Vayigash / The Wheel of Miracles
Vayigash / The Wheel of Miracles
Poetic notes on the parashat Vayigash*
God is not a designer of many wool garments
The resurrected
are all clothed in fine linen
God did not make
many skin garments for Adam
The secret of the tachash skins is private,
together with the secret of the High Priest's wool
The meaning is hidden,
like the meaning of Joseph's dreams
It is the lesson
that we were born to learn
The angel said to Abraham
"Do not slay the boy!"
The ram was concealed in the thicket
The daughter of Asher
comes to Israel when his heart is dying
He gave himself over to his death bed
There she finds him
There he is revived with the words,
"Joseph is alive!"
This occurred on the wheel of miracles
Its axis is wool
Its rim is linen
There are no spokes
There is nothing in between
but the hand of God
Before the miracle
of Joseph's heart breaking
and breaking and breaking
and healing Israel,
there spun another miracle from the wheel
When Judah was still becoming Judah,
he stood face to face with Joseph
and did not know him
Joseph was concealed in a Pharaoh’s cloak
and Judah considered him a man
who was the equal of Pharaoh,
a man obsessed with Benjamin
Was this obsession for evil, or for good?
Judah would find out
This viceroy had shown himself
both treacherous and considerate
One face was a lie that served the other
Which one would it prove to be?
Did the kind face serve the treacherous?
Or did a ruthless face serve a hidden kind one?
Like a lawyer before a jury seeking truth,
Judah would forcefully state the facts of the case
He would lay them out before the world
And allow the conscience
of this viceroy to explain
Judah said to the unknown Joseph:
“You are the equal of Pharaoh”
What was his message between the lines?
Equal for good,
or equal in evil
Its up to you to say
If you treat Benjamin well,
my words will justify you
God will do good to you and Pharaoh
and Egypt will be saved
If your intention toward Benjamin is evil,
my words will be your prosecutor
The God of my father, Jacob,
will dispose of your Pharaoh and all his power,
as he disposes of all in the world who are evil
Understand this well,
God did not chose to be the God of Israel
out of hatred for the world,
but out of His love for the world,
out His desire to save the world
through judgment
Thus it was that the son of Leah
rose up and spoke with truth like a sword
on behalf of the son of Rachel
Before Judah had entered
the arena with Joseph,
he had assessed the situation well
How inscrutable
the unknown Joseph was to him
How arbitrary and aggravating
was the behaviour of this viceroy of Pharaoh
Entering the combatant ring,
Judah had been immediately
pinned to the ground by his opponent,
like his father was pinned by his,
when the dawn approached
And like his father, Jacob,
Judah took hold of his opponent
and would not let him win
Unless he would turn from being an enemy,
and confess the truth of God and become a friend...
Judah knew the truth
He knew that Benjamin was not a thief
Judah knew that, with the truth,
the viceroy could bless them with an act of mercy
And it was simply for mercy that Judah pleaded,
that he might be a substitute for Benjamin
If it was only to dominate Israel
that Egypt wanted,
then Judah himself,
Israel's strongest, would become their servant
In this way, Judah would state the truth
about the viceroy's contradictory behaviour,
even though truth was harsh and threatening
to one who exercised power without it
And because he did this,
the wheel of miracles turned
It turned out that
while Judah was set to let
the conscience of the viceroy speak,
it was the conscience of Joseph’s brothers
that was about to explode with truth
and to expose all the truth before all the world
For Joseph wept
and his tears and Hashem's tears
certainly went down with Joseph
and his brothers into Egypt
and into the conscience of their hearts
and just as certainly raised their hearts up again
revealing for all to see
the reason for the contradictory acts
of the hidden Joseph
Then being lifted up by the kindness of his face,
the conscience of his brothers could speak,
For Joseph became strong and private with them
He became mysterious like the tachash skin,
mysterious like ram's wool
at the hub of the wheel of miracles
He sent all the world away from them
It was a family matter
He spoke quietly to them again, saying,
"I am your brother,
whom you sold into Egypt"
Jacob and Joseph cut their nails
and corrected and healed
and sealed everything with a tender touch
There would be no embarrassment in Israel,
even until the end of days
This is what Jacob did
by doubling and dividing Joseph
into Ephraim and Manasseh,
so that the gentiles would wait
and humbly pray
and would not lust to much
for the gate of prayer in Israel
being kept for them by Dinah,
her gate in the Temple of Jerusalem,
their inheritance in the glorious House of God
For in the day that HaShem speaks
and the heavens and earth hear the truth,
every soul will know rebuke
in a moment of the greatest kindness,
in the opening of the floodgates
of eternal knowledge and love
And our exile from God will be over
*Being a meditation on a Torah class on parashah Vayigash delivered by Rabbi Baitelman of ChaBaD Richmond, B.C., and on materials from the series, Torah Studies for this parashah, by Rohr Jewish Learning Institute. Neither Rabbi Baitelman nor the JLI have reviewed or approved of the content of this post.