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Getting to Hug

Shalom, Shalom v’ein Shalom.

“And you shall go up to your father in peace”. With those words Yosef concluded last week’s parashah. Everything looked hopeless. After having sworn their innocence on the life of the purported thief, the brothers were horrified to see the goblet emerge from Binyamin’s sack. They were drags back to Egypt, presumably to witness the execution of their father’s last precious son from his beloved wife, Rachel. Yehuda seeks to avert this worst of all outcomes by pledging the servitude of all the brothers in exchange for commuting the death sentence of Binyamin. The viceroy, however, is not interested in multiplying his servants, but in justice. On the surface, then, everything works out fine – he will spare the life of the goblet thief, allowing him to remain his servant, while all the other brothers are free to go. Yehuda has made his plea, and this is the verdict: so let it be written, so let it be done!!

Of course, peace is the last thing Yehuda and his brothers will find should they return to Ya’acov without Binyamin. Ya’acov will die of a broken heart, most likely on the spot, Yehudah will have effectively written himself out of any future in the here or the hereafter by bring down upon himself his own curse – “should I not restore him to you…I will have sinned against you forever”. It is difficult to see how his life could continue under such circumstances, much less how the Avrahamic enterprise could continue.

Vayigash Yehudah – Yehudah approaches. The root nun-gimel-shin seems most frequently to convey a sense of approaching the unapproachable. Whether Oz or Sauron, great foreboding precedes approaching one whose power seems limitless, whose will is capricious, and who holds the key to any conceivable future. How does one approach such a one?

Rashi says that Yehudah was angry; his approach was bold and threatening. He was cowed neither by the station of viceroy nor by his demeanor; he insisted that the viceroy was in the wrong, was acting by whim, that despite the undeniable facts, this was all some kind of subterfuge.

Ramban says that, driven by desperation and realizing who held all the cards, Yehuda was obsequious; trying to play upon whatever smidgen of sympathy there might be in this cold-hearted Egyptian. He recounts previous events well-know to the viceroy, in a manner that repeated seeks to tug at his sense of compassion.

Perhaps we don’t need to choose between the interpretations. Perhaps Yehudah stepped forward out of the vortex of emotions that must have enveloped him, humbled by his awareness of how his own original actions against a brother had spun things so far out of control, dead-set that he would make things whole this time, angry at the manipulative power-broker who stood in the way, yet all to cognizant of the need to avoid a single word uttered in Egyptian to the guards. He had to swiftly insert the blade of truth and compassion into the opening presented by his bold stepping forward toward the unknown.

“They try to heal the brokenness of my people all to easily, promising “peace, peace”, when there is no peace”. Jeremiah uses these words in two places to decry attempts of powerful and supposedly wise leaders to smooth over problems whose roots are so much deeper than they can admit to themselves, much less to the people.

You go up to your father in peace, says the viceroy.

No, says Yehuda, as he defies the all-powerful all-but-ruler with each step forward. I will be bold and I will be humble, I will be angry and I will be prudent, but I will be real.

That’s how brothers come to re-embrace

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