Reflections from Rabbi Ellis

Miketz is the twelve Parsha in the Torah. The name means at the end, but the Parsha starts and ends squarely in the middle of the story of Yosef and his brothers. Last week Yosef was kidnapped, sold as a slave in Egypt, accused of attempted rape, imprisoned and while in prison he correctly interpreted the dreams of two of Pharaoh’s servants. This week he interprets the dream of Pharaoh, becomes viceroy, manages Egypt through a famine, meets his brothers and frames Benyamin, his youngest brother, for grand larceny. Still the story is not over yet and if you want to know how this story ends you have to come back next week.

If this week’s Parsha is not the end of the Yosef saga, why then does the name indicate that it is? The word Ketz has special relevance in the Torah, the end it is talking about is cosmic and whenever the term is used in scripture my ears perk up. The times of the Moshiach are called Ketz Hayamim, end of days. As such I understand from its name that this week's Parsha holds within it hints for us about these coming times.

Thus far the relationships that we have seen between brothers have been those of competition, abuse and just short of murder. Cain killed Hevel, Yitzhak was abused by Yismael, Yakov and Esav fought for their position in the family even before birth and last week Yosef narrowly avoided death at his brother's hands.

Competition is a natural fact of the world we live in. In a world of limited resources every individual must compete in order to procure the necessities for survival. The result is that while we develop particular skills and abilities, we often leave our greatest skill undeveloped. Rambam teaches that in the time of the Moshiach competition will disappear along with war and poverty.

In our Parsha when trouble befalls the sons of Yakov rather than appointing blame and ostracizing one of the brothers the sons of Yakov search their souls for sin and then strengthen each other. This builds throughout the Parsha until at the end each of the brothers offers themselves in place of their youngest brother Benyamin. Whereas last week the sons of Leah were calling the sons of Zilpah and Bilah slaves, this week all of them together offered to take the place of the one remaining son of Sarah.

The Midrash relates that the sun and moon were created as equals; the moon approached G-d and pointed out that this was a problem. How can two kings wear one crown? G-d agreed with the moon and so diminished it making the moon a mere reflection of the sun. In the time to come however the rift between the sun and moon will be healed.

After 22 generations of family strife and 22 years of their father Yakov’s suffering the brothers of Yosef learn the lesson. As long as each one is competing with the other, none will know success. Only by working together can they deliver themselves, save their family and complete their destiny. When the brothers offer their lives in place of Benyamin, they finally start a new paradigm for the relationship between brothers and all people. The end that is referred to in the title of this week’s Parsha, is the end of strife between brothers.

Shabbat Shalom!