From: Yeshivat Har Etzion Office <office@etzion.org.il>
To: yhe-parsha@etzion.org.il
Date: Thu, 13 Dec 2001 10:01:19 +0200
Subject: PARSHA62 -10: Parashat Miketz
YESHIVAT HAR ETZION
ISRAEL KOSCHITZKY VIRTUAL BEIT MIDRASH (VBM)
*********************************************************
PARASHAT MIKETZ
Of Bags and Brothers
By Rav Chanoch Waxman
I
At the inn, on the way back from Egypt, one of the
brothers found a surprise in his sack: he still had his
money.
And when one of them opened his sack to give feed to
his donkey at the lodging place, he saw his money,
for behold, it was in the mouth of the bag. And he
said to his brothers: "My money has been returned!
Behold it is here in my bag!" And their hearts
failed them. (42:27-28)
The brothers are confused and bewildered. They do not
understand how the money they paid for food has magically
made its way back to the sack. In the normal way of
things, the sack contains either grain or cash - never
both.
While the brothers possess no clue as to the
mysterious movement of their money, we the readers
possess a bit more information. We know quite well how
the money got back to the bag. Before sending the
brothers back to Canaan, Yosef had commanded his men not
only to "fill their sacks with grain" and "give them
provisions for the journey," but also to "return each
man's money to his sack" (42:25). In sum, Yosef has
ordered it.
But this only shifts the confusion to another plane.
Unlike the brothers, we understand the spatial and
temporal placement of the money. We can trace the causal
path that leads to its location. But we still don't
really understand. We might know the how, but not the
why. We might know the physics, but we don't know the
psychology. Why has Yosef ordered that the money be
returned? In other words, what is his motivation, the
real cause of the money's location?
Part of the challenge of reading Parashat Miketz
stems from the need to engage in a task that sometimes
feels like a Rorschach test. The Torah presents us with
Yosef, a character engaged in a clearly deliberate plan
of action. At the same time, we are given almost no
explicit information regarding the inner side of things,
the reason for his behavior. Inevitably, we attempt to
fill in the missing information, projecting into the text
what Yosef must be feeling and thinking.
This is not necessarily a bad thing. Part of the
excitement of reading the narrative portions of the Bible
stems from this invitation to explore the inner world of
the characters. Yet it is an invitation we must accept
with caution, recognizing that we no longer operate in
the relatively clear and crisp realm of texts and events.
We have shifted to another realm, a multi-faceted, multi-
layered and murky space, a world of shifting and
sometimes conflicting impulses. With this in mind, let us
turn to trying to work through the layers of Yosef's
heart and mind. Why indeed did he put the money in the
bag?
II
Let us revisit Yosef's command to his servants and,
for a moment, adopt the perspective of those who filled
the sacks.
And Yosef gave orders to fill their sacks with
grain, and to return each man's money to his sack,
and to give them provisions for the journey; and so
it was performed. (42:25)
Undoubtedly, the executors of the task considered the
return of the money another example of their master's
largesse. Despite his suspicion that the men from Canaan
are spies, their master has provided the men with the
food they wished to purchase. Moreover, he has also given
them additional provisions for the journey. Finally, he
has contrived to render all of this as a gift. He has
charged them nothing. Their master is truly a merciful
man.
Abarbanel maintains that this external perspective,
the understanding of Yosef's men, constitutes the correct
reading of Yosef's motivation. He acts out of concern,
kindness and mercy. Although he must move ahead with his
mysterious plan and he must imprison Shimon (42:24), he
wishes to show kindness whenever possible. In a time of
famine, cash is crucial. Perhaps his brothers don't have
any more money. Perhaps it may take time to procure more
cash. Either way, it is Yosef's concern for his family's
finances that motivates his return of their money.
Various aspects of the text may well support this
interpretation. Right before Yosef's command to fill the
sacks, the Torah reports that Yosef cries (42:24). The
crying comes in response to Yosef's overhearing of his
brothers' stricken conscience, their confession of guilt
for ignoring their brother's (i.e. his) pleading for
mercy, and their attribution of their current plight to
the events of twenty years past (42:21-23). The crying
signals his renewed attachment to his brothers (see
41:51). He cares and is pained by what he is about to do.
In line with this caring theme, and desperate to soften
the blow of imprisoning Shimon, Yosef gives them back
their money.
Finally, we may note another important marker in the
story. The story of the money (42:18-28) begins with
Yosef's freeing his brothers from three days in prison.
Yosef presents a proposal to his brothers:
Do this and you shall live, for I fear God. If you
are honest men, let one of you brothers be held in
detention, and the rest of you may go and take food
to your starving households. And your youngest
brother bring to me. and you will not die. (42:18-
19)
The Egyptian viceroy declares that he fears God. In
consequence, he proposes a test and compromise. He
suggests a way to provide life and avoid death.
The fear of God is a familiar concept in Avraham's
family. Upon being confronted by Avimelekh and asked why
he claimed that Sarah was his sister, Avraham responded,
"I thought, surely there is no fear of God in this place
and they will kill me for my wife" (20:11). In turn,
Avimelekh, wishing to prove Avraham wrong, invites him to
stay in his land and gives him lavish gifts (20:15-16).
In the tradition of Avraham, a lack of fear of God means
a lack of hospitality, abuse of a powerless guest and the
possibility of death. Fear of God means the opposite:
acts of kindness, the granting of gifts and life.
When the "Egyptian viceroy" tells the brothers that
he fears God, he presents a front. He must explain to
them why he has freed them from prison and what has
become of his accusations. At the same time, perhaps
something else is going on. Behind the mask, the vizier
identifies with the tradition of Avraham, and with his
brothers standing in front of him, weak, powerless and
facing the specter of death. He must help them. The least
he can do is give them back their money.
III
Shifting over to the brothe interpretation of the
return of their money puts a radically different spin on
Yosef's actions. After reporting the brothers' shock, the
Torah tell us, "They trembled and said one to another:
What is this that God has done to us?" (42:28). They do
not view the finding of some spare cash in the bag of one
of the brothers as a good turn of luck. Consequently,
when they return home and report to Ya'akov, they in fact
omit any mention of the find (42:29-34). But they cannot
keep things secret for long. Immediately after their
report, they unpack their bags.
And it was as they emptied their sacks and behold,
every man's bundle of money was in his sack, and
when both they and their father saw the bundles of
money, they were afraid. (42:35)
Once again, the brothers tremble with fear. For some
reason or another the money spooks them. Its presence
portends something bad. But what are they afraid of? Is
it just a general anxiety, a natural fear of the
unexpected?
In fact, the brothers are possessed by a very
particular fear. Later on, upon returning to Egypt, they
are whisked to the house of Yosef. They immediately
conclude that it is "because of the money that we have
been brought here" (43:18). It is all a plot to find "a
pretext against us, fall upon us and take us for slaves"
(43:18). From the brothers' perspective, the viceroy
engages in a vicious game. First he accused them of
spying and imprisoned them unjustly for three days (42:9-
17). Unable to justify his accusations, he has feigned
"fear of God" and set them free, offering a seemingly
reasonable compromise. But all of this is just on the
surface. In fact, he has guaranteed their return by
keeping one brother imprisoned and simultaneously planted
evidence of theft. He intends to accuse them of robbery
upon their return and turn all of them into slaves.
While this may seem slightly paranoid, the brothers
have good reason to be concerned about slavery.
Throughout their ordeal, they continuously attribute
their difficulties not to the evil of the Egyptian, but
rather to God and their actions of twenty years past. As
pointed out previously, upon finding the money in the
sack, the brothers promptly ask, "What is this that God
has done to us?" (42:28). They are concerned with divine
motivation, rather than human machinations.
As mentioned above, upon being offered the deal by
Yosef that subtly involves leaving a brother behind
(42:19), the brothers quickly hark back in time.
And they said one man to his brother: "Alas, we are
guilty concerning our brother, that we saw the
anguish of his soul when he pleaded with us and we
did not heed him, therefore this distress has come
upon us." (42:21)
While the brothers prefer to talk about Yosef's pleading
for mercy and their cruelty, Reuven, who had opposed
acting against Yosef, refers to a far darker act. In
responding to his brothers, Reuven claims, "Now his blood
his sought" (42:22). In his eyes, they are responsible
for Yosef's death and guilty of "murder."
Of course, the brothers, and we the readers, well
know they have perpetrated the crimes of kidnapping and
enslaving (37:23-28). In fact, some chance exists that
they even know that the caravan of merchants to which
they sold Yosef was headed for Egypt. No wonder they are
concerned about being unjustly kidnapped and turned into
Egyptian slaves. They are concerned with divine
retribution for their sin, measure-for-measure
punishment.
Perhaps this second perspective, the brothers' read
of the situation, constitutes the key to understanding
Yosef's motivation throughout the story. Back in the old
days, Yosef reported on his brothers to his father. He
revealed things the brothers would rather have concealed
and they hated him for it (37:2, 8, Rashi 37:8). No doubt
Yosef considered his spying justified and proper. But now
the shoe is on the other foot. The brothers stand accused
of spying (42:9-14).
Back in the old days, the brothers imprisoned Yosef
in a pit (37:24) and eventually caused him to spend
somewhere between two and thirteen years in an Egyptian
jail (37:2, 41:1, 46, see 39:1-20). Now, here in Egypt,
they are given a taste of prison. They all spend three
days in jail, while Shimon, as group representative,
receives a longer sentence (42:17, 19, 24). Finally, by
putting the money back in the sacks, Yosef forces the
brothers to contemplate the fate they imposed upon him.
It is now they who face the prospect of unjust
enslavement.
Assuming that Yosef, in putting the money in the
bags, acts out of the desire to force upon his brothers
this matrix of suffering, fear and contemplation, only
gets us part of the way. We still must interpret. Is this
just vengeance? Maybe. Or perhaps this is a strange kind
of reverse empathy, in which he wishes to make them feel
what he has felt, the crushing despair, anguish and anger
of the unjustly accused and imprisoned. They now feel his
pain. Or maybe, Yosef feels it is his job to punish them,
to help them achieve atonement by structuring some kind
of measure-for-measure punishment. In a bizarre
psychological and theological twist, he provides them
with some suffering, in order to propitiate divine anger
and thereby "help them" (Abarbanel).
IV
The various intuitions and insights into Yosef's
inner world can be thought of as separate and distinct.
Alternatively, we can view these various motivations as
co-existing within the inner space of Yosef's heart and
mind. None seems sufficient without at least some part of
another. Either way, even all this is insufficient to
fully explain Yosef's placement of money in his brothers'
bags.
Yosef returns his brothers their money not once, but
twice in Parashat Miketz. Near the end of the parasha,
Yosef orders his head servant to place Yosef's silver cup
in Binyamin's sack (44:2). He intends to ensnare
Binyamin. In addition, he once again orders the placing
of the money paid for grain into the sacks of Binyamin
and his brothers. We should expect the motivation of the
two cases to be similar, if not identical.
In this light, the second planting of money seems
almost inexplicable. The planting of the cup alone is
already sufficient cause for the enslavement of Binyamin
and sufficient reason for the brothers to offer
themselves as slaves (44:9-10). Moreover, the money in
the bags plays no role in the actual accusations against
Binyamin and the brothers' offer of group enslavement
(44:12-17).
Moving away from a measure-for-measure theory of
motivation and back to a pure kindness theory doesn't
help explain this action. Even if Yosef wishes to make
sure that the brothers are still financially solvent upon
returning to Canaan, why place money in the bag of
Binyamin (44:2)? He seems to intend keeping Binyamin in
Egypt. Once again, what is Yosef thinking?
Perhaps the answer to the riddle of the money, both
the second time around and even the first time around,
lies in a third perspective present in the parasha. Let
us take a look not at the perspective of Yosef's
servants, nor at the perspective of the brothers, but
rather at the point of view of Ya'akov.
As mentioned previously, upon returning back to
Canaan after their first trip, the brothers deliver their
report. They tell the tale of spying accusations and
report the deal offered by "the man," requiring them to
bring Binyamin in order to prove their honesty (42:30-
34). Then they empty their bags, apparently in Ya'akov's
sight, revealing the money lying beneath. Like the
brothers, Ya'akov is afraid (42:35). While the guilt-
stricken brothers fear divine retribution and
enslavement, Ya'akov fears something altogether
different. Upon seeing the money, Ya'akov critiques his
sons and expresses his fear.
.You have bereaved me many times: Yosef is no more
and Shimon is no more and now you will take Binyamin
away; all these things have come upon me. (42:36)
Ya'akov fears losing Binyamin, the only remnant of
his beloved Rachel and favorite Yosef. A few verses
later, Ya'akov reformulates this in even sharper fashion.
After Reuven's offer of his sons as hostages for the
safety of Binyamin, Ya'akov emphatically states, "My son
will not go down you, for his brother is dead and he
alone is left" (42:38). Ya'akov talks as if he has no
other sons. Binyamin is "my son," the only one left, and
apparently the only real son, defined as such by the
death of Yosef.
Binyamin now plays the role previously played by
Yosef. Just as Yosef had always remained by his father's
side (37:12-13), now Binyamin is his father's constant
companion. While the other brothers went to Egypt to buy
food, Binyamin, termed by the Torah "the brother of
Yosef," stayed home with his father (42:4). But what does
this have to do with the money? Why does Ya'akov voice
his refusal, his fear and his focus on Binyamin in
response to the cash?
At first glance, the answer seems simple. The
presence of the money in the sacks is strange; it strikes
the finders as portending something bad. In response,
Ya'akov gives voice to a fear that has accompanied him
ever since Yosef's disappearance and presumed death.
Perhaps something will happen to Binyamin, perhaps an
"accident will befall him on the way" (42:38).
Alternatively, on some level Ya'akov's fear revolves
around something more specific than an ill-defined fear
of disaster. He in fact makes no mention of the
possibility of accident when first refusing to send
Binyamin. Instead, he refers to "taking" Binyamin
(42:36). Commenting on this verse, Rashi (42:36) states:
...this teaches that he suspected that perhaps they
would kill him or sell him as they did to Yosef.
According to Rashi, Ya'akov not only suspects that the
brothers had killed or sold Yosef, but also that they now
plot to do the same to Binyamin.
While this may seem a bit extreme, the context of
the brothers' report does support part of Rashi's claim.
The brothers have returned from their mission partially
successful. They have returned with sacks of grain. The
downside is that in order to dispel the spying charges,
the Egyptian viceroy has demanded to see Binyamin. On the
logical plane, he has given goods (the grain) and demands
"seeing" Binyamin as payment. This is precisely the
meaning of the money still being in the bag. The grain
has not been purchased by legal tender. Binyamin
constitutes the real price that must be paid.
Seeing the money strikes Ya'akov like a hammer blow.
He is confronted with a trade, not just Binyamin for the
release of Shimon, but Binyamin for the grain, Binyamin
for survival itself. It is this implicit placing of
Binyamin on the trading block that triggers Ya'akov's
fears.
This theme, drawn from Ya'akov's perspective, from
his conscious or subconscious fears, appears implicitly
again a bit later on. When the brothers leave for Egypt,
Ya'akov orders them to "take in their hands," along with
an offering, two distinct objects: the money and their
brother. And so they do.
.And they took double money in their hand, and
Binyamin; and they rose up, and went down to Egypt
and stood before Yosef. (43:15)
But which is the real price they must pay, the money or
their brother?
Finally, the issue of the sale of Binyamin surfaces
one last time at the very end of the parasha. While the
brothers are perfectly willing to endure group slavery,
Yosef has something else in mind. He wants only Binyamin.
The rest of the brothers can go home, with all their
grain, with Shimon and with all their money. He
implicitly offers them the chance to sell Binyamin, the
other child of Rachel, into Egyptian slavery, just as
they once had sold him into Egyptian slavery. He offers
them a test, a chance either to repeat or to repent.
If so, we have arrived at an additional explanation
for Yosef's placing of the money in his brothers' bags.
By conjoining the giving of the money and the grain with
the demand for Binyamin, Yosef recreates for his brothers
a piece of their joint personal history. While this re-
creation theme is more blatantly present the second time
around, it is already present the first time around.
Piece by piece, Yosef recreates the past, subtly building
to a fateful moment. He tests his brothers, probes them,
arouses their conscience, seeks their repentance and
works for reconciliation.
In sum, we can add a third motif to the inner world
of Yosef and the package of motivations for placing the
money in the bag. Yosef is animated not just by sincere
caring and kindness, not just by the creation of measure-
for-measure suffering for his brothers, and not just by
any possible mix of the two. In addition, he is animated
by a genuine desire for reconciliation with his brothers.
Consequently, he creates for them an echo of twenty years
past, an opportunity to know their hearts, a test through
which to elicit their repentance and truly reconcile.
These are the causes of the money being in the bag.
V
Before closing, I would like to make a final point
about motivation. Most discussions of Yosef's motivations
in Parashat Miketz concentrate on different issues than
those discussed above. For example, in exploring the
issue of Yosef's motivation, Ramban points to the dreams.
Building upon Yosef's remembering of his dreams upon
seeing his brothers (42:9), Ramban argues that Yosef
works throughout the story to have all eleven brothers,
rather than just ten, bow down to him. This is why he
must arrange to bring Binyamin to Egypt. By implication,
the next step would have been to realize the next dream,
the dream of the sun, moon and stars, symbolic of
brothers and parents (37:9-10). On this account, Yosef's
motivation might be thought of as metaphysical: he is
chained to his dreams and his interpretation of future
history.
In recent years a competing theory has surged in
popularity. On this account, Yosef views himself as an
expelled brother, akin to Yishmael or Esav. Yosef's
immediate recollection of the dreams in response to his
brothers' bowing down to him indicates Yosef's
recognition that the dreams have come as true as they
ever will. He had misinterpreted the dreams as a brash
youth. He was never destined to be King of Israel. He,
and by implication the sons of Rachel, were destined for
Egypt, for a destiny of an altogether different kind than
the blessings of Avraham. Consequently, he works
throughout the story to bring Binyamin to him. He too
must be sent away. Once again, Yosef is chained to
metaphysics, his interpretation of future history and his
vision of destiny.
On either account, the story of Yosef's actions in
Parashiot Miketz and Vayigash constitutes a tale of the
tension between Yosef's commitment to history and destiny
on the one hand, and his humanity, his mercy for his
brothers, and his desire for reconciliation on the other.
In this line of thought, Yosef's eventual self-revelation
to his brothers constitutes almost a failure on his part,
a point in time where he can no longer stick to his plan,
where his humanity overwhelms his vision of destiny.
The reading of Parashat Miketz offered above
comprises a radical alternative account of Yosef's
attitude to dreams, history, metaphysics and destiny.
Quite possibly, they never concern him. Remembering the
dreams is not Yosef's first reaction upon finding his
brothers before him. Rather, we are told not once, but
twice that Yosef "recognized his brothers" (42:7-8). They
are his brothers, with all that the fact implies. Then he
remembers the dreams, literally, "the dreams that he
dreamed to them" (42:9). He remembers his commitment to
his destiny, his own arrogance, his insensitivity to his
brothers' feelings and all the tortured path of their
twisted relationship. It is this new "interpretation" of
dreams and dreaming, that sometimes commitment to destiny
as opposed to humanity can be an error, that leads to
Yosef's actions in Parashat Miketz. Throughout the story,
in a reversal of the Yosef of Parashat Vayeshev, he
operates on the human and moral planes alone. He is
concerned for his brothers and for their relationship,
not for his dreams, nor his destiny.
YESHIVAT HAR ETZION
ISRAEL KOSCHITZKY VIRTUAL BEIT MIDRASH
ALON SHEVUT, GUSH ETZION 90433
Copyright (c) 2001 Yeshivat Har Etzion.
All rights reserved.
****************************************************************