Miqqez: Recognition & Rejection

By Rabbi Gil Nativ on December 7, 2007 - כ"ז כסלו תשס"ח

The Book of Genesis is a collection of stories about people and events from the Creation until the descent of Jacob and his family to Egypt. Other than genealogical continuity, the stories would not appear to be connected. But one motif appears again and again: opposition to the presumption of primogeniture (Deut. 21, 15-17), the presumption that the firstborn son is the natural successor, and is entitled to a greater share in his father’s estate.

From parashat Bereishith through parashat VaYehi, the elder son is generally less suited to carry on the family dynasty, and the younger son takes up the mantle of leadership. God prefers the sacrifice of the younger Abel to that of the firstborn Cain. Abraham is the eldest, but he leaves his father’s home, and the patrimony goes to Nahor. Abraham banishes his firstborn, Ishmael, in favor of the younger Isaac. Jacob obtains both his elder brother’s birthright and his blessing. Jacob favors his younger son Joseph, and pays for it with years of sorrow and suffering. At the end of Genesis, we find that he has not learned his lesson. When his grandsons Manasseh and Ephraim are brought to him, he crosses his hands, and lays his right hand upon the younger Ephraim and his left on the elder Manasseh, thus granting the birthright to the younger brother. Moreover, he grants his grandsons the status of sons (48:5-6), and thereby bequeaths the double portion of the firstborn to Joseph.

The story of Joseph and his brothers is the most complex among these stories of brothers. Joseph is a lad of seventeen when the tension between him and his brothers reaches its climax. How many years pass from his sale into slavery until he sees his brothers again? He was thirty when he first stood before Pharaoh (41:46), and thirty-seven at the end of the seven good years. So he must have been thirty-eight of thirty-nine years old when his brothers appeared before him. He recognizes them, but they do not recognize him (42:7-8). Had he aged so much in the twenty-one or twenty-two years that had passed? Recently, I had the opportunity to meet some of my high school classmates and old youth group friends. They had little difficulty recognizing me, despite the passage of nearly forty years. Yet Joseph’s brothers were unable to recognize their own brother after less time had passed!

Two explanations can be offered:

1. Joseph’s alienation was not just from his brothers, but also from his past. Like many assimilationists in Jewish history, Joseph began adapting to Egyptian society as a matter of necessity, in order to liberate himself from slavery and incarceration, but he continued the process enthusiastically, as we see from the reason he gives for naming his son Manasseh: “God has made me forget completely my hardship and my parental home” (41:51). Adopting an Egyptian name and marrying an Egyptian woman mark the pinnacle of the assimilationist dream. Not all who reach the highest echelons of foreign society and culture knowingly turn their backs on their past. Mordecai was identified as a “Jew” in the court of Ahasuerus. In his style and manner, Joseph, viceroy to the king of Egypt, was “more Egyptian than the Egyptians.”

2. The brothers did not remember what young Joseph looked like because when they lived together “they hated him so that they could not speak a friendly word to him” (37:4). In their hatred of Joseph, the brothers avoided looking at him. They recognized him from afar when he approached them in the field (37:18), not because of how he looked but rather because of his “coat of many colors.” The features of a loved one are etched in the mind, but not so the face of a person whose presence we avoid.

Joseph’s greatness in parashat Miketz is twofold:

1. His personal interests would best have been served by ignoring his brothers, so as not to endanger his successful integration into Egyptian society. He should have been delighted that his brothers did not recognize him, and he could have sent them away without risk that anyone in the royal court would discover that Zaphenath-paneah was the brother of “primitive” shepherds. Yet, he employs subterfuge to bring them closer to him.

2. Joseph’s conduct toward his brothers is not marked by revenge, but rather by a desire to bring them to a true realization of what they had done in selling him into slavery, and to cause at least one of them to offer to sacrifice his own liberty in order to save Benjamin from slavery.

Sibling rivalry is not a relic of the past. Families do not always survive intact. Life is full of surprises. Jacob goes to his grave harboring anger for his eldest sons, Reuben and Simeon (49:1-7), and he prefers their younger brother, the son of the loved wife. In many families, such favoritism would lead to destruction, but Jacob’s descendants preserve the framework and become one nation, and to no small extent, thanks to Joseph. There is much to be learned from Joseph’s wisdom: Good intentions will not suffice in achieving reconciliation. And reconciliation must be firmly established if it is to serve as the basis of a future bond.

Rabbis for Human Rights recommends that you read these articles in Miqqez

Miqqez: Recognition & Rejection - December 7th, 2007
Miqqez: It is not too late to renew and fulfill the promises of old - December 30th, 2005

Categories: Miqqez
Tags: Bo, conciliation, court, Features, human rights, ISM, order, palestinians, reconciliation, rest, settlers