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Parasha Vayigash/And He Came Near
by Rabbi Jack "Yaacov" Farber
The Scripture readings for the Shabbat of December 14/9 Tevet are: Bereshit/Genesis 44:18-47:27; Yechezkel/Ezekiel 37:15-28; Luke 6:9-16. . . . that your days may be long in the land Bereshit {44:18} Then Y'hudah (Judah) came near to him, and said, "Oh, my l-rd, please let your servant speak a word in my l-rd's ears, and don't let your anger burn against your servant; for you are even as Pharaoh. {44:19} My l-rd asked his servants, saying, 'Have you a 'ab (father), or a brother?' {44:20} We said to my l-rd, 'We have a 'ab, an old man, and a child of his old age, a little one; and his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his 'em (mother); and his 'ab loves him.' {44:21} You said to your servants, 'Bring him down to me, that I may set my eyes on him.' {44:22} We said to my l-rd, 'The boy can't leave his 'ab: for if he should leave his 'ab, his 'ab would die.' {44:23} You said to your servants, 'Unless your youngest brother comes down with you, you will see my face no more.' {44:24} It happened when we came up to your servant my 'ab, we told him the words of my l-rd. {44:25} Our 'ab said, 'Go again, buy us a little food.' {44:26} We said, 'We can't go down. If our youngest brother is with us, then will we go down: for we may not see the man's face, unless our youngest brother is with us.' {44:27} Your servant, my 'ab, said to us, 'You know that my wife bore me two sons: {44:28} and the one went out from me, and I said, "Surely he is torn in pieces;" and I haven't seen him since. {44:29} If you take this one also from me, and harm befalls him, you will bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to Sheol.' {44:30} Now therefore when I come to your servant my 'ab, and the boy is not with us; seeing that his life is bound up in the boy's life; {44:31} it will happen, when he sees that the boy is no more, that he will die. Your servants will bring down the gray hairs of your servant, our 'ab, with sorrow to Sheol. {44:32} For your servant became collateral for the boy to my 'ab, saying, 'If I don't bring him to you, then I will bear the blame to my 'ab forever.' {44:33} Now therefore, please let your servant stay instead of the boy, a bondservant to my l-rd; and let the boy go up with his brothers. {44:34} For how will I go up to my 'ab, if the boy isn't with me? Lest I see the evil that will come on my 'ab." I know I can spiritualize this passage (Sod) and in fact in the past I have. However if we just take these scriptures for their plain sense (Pashat), their plain meaning what we read happening here is very beautiful and very meaningful. Y'hudah is showing an honest and sincere concern for his father. Torah commands us to honour our father and mother: Shemot {20:12} "Honor your 'ab and your 'em, that your days may be long in the land which HaSHEM your G-D gives you. This is the fifth of the Ten Dibrot "Ten Words (Commandments)" and it is the only one that comes with a promise "... that your days may be long in the land." There are benefits to honouring your parents and teaching others to do so as well. It is the promise of a long life. Now the questions that often arise concerning this passage are: "How do I honour my father and my mother? Do I do it by helping them financially? Do I honour them by listening to them, by obeying them? How do I honour a father who abandoned me, or a mother who abused me, how can I honour them? The answers I believe, vary according to the circumstances. Y'hudah had what I would consider a normal father/ son relationship. He was honouring him, according to these scriptures, by taking his feelings into consideration, having compassion on him and concern for his well-being. The last thing he wanted was for some harm to come to his father on his account. What if you did or do not have a good relationship with your father or mother or both? What if you were abandoned, or abused? How do you honour your father or mother then? I can answer that by saying, if what occurred was in the past, you begin by forgiving them. There is no better way to honour a parent than to forgive. Forgiveness brings healing which allows you to now appreciate the good while forgiving the bad. It also releases you spiritually to pray sincerely for their well-being and salvation. That is honouring them. Whether or not you honour your father and mother by listening to them or by obeying them, depends on whether you are still living with them or not, and whether you are married or not. If you are living at home and are under the age of twenty-one I believe you need to not only listen but also obey your parents. If you are older than twenty-one and supporting yourself, while still living at home, I believe you need to listen to your parents by taking their advice into consideration before making a decision and then being able to justify the decision you made with sound logic and or biblical proof, but you are not necessarily obligated to obey everything they say. For a single person not living at home or if you are married, I believe the following would be honouring to parents. Listen to your parents, consider their advise, but the final decision is yours. It is not honouring to the L-rd for a married person to be influenced by their parents. Bereshit {2:24} Therefore shall a man leave his 'ab and his 'em, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. All of us need to honour our parents by having compassion and a sincere concern for them. This I believe should include financial assistance or whatever assistance may be necessary to the best of your ability and within the limits of reason for us to provide. In conclusion I would like to mention that honouring our parents is not an option it is a commandment. In addition the Hebrew word for honour used in the fifth Dibrot as referring to parents is the same Hebrew word used in reference to honouring G-d -- kabayd, e.g. Mishlei (Proverbs) 3.9.Rabbi Jack "Yaacov" Farber is the spiritual leader of Congregation Melech Yisrael in Toronto, Canada. Copyright 2002
- Romans 1:16, NIV |