Ari Levisohn: Welcome to Into the Verse, where we share new and unexpected insights about the parsha … diving deep into the verses to uncover the Torah’s own commentary on itself.

Hi, I’m Ari Levisohn. I love Parshat Vayigash. It has to be one of the most emotional scenes in the whole Torah. Joseph’s brothers are standing in front of him, not knowing who he really is. All they know is that this powerful Egyptian is threatening to keep Benjamin as his slave while the rest of them go back to Canaan. But Judah can’t let that happen! He promised their father to bring Benjamin safely home. So he tells Joseph the whole story of his conversation with Jacob, and how their father didn’t want to let Benjamin go to Egypt. And we all know what happens next: Judah's words are so moving that Joseph bursts into tears, and he reveals that he’s their long-lost brother, the one they sold as a slave.  

It gives me chills every time I read it. So how could any insights of ours add to this already compelling scene? Well, this week, Rabbi Fohrman and I share some brand-new research that changed the way we view this story. We uncovered a kind of story-behind-the-story that we never knew was there. We’re really excited to show you what we found. And we’re going to start by looking at another place in the Torah. 

Now, just to let you know: This other place in the Torah… you might expect that it’s also about Jacob and his sons. But, not only is it not in the Book of Genesis – it’s not even a story at all! It’s actually in Parshat Mishpatim, in the laws that talk about damages. I know that sounds like a really weird place to look for insight on Jacob’s family dynamics. But I think once you start listening, you’ll get swept up just the way Rabbi Fohrman and I did. Here’s our conversation.

Rabbi David Fohrman: Hey, welcome to Into the Verse. I am Rabbi David Fohrman, and I am here today with Ari Levisohn, one of our scholars here at Aleph Beta. Ari, it is great to hang out with you. 

Ari: How you doing?

Rabbi Fohrman: Ari came to me with some just mind-bending, fascinating research into some of the most heart-wrenching moments in our Parsha, Parshat Vayigash. And let me set it up Ari by  , kind of touching on an issue which I had always been struggling with for a number of years. I think the research that you have uncovered here, felt like it gave me a window into answering a question that I was always deeply puzzled with.

For those who have been around the block with me, they know that the Joseph story is one of my favorite stories. It's not just my favorite story. The Torah itself spends thirteen chapters on it, longer than any other story in the entire Book of Genesis. It is a story told in very, very fine and great detail, and we hear much about the feelings, emotions, and thoughts of all the various protagonists in the story. And yet it strikes me that there is one great mystery that at least me, as the reader of the story, was always very frustrated by it, and it's the issue of Jacob's favoritism of his kids, specifically the kids born to Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin.

The story kicks off with Jacob sort of maddeningly favoring Joseph, leading to this terrible crisis in the family where the brothers, you know, ultimately sell him off as a slave. Later on, the favoritism kind of extends itself with Jacob's unwillingness to part from Benjamin, Judah and the brothers come back, say that there’s this high Egyptian official. He really wants to see Benjamin. And the family’s starving, and still Jacob is not going to let Benjamin go. Even later on in this week's parsha, when Judah talks about this to this high Egyptian official, which is in fact his long-lost brother, but he doesn't know it – he's talking to Joseph, he doesn't understand that that's true – he says that, you know, we came back to our father, and he wouldn't let Benjamin go, because וְעָזַב אֶת-אָבִיו וָמֵת – if he would leave his father, then he would die (Genesis 44:22). And it's actually unclear who the “he” is. Does it mean that Benjamin would die? Does it mean that father would die?

But either way, it's kind of strange, right? The notion that here's Benjamin, this fully grown man by this time, and if he leaves his father he's going to die, or father is going to die. It seems like just a strange thing to say. So Jacob's behavior with Joseph and with Benjamin, you just want to reach back into the story and shake Jacob, like, “You can't just give Joseph that coat. You can't just love him to pieces and ignore what's happening in the rest of the family. What are you even doing?” 

And Ari, as a result of what you found, for the very first time I began to develop some sympathy for what was happening in Jacob's life, where he was coming from, in his treatment of Joseph and Benjamin. So kind of with no further ado, Ari, what I'd love to do is recreate this journey that you began to take me on, and we began to go to all sorts of interesting places. What was it that sort of got you thinking about this?

Ari: I was actually not looking at Parshat Vayigash at all. I actually happened to be looking at Parshat Mishpatim in Sefer Shemot. Parshat Mishpatim has this whole series of case law, all sorts of damages one person can cause to another, and this is one case that caught my eye as a kind of strange case.

Rabbi Fohrman: So this is the story of this fight between two men, apparently, and this unintended miscarriage. So maybe read the verses for us, and then and then we'll kind of go from there. Exodus 21 verse 22. So take it away.

Ari: Okay. וְכִי-יִנָּצוּ אֲנָשִׁים – So people, men, are fighting, וְנָגְפוּ אִשָּׁה הָרָה – they strike a pregnant woman. 

Rabbi Fohrman: It just happens to be there’s this pregnant woman standing next to these guys, and what happens when she gets hit?

Ari: וְיָצְאוּ יְלָדֶיהָ – So literally, her children leave her.

Rabbi Fohrman: Strange language for a miscarriage.

Ari: Right? And you know, we say miscarriage, but the truth is, it's actually kind of unclear whether it's a miscarriage or not. Perhaps that she actually gives birth successfully.

Rabbi Fohrman: Right, because וְיָצְאוּ יְלָדֶיהָ doesn't say that the kids were killed. It just says they left. not that they died. So the fate of these children are unknown. And Ari, one of the things you pointed out when we were learning is that there's a sort of inexplicable plural here. For some reason, the woman just happened to be carrying twins. Why is that so important?

Ari: Exactly. So now we have this woman who happens to get caught up in some fight which causes her to end her pregnancy early, not exactly clear what the fate of that is, but also she happens to be carrying twins. So what's going on here? It's an oddly specific case, with some ambiguity, too. 

But that ambiguity continues, because then it's going to break this case down into two different possibilities. Here's the first possibility, וְלֹא יִהְיֶה אָסוֹן – if there was no אָסוֹן. Now the word אָסוֹן is a hard word to translate. It's a hard word to translate because it's extremely rare. But it appears to describe some kind of harm, so let's translate it for now as a harm. So if there was no harm done, עָנוֹשׁ יֵעָנֵשׁ – so he will surely be punished. כַּאֲשֶׁר יָשִׁית עָלָיו בַּעַל  הָאִשָּׁה וְנָתַן בִּפְלִלִים.

Rabbi Fohrman: Right, there's very ambiguous language. He's going to be punished כַּאֲשֶׁר יָשִׁית עָלָיו בַּעַל  הָאִשָּׁה – as the husband places upon him, seemingly the one who caused the children to go out, וְנָתַן בִּפְלִלִים – and he places it before the court. So it's sort of unclear. How does the Talmud interpret that, Ari?

Ari: So the Talmud interprets that as, certainly it couldn't mean that the husband dictates the punishment, because that would make no logical sense, that he could just set whatever punishment he wants. So what it must mean is that when the husband takes the perpetrator to court, then he will pay according to whatever the court decides.

So all this is וְלֹא יִהְיֶה אָסוֹן – all this, is if there is no אָסוֹן – if there is no harm. 

וְאִם-אָסוֹן יִהְיֶה וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ

But if there is an אָסוֹן – so he gives a soul in place of a soul, at least, if you read it literally (22:23).

Rabbi Fohrman: What, seemingly, that means it's that it's a capital crime, and someone dies. The aggressor needs to die. But the Talmud, it again doesn't interpret that as capital punishment. It interprets that as if there's some other punishment, but it has the flavor of “one soul for another soul.” You pay a soul for a soul. Maybe it’s you pay for the money, the damages of what was lost.  

Ari: So we have this oddly specific case. There was the language of וְיָצְאוּ יְלָדֶיהָ – which is a strange word to describe a miscarriage. The fact that it's talking for some reason about multiple children. This אָסוֹן – we're not sure what it means. And this strange language of נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ – a soul in place of another soul.

Rabbi Fohrman: One of the things you said to me, Ari, when we were talking about it, is that it's too weird a case to be just, like, a made-up case law. Especially because case law is there to teach me a principle, and here there seems to be more than one principle at play.

 One principle might be that if somebody is in a fight with someone else and is trying to kill them, but in the end they kill someone else, right, hurt someone else, so what's the law in that case? So that's one possible thing that we're talking about.

But if so, you know, why did it have to be a pregnant woman that was struck? Why did she have to be carrying twins, right? You could have a less complicated case of two people who are fighting and hit someone else. And if the issue of pregnancy is important, so don't talk about two people who happen to be fighting and hurt this woman. Talk about somebody who just hit this woman, right? What's this fight between the two people doing? 

And that led you, Ari, to this very tantalizing conclusion. What was that? 

Ari: So here’s what I was thinking. Not only is the Torah describing this oddly specific case, but it’s also using unusual language like אָסוֹן. It just doesn’t seem like a standard example of case law. And I started to wonder: Could it be that this case actually reflects a story that happened somewhere else in the Torah? Like, if there was once an event that somehow relates to this case, then maybe the details of the case might come from that story. And that could explain why they’re so complicated. And if some of these weird expressions like אָסוֹן were in that original story, then it might explain what they’re doing here in Mishpatim.

Rabbi Fohrman: And that brought you straight to Parshat Vayigash. And the clue there is that strange word אָסוֹן – because it turns out that that word appears only one other time in the Torah, and the other time is in Parshat Vayigash. So there seems to be this little clue – what we call, in Aleph Beta parlance, a little corner piece of a puzzle – that seems to be saying: Look over there, there might be something in Vayigash which is interesting, because the only other time we have an אָסוֹן is in Parshat Vayigash. 

So where's the אָסוֹן in Parshat Vayigash?

Ari: So, as you mentioned before, Jacob really didn't want to let Benjamin go with the brothers back to Egypt. But eventually Judah convinces him. He personally guarantees  Benjamin’s safety. But Joseph is not done with his tricks. He frames Benjamin and he threatens to put Benjamin in prison, and that's where Parshat Vayigash picks up. And Judah, not wanting to return to Jacob without Benjamin, makes this impassioned speech. He retells the whole story of basically everything that's happened to them, including the part where they have to convince Jacob to let Benjamin come to Egypt, and where Jacob, um refuses again and again. And so this is Judah quoting Jacob talking about how he doesn't want to let Benjamin go.

He says: אַתֶּם יְדַעְתֶּם כִּי שְׁנַיִם יָלְדָה-לִּי אִשְׁתִּי – So you know very well that my wife – i.e. Rachel, my favorite wife – bore me two children. וַיֵּצֵא הָאֶחָד מֵאִתִּי – And one of them left me, i.e. Joseph, וָאֹמַר אַךְ טָרֹף טֹרָף – I said he was surely torn up, וְלֹא רְאִיתִיו עַד-הֵנָּה – and I have not seen him until now. וּלְקַחְתֶּם גַּם-אֶת-זֶה מֵעִם פָּנַי – And you're going to take Benjamin too, וְקָרָהוּ אָסוֹן – and here, here's this word אָסוֹן again – some harm will fall upon him, וְהוֹרַדְתֶּם אֶת-שֵׂיבָתִי בְּרָעָה שְׁאֹלָה – and you will bring me in sorrow to my grave (Genesis 44:27-29).

Rabbi Fohrman: So there's that word אָסוֹן. So generally, as suggestive as a connection like that is, it's only suggestive, right? You can't just go around saying, “Well, here's a word, there's a word, everywhere there's a word word,” right? 

It is interesting. There's only these two cases of אָסוֹן. But if you stop me right there and say: Fohrman, would you bet your house that the author of Parshat Mishpatim wants you to be thinking about Parshat Vayigash just because of that word אָסוֹן – you know, I'm not convinced. It could be, you know. If we had a red phone, we could call up to God, God would say, “Sure, you know that's exactly what I was thinking, totally. When you're reading Mishpatim, you should be thinking about Vayigash.” As crazy as that sounds. 

Maybe, but it could just easily be a coincidence. In order to suggest that it's not a coincidence, you sort of need more. Are there any other connections between the story that we're hearing about in Parshat Mishpatim – about this fight between two people, and then this pregnant woman and the children coming out – and the story of Judah in his speech to Joseph? Are there any other pieces of the puzzle here besides that single word אָסוֹן?

Ari: So let's just, you know, take a step back and think for a minute about what the word אָסוֹן is actually doing here in Vayigash. Who is it talking about?

Rabbi Fohrman: It's the loss of Benjamin. 

Ari: And what's happening to him?

Rabbi Fohrman: Potentially, he'll get either killed, taken as a slave, somehow never coming back to his parent.

Ari: So אָסוֹן itself is describing a child who is going to be lost to his parent. And you know, if we think about why that happened, what was the cause of that – we really kind of dig, dig all the way back and say, “What started this whole saga that led to this child being lost to his parent?” 

Rabbi Fohrman: So on some level, you're saying, “I wonder if the story of the possibility of Benjamin being lost to his parent, could that have been the indirect consequence

of a fight between people?” And of course, we've got fights in spades in Parshat Vayigash. 

Ari: We sure do.

Rabbi Fohrman: The whole story is one big fight between Judah and the other brothers against Joseph. And somehow, as a consequence of this whole drama around the sale of Joseph, and now Joseph coming back and taking his revenge, who gets caught in the middle but poor Benjamin? But I – Ari, that's weird, because Benjamin is, he's twenty-three years old, you know. What, he's coming out of the womb? And whose womb is he coming out of with this miscarriage? What's going on there?

Ari: Right, so it kind of sounds like the case that Parshat Mishpatim is describing, but they're like all these differences. So I guess the next question we should ask is: Okay, let's try to be really sure that these two sections are connected. Let's read these verses again, and stop me when you hear the other parallels to Mishpatim. 

וַיֹּאמֶר עַבְדְּךָ אָבִי אֵלֵינוּ אַתֶּם יְדַעְתֶּם כִּי שְׁנַיִם יָלְדָה-לִּי אִשְׁתִּי – So you know surely well that my wife gave me two children.

Rabbi Fohrman: So let’s stop right there. Two children! One of the things we were talking about in Mishpatim was, how crazy is it that the woman's pregnant with two children? 

Ari: Right, it seems irrelevant.

Rabbi Fohrman: And here Judah is paraphrasing Jacob talking about his wife giving him two children. There's “yeladim” (children). And, by the way, it's not just that. Keep on going in the verse, what are the very next words?

Ari: וַיֵּצֵא הָאֶחָד מֵאִתִּי – 

Rabbi Fohrman: וַיֵּצֵא הָאֶחָד מֵאִתִּי – That's like screaming out at you now, that language. “One of them came out from me.” Boy, if that doesn't sound like birth language! The birth language in Mishpatim seems almost this carbon copy of Jacob's language in Vayigash. Jacob said, One of them came out from me – i.e. Joseph – and now I'm worried about a second one coming out from me, which would be Benjamin.

Almost as if – and this is crazy, Ari – that if, you know, if you match up the characters… One of them came out from me… what role is Jacob playing over here? Jacob is playing mom. He is the one they go out from, right, which is crazy. Benjamin and Joseph are in his womb? What's that about? 

Until you start thinking about the circumstances that Jacob’s struggling with. Jacob's talking about two children born to his dead wife. She's no longer here. And how did she die?

She died in childbirth, Benjamin, right? The one that Jacob won't let go anymore. And Ari, when you first showed this to me, it was like, “Oh, my gosh!” It's like that moment of the death of Rachel. It's almost like time freezes for him, and suddenly – 

Ari: He’s in a state of denial – 

Rabbi Fohrman: Almost in a state of denial. She's out of the picture, and he can't just be Father anymore. It's like, I'm Mother, too, and from then on… You know what it reminded me of, Ari? Dickens has a book called Great Expectations, this great Victorian novel, and in it there's this character, Miss Havisham, who's traumatized because she's abandoned at the altar right at the moment of her wedding. And so what happens is, she never takes off her wedding dress, and she just sits there with the wedding cake rotting for twenty years in this room, and it's almost like time has frozen for her.

And that was the image which I have. With Jacob, time is frozen. It's like he's the mother. And this protectiveness that he has over Benjamin, it's almost like he views him as this baby in his womb. He won't let him out of his sight, won’t let him out of his tent. The tent is this extended womb, and it's because one of them already left my womb, and who is the one that left the womb? it was Joseph, and look what happened to him. אַךְ טָרֹף טֹרָף – I don't know what happened to him. 

Ari: And also, the last time that Benjamin left the womb, it didn't end well for Mother. So now Jacob is kind of going back in time and pretending like Benjamin never did leave the womb, and now he is Mother. And now Benjamin is in his womb, but he can never press play, because if you press play, Benjamin leaves the womb, and Mother dies.

Rabbi Fohrman: Fascinating, which is exactly what Judah says, isn't it? וְעָזַב אֶת-אָבִיו וָמֵת – right, he can't leave his father, because if he leaves his father he might die (Genesis 44:22). And there's that wonderfully ambiguous word “he,” which we sort of assume means Benjamin, right, but it also could mean mother – in this case, Jacob, who's over-compensating and playing Rachel, the dead Rachel, because his children don't have a mother – that he would die. It would be as if we’re replaying the death of Rachel, and that Rachel would somehow die upon losing Benjamin. Fascinating. And so Jacob feels like there's mortal peril for either me or for him at this moment. 

And one last piece here, by the way, which is really striking… which is that, you know, if we play this through the אָסוֹן in Mishpatim, this harm coincides with the harm that would be done to Benjamin. And then, if in Mishpatim the text says that וְאִם-אָסוֹן יִהְיֶה – right, if there is a loss of the child, which in this case would be Benjamin, then וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ – you've got to give a soul for a soul. It was so fascinating, because if you go back to Vayigash, that really happens. There is this precedent for a soul for a soul, right? And what's that?

Ari: So if we continue reading the verses where we left off: וְעַתָּה כְּבֹאִי אֶל-עַבְדְּךָ אָבִי וְהַנַּעַר אֵינֶנּוּ אִתָּנוּ – So now, when we go back to our father and the child Benjamin is not with us (44:30),

Rabbi Fohrman: I.e. there’s an אָסוֹן – he’s lost, he never comes back to Dad.

Ari: וְנַפְשׁוֹ קְשׁוּרָה בְנַפְשׁוֹ – and his soul is bound up with his soul, Jacob’s soul is bound up with Benjamin. 

Rabbi Fohrman: We've got the same language of souls and souls. We got a soul here, we got a soul there, an intertwining of souls. In this case, the soul of Jacob and the soul of Benjamin. But then, how does Judah respond to that notion of the way his father's soul is so bound up with Benjamin’s soul?

Ari: By the way, when is a soul literally, one soul literally bound to another soul? In pregnancy.

Rabbi Fohrman: Fascinating, right? When is one soul bound to another soul, Ari asks, and the answer is pregnancy, right? When is it, biologically, that you actually have souls intertwined with one another? You have the umbilical cord. You have the mysterious interchanging of blood. Of course, the two souls are intricately bound up in each other, almost as if that's what Judah is realizing, that Father views himself as pregnant with Benjamin. It's as if Benjamin never left, and there's that deep connection between mother and child which only exists in the womb. That is the connection between Father and Benjamin. And Judah heroically – rather than being resentful of that, as he once was, right, there was once a time when he let a brother languish in the pit and sold him into slavery because of the animosity, that Father loved another child that way, but not him, right – but now Judah recognizes it and says: Because it's true, I have to give my nefesh (soul) for his nefesh.

Ari: And here’s what he says, וְעַתָּה יֵשֶׁב-נָא עַבְדְּךָ תַּחַת הַנַּעַר עֶבֶד לַאדֹנִי – I will become your slave, תַּחַת הַנַּעַר – in place of the boy Benjamin (44:33). And that word תַּחַת is the exact same way Mishpatim describes נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ.

Rabbi Fohrman: Fascinating, I even didn't pick up on that. It's even the same language. נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ – a soul in place of, or underneath, another soul. 

Ari: It's the exact punishment that Mishpatim describes, one soul in place for another soul. So we said, by the way, that's a weird punishment to say. It sounds  kind of like it's a capital punishment, but you know, the Gemara has different ways of interpreting it, including that maybe that it's monetary, you know. Why would the Torah use such an unclear phrase? Well, because in the actual case it's describing, there really is a replacing of one soul for another soul.

Rabbi Fohrman: Even though, by the way, in some ways it's monetary, because what he's saying is, I’ll be the slave, i.e. you'll have monetary rights to me, instead of having monetary rights in Benjamin. Which ends up becoming, as the Sages understand it, you have paid the money for the other person as if they were a slave. Because that's actually how the Talmud understands it. Imagine they were a slave, pay the money, right? And all of that has all these fascinating resonances going back to this story. 

Let me just come back to the issue we started with. You know, for me, suddenly I feel this incredible sympathy for Jacob, right? I mean, it's like his wife died, and he loved her, and she died in childbirth. And here you have these children growing up without a mother, right? And you’re Father, and what do you want to do? You love them, and you can't just love them as a father. You need to try to love them as a mother too, that unconditional flowing love that only a mother can give. He somehow has to do it, because they don't have any other mother. 

And here he is struggling and grasping to fill a hole that he just can't fill, and of course, it leads to this terrible animosity in the family. But you begin to understand that predicament that he's in, and that sense that Benjamin – that I need to do whatever I can to safeguard this child. And hence Jacob tragically shelters Benjamin, to this point where, you know, Joseph, when he meets Benjamin, his words are: הֲזֶה אֲחִיכֶם הַקָּטֹן אֲשֶׁר אֲמַרְתֶּם אֵלָי – Is this your little brother (43:29)? He's twenty-three years old! This is the one you said who can't leave his father, because he's all mushed up in his father's soul? But it's true, right, and suddenly, it all makes sense.

Ari: It is almost as if they are biologically connected, so much so that whatever happens to Benjamin, it's like it'll happen to Jacob, right? וְקָרָהוּ אָסוֹן – and harm will befall Benjamin, וְהוֹרַדְתֶּם אֶת-שֵׂיבָתִי בְּרָעָה שְׁאֹלָה – and you will bring me in sorrow to the grave. So harm befalls Benjamin, and I'm going to go to the grave because of it.

Rabbi Fohrman: Fascinating.  And really, Ari, for me it goes back to the heroism of Judah. Right? Because you can look at this and you could say, “Dad, that's dysfunctional. Dad, you shouldn't feel that way. Rachel's gone. You just have to get on with your life. You know, Benjamin's grown up. He's twenty-three years old.” And you could lecture Jacob all you want, but Judah chooses not to lecture him, and he recognizes the tragedy, and he recognizes the limitations. It's like, “Yes, he really does love him. He loves him in this way that can't be replicated with me, and I need to understand that and deal with that. And because I will do that, וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ – if there’s an אָסוֹן I need to give my soul for his soul, because these souls are bound up with one another.”

Ari: Wow, Rabbi Fohrman, this was amazing. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Rabbi Fohrman: Thanks so much. 

Ari: Wow, that was a wild ride. Before I noticed these parallels, I wouldn’t have thought anything could possibly add to the story of Jacob’s love for Benjamin. But it turns out that when you read it through the lens of the case in Mishpatim, it opens our hearts to a new way of understanding what Jacob went through.

There’s something I’m still wondering about, though. Why, exactly, would the Torah connect these two passages? Yes, the parallels give us a deeper understanding of Jacob’s dilemma… but it still seems strange to link this parsha with Mishpatim, of all things. You heard Rabbi Fohrman and me starting to make sense of the evidence we found, but it turns out this is just the tip of the iceberg. After this recording, Rabbi Fohrman and I continued to gather additional evidence, and more and more parts of the puzzle started to come together, a very complicated puzzle, I might add. It’s not ready to release yet, but if we have any breakthroughs, you’ll be the first to know. In the meantime, I actually want to share with you our notes. You can find them by following the link in the description. We would love your input, and if you have any thoughts, you know what I am going to say: Leave us a voice note! There is a link for that in the description too. Who knows, you may even be featured on the show.

And speaking of more to discover: Ami Silver noticed some of these same parallels a few years back and saw a broader theme of connections between the laws in Parshat Mishpatim and the Joseph story. A link to that video is, you guessed it, in the description. Go check it out, and if you haven’t explored the rest of our website yet, now is the perfect time.

Thank you so much for coming with Rabbi Fohrman and me on this journey of discovery. If you enjoyed, please share the podcast with your friends and family. It's the easiest way to help us grow and spread amazing Torah as far as we can. 

Credits

This episode was recorded by our lead scholar, Rabbi David Fohrman, and me, Ari Levisohn. 

Into the Verse editing was done by Sarah Penso.

Our senior editor is Beth Lesch.

Our audio editor is Hillary Guttman. 

Our editorial director is me. 

Thank you so much for listening.