreamer is told as a novel instead of a news article; there are embellishments and revelations. 

Joseph is designated as the legacy of Jacob. This is a shocking statement of favoritism. That selection is reflected in  his appointment as  supervisor of  his brothers. In his dream Joseph imagines himself the monarch to whom all his siblings - and even his parents- bow to. Is this not just another, novelistic, version of his  reality? Did not  the other brothers have similar dreams of dominance? 

Certainly Reuben wanted to lead the family. He was the first born... if you count the children of Leah ( the wife that was married accidently). When the subsequently-born brothers plot to kill Joseph, Reuben convinces them to throw him into a pit and secretly plots to return and rescue the Joseph.  Reuben would thereby gain the graces of his father Jacob … and betray his other brothers. But his plot dissolves and his road to the ascendancy of his dreams comes to naught.  Reuben expresses his anguish when Joseph is gone, revealing his duplicitous ambition. Is this the origin of the separation of the tribes with Reuben and Gad in trans-Jordan when the states are apportioned? 

Judah is the master of negotiation. He convinces the brothers to sell Joseph, rather than kill him. Selling your brother is a heinous crime, and, in Torah law, a capital offence, but the outcome is a living Joseph. Selling Joseph seems to cancel his dream.  Joseph will be a slave until he dies from overwork. Joseph's ascent through talent and Divine intervention is a model; it is a legacy of Jacob. Judah, who is the forbearer of the kings of Israel, will negotiate again with Joseph.  Then Judah will sell himself  into slavery to rescue Benjamin. 

The contrast between Joseph and Judah is staged. Judah leaves this family -  brothers that will kill one another, betray each other, sell a sibling.  He befriends an Adulamite and marries a local. Two sons die, the second, Onan, dies by Divine decree because  he will not sire a child who will not  have his full loyalty. His child, with the widow of his brother, will carry some part of the spirit of his dead brother; and Onan will not have that. The widow, Tamar, will not be left out of this genealogy. She  demeans herself, risks her life, plays the prostitute, to bear Judean offspring. Judah, as the stiffing John  contrasts with Joseph avoiding the advances of his master's wife. 

Joseph needs to go to prison. It makes the story better ( and every story has a dreamlike quality). He goes from a  pit to a pit within a pit. His clever interpretation of dreams, three days before the pharaoh's birthday [when the Pharaoh reviews his ministers' actions], establishes his power to see ( or make) reality from dreams.  The ascent of the [confident] wine steward and the beheading of the [terrified] baker create a lasting impression upon the survivor that is not erased, despite his efforts. 

Truth comes in many disguises. The alt-edited dream benefits from a clever interpreter. 

Vayishlach: Renaming

 Jacob is renamed Israel ...twice. The name sticks.. to an extent. Unlike Abraham and Sarah, the text often reverts to Jacob. Who are these people: Jacob and Israel? 

Jacob is the child that held onto the heel of his firstborn brother Esau. His defeat, and his determination to continue,  in the intra-uterine battle for ascendency is reflected in this pursuit until the end. His name comes from עֲקֹ֤ב akeiv, hold back the other. When Esau realizes that he was tricked out of his father's blessing, he calls Jacob's act : vayaakveini, 

וַיֹּ֡אמֶר הֲכִי֩ קָרָ֨א שְׁמ֜וֹ יַעֲקֹ֗ב וַֽיַּעְקְבֵ֙נִי֙ זֶ֣ה פַעֲמַ֔יִם אֶת־בְּכֹרָתִ֣י לָקָ֔ח וְהִנֵּ֥ה עַתָּ֖ה לָקַ֣ח בִּרְכָתִ֑י וַיֹּאמַ֕ר הֲלֹא־אָצַ֥לְתָּ לִּ֖י בְּרָכָֽה׃ 

[Esau] said, “Was he, then, named Jacob that he might supplant^*supplant Heb. ‘aqab, connected with “Jacob.” me these two times? First he took away my birthright and now he has taken away my blessing!” And he added, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”

Jews continue to call themselves the children of Jacob, the progeny of the deceiver. 

Jacob is terrified. He must confront the brother who believes that he was deceived and holds a murderous grudge against him. He splits his household into two camps ( he sends half his people from Europe to America, along with a hearty delegation to British [nee Ottoman] Palestine) so that one contingent may flee while the other is destroyed. He prepares an elaborate gift, a bribe to which he devotes a large proportion of his wealth, to be delivered in parts, to maximize the effect, and sends it to his now powerful ( hegemonic) brother (like the oligarchs and Putin). 

Terrified Jacob tries to sleep, but instead he wrestles with The Man, an unidentified entity( who refuses to give his name) with the power  of blessing. Jacob ends up lame. Is this ironic? Was that what he was trying to do when he held the heel of Esau? Is this a continuation of that same wrestling match?

The blessing is: Jacob is renamed Israel.  The usual  renaming formula is invoked: 

וַיֹּ֗אמֶר לֹ֤א יַעֲקֹב֙ יֵאָמֵ֥ר עוֹד֙ שִׁמְךָ֔ כִּ֖י אִם־יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל

Said he, “Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven^*striven Heb. saritha, connected with first part of “Israel.” with beings divine and human,^*beings divine and human Or “God (Elohim, connected with second part of ‘Israel’) and human beings.” and have prevailed.” 

This is a significant, slightly hidden blessing. Jacob/Israel is fearing a life or death battle.  The impact of self confidence cannot be underestimated. Jacob, whose name reflected ongoing exertion despite  frustration at birth, has grown into a mighty force that can successfully contend, even with Divine powers.  The name Israel changes the self image from an obstacle to a howitzer. 

The next verse calls him...Jacob. 

At the same time, as a result of the same wrestling match, Jacob is left lame; he is left pitiful, an enemy that is not worth fighting. Is this an aid to his old trickery?

Jacob 's daughter Dina is raped and abducted by his Hittite neighbors.  Jacob's second and third sons, Simon and Levi, avenge the violation by decimating the city, with some guile. Jacob is left terrified that the surrounding tribes will avenge the massacre, but the fear  of them, their self-confidence, saves the camp.  After some travel,  the Jacob  family return to the place of  dream Jacob had when  he exited Canaan, running from Esau. Gd names him... Israel. Confidence. 

[There is also a hint of matriarch Sarah in this name Israel. She was a model of endurance through great trials; and a strong force for the future of her progeny. ]

The first essay I wrote in Freshman English at Brooklyn college was about my names. On my birth certificate I was named Sheldon: the most American name my parents could think of ( having essentially no English, coming from DP camp 2 years prior).  I have lived with, and  perhaps up to, this nerd name, a name that has been rescued somewhat by the Bing Bang Theory television series [I may have seen half an episode]. I grew up called Shloime by my parents, my secret, real name.  A name of wisdom, power, wholeness and the shtetl.  A name like Israel. In my adolescence, Shloime  became the modern Hebrew Shlomo, what my wife and several  Jewish  friends call me. I am not yet Shlomo. I am trying to grow into that one. 

Vayetzeh: Borders

Yaakov leaves Be'er Sheva and travels toward Haran. Gd and Abraham had forbidden his father, Isaac, to leave the Promised Land.  Yaakov had to leave to allow his brother, a contender for the land, to chill from his murderous rage over Isaac's blessing. Yaakov returned to Haran, where Abraham's ancestors had assimilated,  integrated into the local customs. These were the people and practices that Abraham had rejected and moved away from. Yaakov would confront this past and, by necessity, participate in it. 

Yaakov came to a place and he went to sleep. Actually, Yaakov and the place had a confrontation.  וַיִּפְגַּ֨ע בַּמָּק֜וֹם , This word PheGA, in modern Hebrew, is the verb used to denote a terrorist  attack. Pigua has acquired a violent connotation. The second word Makom, meaning place, later  became an appellation of Gd, presumably implying omnipresence.  Yaakov was confronted by the Omnipresent. 

Gd often appears in dreams. At the chiastic  end of the parsha, just before the conscious  Yaakov is greeted by angels as he re-enters the Promised Land, Gd appears to Lavan, Yaakov's father-in-law, in a dream, to warn the pursuing, would be creditor, not harm Yaakov. 

When Yaakov awakes, he declares that Gd is in this place, and he did not know it. Is this a violation of Omnipresence? Is Gd in one place and not another?  A simple understanding would posit that Yaakov did not realize that, having traveled so far,  he was still in the Promised Holy Land. Yaakov recognizes the place as a gateway to Heaven. The Midrash identifies the location as Jerusalem. Jerusalem becomes a location of significance to Christianity  and Islam. The Abrahamic religions recognize it as a gateway.  

Yaakov continues his journey. He comes upon a covered well. Shepherds are socializing, not tending the  sheep, waiting for a quorum to lift the stone.  This is a place of rules, the rules do not favor productivity. It is a place where  workers are alienated from their tasks. Perhaps these are hired workers (wage slaves), perhaps they have inherited their fortunes and do not know how to care for their charges. 

As the story unfolds we learn more about the place that Abraham abandoned and Isaac could not visit. Yaakov agrees to work 7 years for Rachel, but the local custom demands that the elder sister, Leah, be married first. Deception for the sake of the tradition is permitted.  Marrying sisters: no problem. 

The economic theory  is revealed in the last argument between Yaakov and Lavan.  Yaakov alludes to the numerous times he was cheated.  His wages were changed 10 times, he was financially responsible  for losses in the herd; and the profits were maximized for the capitalist, Lavan.  Yaakov's labor was dangerous and exhausting. Lavan counters: the daughters are my daughters and the sheep belong to me and my sons!  Value is capital. Labor is not a consideration in value. 

The Jews. in their travels and travails were not unaffected by Yaakov's sojourn into this land of economic experiments. 

Credit to my daughter Elisheva for directing me to the place.  She belongs to herself.