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

Parshat Vayeshev tells the story of the animosity, the hatred, the fighting between Joseph and his brothers. It tells the story of how Jacob one day sent Joseph to go check on his brothers who are shepherding. And of course, we know what happens. The brothers take him, throw him into a pit, sell him into slavery. It's a horrible, tragic story. 

This is Ari Levisohn, and I’m joined today by Adina Blaustein to discuss the following question: What was Jacob thinking in sending Joseph to his brothers? Here is our conversation:

The question I want to focus on today is, what was Yaakov thinking? I mean, you take Yosef, and you send him to the people who you know hate him more than anyone else in the world. I mean, you were leading Yosef right into the lion's den.

Right, Adina? If ,you know, your kids are fighting, you have to separate them, and you each put them in their room for time out. You don't take one kid and then say, “Oh, can you actually go check on the other kid in his room?”

Adina: Absolutely. When you frame it in modern parenting, the scenario completely makes no sense. When you know that there's clear animosity, when you know that there's rivalry, you don't stoke the fire more, right? 

Ari: It seems like a crazy idea, you know, if your kids are with you in the house. But then you imagine they're 100 miles away where there's no supervision, there's no one to watch over them, there's no witnesses. It really, like, makes you just scratch your head and ask, what was Jacob thinking?

Adina: In Parshat Vayeshev, in this week's Torah portion, that's exactly what Jacob does. He sees the tension that's fomenting amongst his sons. They go to shepherd off in Shechem, which is some miles away from where he is, and he turns to Yosef, who he sees is in this state of tension and rivalry with his other sons, and he says, “Joseph, why don't you go check out what they're doing?” So he is doing exactly that. The brothers have found some separation, some time out, as you're calling it in this metaphor. And he then says, “Oh, instead of letting them have a cool down period, I'm going to send Yosef directly to them.” What was he thinking?

Ari: That's exactly the question I want to tackle today because I think that when we dig deeper here, I think there's a lot to be discovered under the surface and a lot to teach us about relationships, and particularly how to mend broken relationships. 

Starting with the Least Significant Part of the Story

So where do we begin? We need to look for some clues in the text that might help us find an answer to this. And there are a lot of parts of the story that we could look at and try to dissect.

I actually want to focus on the part that seems to be the least significant part of this story because…if I've learned anything from Rabbi Fohrman, it's that if some part of the story seems to be insignificant, if it seems like it has no purpose in the overall plot, it probably means we're missing something in that part of the story and missing how that part of the story actually plays into the bigger whole.

Adina: It’s like a good Agatha Christie story or play.

Ari: Right, right; it's never the one you were expecting. So I'm not going to talk about the part where Yaakov sends Yosef, and I'm not going to talk about the part where the brothers take him and throw him in the pit and sell him. But wait, isn't that the whole story?

Adina: So which part are you going to be talking about? I feel like this story has been analyzed to death so it's exciting to be a part of the team where we're always uncovering and discovering new aspects.

So let’s see…you're not going to speak about being sent away and you're not speaking about the part where the brothers meet up in Dotan. So what does that leave? Are you speaking about Joseph's journey?

Ari: Exactly, Adina. There’s this strange few pesukim (verses) that tell us about Joseph's journey. So if we could open up to Genesis 37, verse 15 — Adina, could you read to us this mini-chapter of the story?

Adina: Verse 15: וַיִּמְצָאֵהוּ אִישׁ — And a man comes upon him, וְהִנֵּה תֹעֶה בַּשָּׂדֶה — and he's wandering the fields, וַיִּשְׁאָלֵהוּ הָאִישׁ לֵאמֹר — and the man asked Joseph, מַה־תְּבַקֵּשׁ — What are you looking for?

Ari: So apparently Joseph is wandering around looking for his brothers. He has no idea where they are, and this guy says, “What are you looking for?” He says, “I'm looking for my brothers.” The guy responds, “Oh, your brothers aren't here anymore. They went to this place called Dotan.” So Joseph goes to Dotan and the story continues.

So, you know, on the scheme of the whole story, like, where does this fit in? If the Torah just left this out…if we didn't know, if we just went straight to the brothers, would that have changed the story at all?

Adina: Great question. I completely agree. If we wanted to make this story more impactful, more concise, more dramatic, take this section out. And furthermore, the buildup of the story and the tension, you know…you're on the edge of your seat. Jacob just sent Joseph to check on the brothers, and this section just kind of completely deflates that buildup, that climax 

Ari: Yeah, you're waiting to see, “What's going to happen, what's going to happen,” and then it's like, “And Yosef stopped to fill up gas.” Right, we don't need that. Skip, just move on to the next one.

The Torah’s Commentary on Itself

So, if only the Torah provided some sort of commentary on itself that would help us understand this story. Of course, it's the tagline of this podcast; the Torah is a commentary on itself. The Torah does this all the time, where we have later sections of the Torah that reference back to these earlier stories and really help us understand these stories and how we're supposed to see them.

So, we're going to look for this other place, and the hint, the key word, is this word תֹעֶה, which means “to wander.” There's actually only one other place in the Torah that we get the word תֹעֶה in this form, and that's in Parshat Mishpatim, in Exodus chapter 23, verse 4.

Adina, why don't you read this for us? When you do, let's pay careful attention to any words in this that remind us of the Joseph story. Anything about this that jumps out of us and screams “Joseph.”

Adina: It's interesting because when you suggested that there could potentially be another place in Torah to look for commentary to explain this question, I wouldn't have thought of Parshat Mishpatim. So this is fascinating. 

Ari: Right, it’s in the middle of a section of just like random laws. One after another, these laws, mostly about civil, between one person and another, stuff. And then we get this one law here.

Adina: Okay, so I'll take a look at verse 4: כִּי תִפְגַּע שׁוֹר אֹיִבְךָ אוֹ חֲמֹרוֹ תֹּעֶה הָשֵׁב תְּשִׁיבֶנּוּ לוֹ — When you encounter your enemy's ox or donkey wandering, you should return it. You must take it back. Okay.

Ari: So there's that word תֹּעֶה, “wandering.”

Adina: Yeah, there's that word תֹּעֶה. And then, I have to say something else that immediately jumps out at me is אֹיִבְךָ — it's your enemy's animal that the Torah is saying to return. And the context of the Joseph story is a story of enemies, so that…that just right away is just fascinating. 

Ari: Right. It's not just any ox. Out of all the oxen out there, it's specifically the one of your enemy. And also, the language of שׁוֹר. Does that ring any bells? Particularly the animal of an ox. Does anything about that remind you of Yosef?

Adina: I'm trying to think…in the blessings, is he associated with שׁוֹר? Yeah? All right. Okay. So let’s see…

Ari: In Genesis 49:22.

Adina: When Jacob blesses the brothers.

Ari: Yosef isn't called an ox once, but actually twice, in both sets of blessings in the Torah. The first ones that Jacob gives, and the second one, in Deuteronomy 33:17, that Moshe gives. Both times, Joseph is called a שׁוֹר, an ox.

Adina: What's the phrase?

Ari: So the first one, it's עֲלֵי־שׁוּר in Genesis 49:22. And then in Deuteronomy 33:17, Moses calls him בְּכוֹר שׁוֹר.

Adina: Oh, okay, so that's the one I was thinking of. Okay, cool. And then, in Navi (Prophets), Joseph's descendants eventually become the Ten Tribes, and the symbol of the northern kingdom, the Ten Tribes, also becomes associated with the horns of a שׁוֹר, of an ox. So that is very much symbolic of Joseph and his whole identity and this kind of larger than life throughout generations, a kind of national identity as well. Fascinating.

Ari: So far, I mean, we've seen this, the only use of this word, תֹעֶה, “to wander,” and it's not just any animal wandering, but it's an ox wandering. An ox is like the nickname for Joseph. It's the symbol for Joseph that we see throughout so many different places. And it's not just any ox, but it's the ox of your enemy. And then — here's what's so fascinating about it — what does it say to do when you find the ox of your enemy wandering about?

Adina: You have to return it, הָשֵׁב תְּשִׁיבֶנּוּ לוֹ.

Ari: If we're right about this, then the implications here and what the brothers should have done, it really is just so clear and it makes so much sense, right? We all know what they should have done; they should have brought him back to their father, and instead they did the exact opposite of bringing him back to their father. They take him, and they sell him into slavery.

Adina: Sure, my heart…I'm having a pang of sadness because Reuven’s plan seems to have been to try to return him and restore him to his father, and this…reading this law in Mishpatim, having the opportunity to think of, well, how could the story have gone differently? It just reminds me of that failed rescue attempt and, in a sense, the failure of the story. So I think this parallel just kind of forces you once again to realize just how tragic the Joseph story is in chapter 37.

Ari: Right, that's such a great point. The language that it uses when Reuven, who tries to stop this plot, who tries to stop the sale of Joseph from happening, is: לְמַעַן הַצִּיל אֹתוֹ מִיָּדָם — In order to save him from their hands, לַהֲשִׁיבוֹ אֶל־אָבִיו — to return him to their father (Genesis 37:22). That's what should have happened.

Playing Cast of Characters

So a few years back, our colleague Ami Silver stumbled across the same set of parallels. He pointed out that whenever you have a parallel between these two stories, you try to line up which character corresponds to which character in each story.

Adina: Sure. Rabbi Fohrman likes to call that the “Cast of Characters.”

Ari: The Cast of Characters. So when we're doing Cast of Characters, it pays to be really precise about exactly who each character is. So often, you think you understand the parallels, and then you do Cast of Characters and you realize that the parallels are telling you something even more surprising than you thought. So let's do that now. 

Adina: Let's list the characters in Mishpatim. So we've got the ox, okay. We've got the ox’s owner who we learn is an enemy. And then we have this individual who finds the ox who is enemies with the ox’s original owner. So I feel like we've got three characters, yeah…in Mishpatim.

Ari: Okay, so let's line them up. The ox is the easy one.

Adina: Okay, so the ox, yeah, that's Joseph.

Ari: Right, and who finds him?

Adina: In 37 in Genesis, I feel like there's two candidates. You could say the brothers in general, right, because, you know, he eventually goes to them in Dotan. But another possible candidate could be this mysterious, anonymous אִישׁ who Joseph stumbles upon in the fields near Shechem on his way to see the brothers.

Ari: So Adina, you're right that there could be two possible candidates for this role, for the person who runs into Yosef. But we're talking about someone who is an enemy here. So the guy who runs into Yosef, whether he was an angel or just some random guy, I don't think he has any agenda. I think the brothers are a lot better of a candidate

Adina: Well, it has to be an enemy with the שׁוֹר's owner. So we have to figure out who’s the שׁוֹר's owner and who’s enemies with that שׁוֹר's owner.

Ari: Right, well, who is Joseph's owner?

Adina: I would have thought Jacob, right? His father is the person who seems to be controlling him like a puppet. He says, “You go to Shechem,” and Joseph does. So who's enemies with Jacob? So in this story, right, when we think about the tensions among the brothers in chapter 37 of Genesis, we always focus on the enemies are Joseph and his brothers. And now, this Cast of Characters is saying, “Oh, Jacob is most natural to be the owner.” Who's he enemies with? This is somewhat strange.

Who is Really Fighting with Whom?

Ari: Right. So here's Ami's suggestion, which I think is really just fascinating, mind blowing is… Maybe the fight isn't really between Joseph and his brothers, or at least maybe it's not supposed to be. But maybe the real fight is between the brothers and their father Jacob. So why would that make sense? Let's go back to the verses where it actually talks about this hatred between the brothers and Joseph.

So Adina, if you could read Genesis 37, verse 4. This is the first time we hear about the brothers hating Joseph.

Adina: Sure: וַיִּרְאוּ אֶחָיו כִּי־אֹתוֹ אָהַב אֲבִיהֶם מִכׇּל־אֶחָיו וַיִּשְׂנְאוּ אֹתוֹ וְלֹא יָכְלוּ דַּבְּרוֹ לְשָׁלֹם — When Joseph's brothers see that their father Jacob loved Joseph more than any of his brothers, they hated him so that they could not speak a friendly word to him.

It is such a horrible consequence of the favoritism that Jacob displays for Joseph in making him the כְּתֹנֶת פַּסִּים, that special garment, and in signaling him out for special treatment.

Ari: So it's clear they hate Joseph, and later on that hatred turns into jealousy, but who's the real source of their problems? Who's the one who really is causing them all of this pain?

Adina: The idea I think that's being suggested here is that really they are despising their father's actions as signaling Joseph out for special treatment, but the direction that their anger takes them is to Joseph. So it's almost like they're fighting with the wrong person, right? Really the person who they should be angry at and directing their frustration at is Jacob. 

Ari: Right, it's a story of this misplaced hatred and anger. The sad thing is, as long as they continue to take out this hatred on Joseph, the problem is never going to get better. Because until they actually confront the person who's causing their pain…Joseph is, I don't know if I should say innocent bystander because, you know, he definitely did plenty to annoy them.

Adina: He has his fair share of escalation of the tension.

Ari: Right, he definitely fuels the fire, but the source of that fire is not Joseph — it's Jacob. These brothers, all they really want is for him to love them just as much as he loves his favorite. That, that…you know, you could almost imagine how, if they had been aware of that, if they had been in touch with their own feelings and realized who the source of their anger was supposed to be, how different the story could have ended up.

Adina: I think that's also a remarkable point about human nature, that sometimes we don't even fully realize who our anger really should be directed to. We scapegoat people all the time. As societies, tragically, we do this, and certainly as individuals, we do this.

I'm fascinated by how the Cast of Characters kind of led to this remarkable insight into this story, because there's a tension in this story that never fully gets resolved at all. The massive scope, the latter half of Genesis, all deals with this question of, will the brothers and Joseph reconcile? But we never really stop to think, did Jacob and his other sons ever truly reconcile? 

So our Cast of Characters is feeling much more complete now. Joseph is the שׁוֹר, the owner is Jacob, and what you just pointed out is that the brothers are the ones who come upon Joseph and should have returned him to his rightful owner, to Jacob, and that tragically there's this tension between Jacob and his sons and their enemies.

Coming Back to Our Original Question

Ari: Okay, so, Adina, keeping all of this in mind, I want to come back to that original question we asked — why did Jacob send Joseph? What was going through his mind at that point? So I think we're in a place now to actually look at the verses of when Jacob does send Joseph.

Let's start in Genesis 37, verse 11. This is right after Joseph told his brothers about the dreams, which really gets them riled up. Adina, take us away.

Adina: This is just a chilling pasuk (verse): וַיְקַנְאוּ־בוֹ אֶחָיו — The brothers were jealous of him, וְאָבִיו שָׁמַר אֶת־הַדָּבָר — and his father literally watched the matter, guarded the matter.

Ari: Right, he “kept,” he “guarded,” he “took heed of the matter.” And the question is, what's “the matter?” Of course, Rashi says that it was the dreams and he was waiting to see if they would come true. But I think the simplest understanding, the simplest way to understand this is that the דָּבָר, the “matter,” is the most immediately preceding thing that we just read about; the thing that came just a few words earlier, which is...

Adina: It seems like the דָּבָר is the first half of verse 11, וַיְקַנְאוּ־בוֹ אֶחָיו, the jealousy that he witnesses between his sons and Joseph.

Ari: Exactly. The jealousy gets to a point where finally Jacob sees it; he understands, he recognizes that his family is about to fall apart. So of course, if you're Yaakov, you're Jacob, and you realize your family is about to fall apart, what do you do?

Adina: So when you see a problem, a good person, a leader should try to fix it.

Ari: Right. You try to do something about it. So what does Jacob do? Continue.

Adina: In the very next verse, verse 12: וַיֵּלְכוּ אֶחָיו לִרְעוֹת אֶת־צֹאן אֲבִיהֶם בִּשְׁכֶם — Some time goes, and the brothers go to pasture their father's flock at Shechem. Then, in verse 13: וַיֹּאמֶר יִשְׂרָאֵל אֶל־יוֹסֵף הֲלוֹא אַחֶיךָ רֹעִים בִּשְׁכֶם לְכָה וְאֶשְׁלָחֲךָ אֲלֵיהֶם וַיֹּאמֶר לוֹ הִנֵּנִי — Here called “Israel,” Jacob says to Joseph, “Your brothers are pasturing the flock at Shechem; go to them.” And Joseph says, “Alright, I'm ready. Here I am.”

And then, in the next verse, in verse 14, Jacob says it again: וַיֹּאמֶר לוֹ לֶךְ־נָא רְאֵה אֶת־שְׁלוֹם אַחֶיךָ וְאֶת־שְׁלוֹם הַצֹּאן וַהֲשִׁבֵנִי דָּבָר וַיִּשְׁלָחֵהוּ מֵעֵמֶק חֶבְרוֹן וַיָּבֹא שְׁכֶמָה — And he said, “Go see how your brothers are, how the flocks are, and bring back word for me.” And he sent him from the valley of Chevron, and he goes to Shechem.

Ari: And let's look at those words closely: רְאֵה אֶת־שְׁלוֹם אַחֶיךָ וְאֶת־שְׁלוֹם הַצֹּאן — Literally, the peace of your brothers and the peace of the flock. What's the significance of that word, שְׁלוֹם?

Adina: That's exactly the situation that verse four seems to be alluding to: וְלֹא יָכְלוּ דַּבְּרוֹ לְשָׁלֹם — The brothers cannot speak with peace, a friendly word to Joseph (Genesis 37:4). And now, Jacob is basically demanding, you know, “Seek their peace.” 

Ari: Right. “That elusive peace, that peace that we just can't find between you and the brothers. I'm sending you out now to go find that peace.” 

A Peace-Keeping Mission

This is actually a point that Rabbi Fohrman makes in one of his Tisha B'Av courses, the one on the Spies…that Jacob sent Joseph out as a peacekeeping mission. He recognized the jealousy, he realized his family was about to fall apart, and he knew this was his last chance to do something, and he hoped that maybe sending Joseph out would somehow fix the problem, that it would finally bring that peace. 

But the question we have to ask is, how? How would sending Joseph out to his enemies, to the brothers who hate him, actually bring peace? And here's where I think Mishpatim sheds light on this.

So if you imagine, you're in your own field, and you're tending to your farm. You're tending to your animals, and out in the corner of your field, you see an ox wandering around. It's clearly lost, it doesn't know where it's going, and you feel bad. “Oh, this poor ox.” You know, it's like when it happens we see a lost dog. You're like, “Oh, this poor lost dog,” right? “You guys, I'm going to go try to return it to its owner because it needs my help.”

Then imagine you go over to the ox, and you look at its name tag, and you realize it's your enemy's ox. You don't really hate this ox. The ox didn't do anything to you. It's just a poor ox that's wandering around in the field. You're already thinking, like, this is a good ox to help. You wanted to help this ox. Your enemy is the one you have a problem with, not the ox. 

Yosef was no different than the ox wandering around in the field. He's a young boy. He's lost, he's תֹעֶה, he's wandering. He doesn't know where he is going. You know, you could imagine the brothers seeing Yosef, running into him. They start talking, and then they realize, you know, here they are in…actually in Dotan, about a hundred miles away from where Yaakov was. They realize, Yosef's not our enemy — it's Yaakov. Yosef's annoying, we don't like him, yeah, sure. But 100 miles away, removed from the whole issue of their father's love, maybe they would have realized that Yosef wasn't the one they should have had the beef with.

Speculating on Jacob’s Motive

So maybe, and this is, I think, speculative, but maybe if Jacob really understood what was going on and he understood why the brothers were hating Joseph…he understood that the real problems weren't with Joseph, but were really with him. Maybe he saw an opportunity here. For the first time, maybe ever, as far as we know, the brothers are really far away from home. They're completely separated from Jacob. And now they have an opportunity to actually interact with Yosef, removed from their father. They have an opportunity to actually get to know who Yosef is, you know, other than being the favorite child. I don't know that this is what Yaakov was planning, but to me, this seems to be what Mishpatim is suggesting.

Adina: So maybe Jacob was hoping that in sending Joseph to the brothers without him, somehow the brothers and Joseph without Jacob present could resolve their tensions, realizing that the brothers shouldn't be blaming Joseph for anything, right? It's not Joseph who's caused any of these issues, really. Perhaps they can become a unit, and that's why Jacob maybe is sending Joseph out to the brothers, and maybe that's why Jacob feels it's so important that Joseph go on this journey.

Ari: Right. That leaves us wondering though… if that was the plan, how did it fail? Why didn't it work the way that Jacob was hoping, or the way that Mishpatim is suggesting it could have worked?

Adina: I think an answer to that question could be because, look at what the verses in Mishpatim suggest. The reconciliation really needed to happen between the brothers and Jacob.

Ari: Right, but there was a step, right? First they need to realize who the real enemy is. Then they can realize, then they can work on fixing things with Jacob. But until they…but the first step has to be smoothing, realizing that their problems aren't from Yosef.

Adina: Mm-hmm.

Ari: Hi, this is future Ari popping in. Adina’s answer resonated with me. She was using the insight we had gained from looking at the parallels between Yosef and the lost ox in Parshat Mishpatim. Doing the Cast of Characters allowed us to see that there was misplaced hatred, and you can’t resolve that if you’re trying to work it out with the wrong person. But, truthfully, there is a part of the parallels which doesn’t seem to line up, and I think that difference may give us additional insight into why Jacob’s plan failed, why the brothers weren’t able to resolve their misplaced hatred with Joseph. 

So just to review, the verse in Mishpatim says: כִּי תִפְגַּע שׁוֹר אֹיִבְךָ אוֹ חֲמֹרוֹ תֹּעֶה הָשֵׁב תְּשִׁיבֶנּוּ לוֹ – When you encounter the ox of your enemy wandering, you must return it. The word used there for “encounter” is תִפְגַּע, which typically refers to an up-close and personal encounter, but when you read the verse in Genesis 37 with Yosef and his brothers, things seem to unfold differently.

A Reconciliation That Could Have Been

Ari: So let's look at the verse where that reconciliation could have happened, when they actually meet Joseph. Here's the point: They meet Joseph and they start talking and then they're like, “Oh, yeah, he's just an annoying little brother. He's not the cause of the great sorrow of our lives.” So let's look at 37, verse 18.

Adina: Okay.

Ari: He's on his way to the brothers. He finally finds which way he's going. 

Adina: וַיִּרְאוּ אֹתוֹ מֵרָחֹק, such dramatic irony — They see Joseph from afar, וּבְטֶרֶם יִקְרַב אֲלֵיהֶם — and before he gets a chance to get close to them, וַיִּתְנַכְּלוּ אֹתוֹ לַהֲמִיתוֹ — they conspire to kill him.

Ari: The Torah makes this whole big deal about the fact that they saw him from afar, and before he even came close to them, they had already plotted to kill him.

Adina: I almost wish I could just to be at that scene and just say, “Everybody take a knee. Everybody just pause for one minute. You know, when your adrenaline is racing and you're talking so fast, everybody just pause and just stop and think.” It almost feels like the buildup of the tension in this pasuk is implying they never pause.

Ari: Not just they never paused, but they never even got the chance to be pog’ei’a, to actually encounter Joseph. By the time he got close to them, it was already set in their minds to kill him, and at that point, the gears had already started turning. It was all set in motion. If only it took them a little bit longer to come to this decision, maybe they could have discovered this new relationship with him, a relationship that wasn't centered around him being the favorite child. 

Adina: They missed the opportunity, I think, to engage with Joseph on his own terms.

Ari: Right. They missed the opportunity, right? וּבְטֶרֶם יִקְרַב אֲלֵיהֶם — it's so chilling. Before he even got close to them, they already set their minds up. If only they had taken a minute to slow down, things just could have ended up so differently. But one of the great tragedies of this story is that that one minute that they didn't wait was all the difference. If things would have been just a slight bit different, we would have been reading an entirely different story.

Returning Lost Objects and Restoring Broken Relationships

So Adina, there's one more possible thing we can take away from this, which I think Mishpatim might be trying to teach us….which is this whole idea of hashavat aveidah, returning the lost object or the lost ox is not just an opportunity for you to realize that the ox is not your enemy and that you shouldn't mistreat the ox because of it, but maybe it's also an opportunity for you to reconcile with the owner.

Adina: Yeah, I definitely see that. I think that this speaks to something about human nature. You know, sometimes all the conversations in the world can't enable two people who are so entrenched to see eye to eye. But sometimes what can resolve tensions is acts of kindness. So I'm thinking about somebody who despises another individual, and he's put in a situation where he kind of rises to the occasion and does the right thing and restores his enemy’s ox.

Human nature is that when you do an act of kindness for somebody else, you feel more positively disposed to them. You know, I'm thinking as a new parent, the way that you bond with your baby is by doing a million acts of kindness a day for this helpless child who doesn't show any affection back to you, and that's how your love grows. 

There's that old adage that the shoresh (phonetic root) for ahava (love) is hav, “to give.” That's how you can reverse hatred.

Ari: Isn't it fascinating…many years later, it seems like the brothers do finally reach some level of resolution with their father and they get past this animosity. It seems to be that the one thing that actually does end up doing that is something that is really so similar to this, which is a different favorite son of his who is lost away from home.

Adina: The story of Benjamin, and the emphasis on, “We'll return Benjamin to you.”

Ari: They all rally around that mission of returning Benjamin to his father. It's that mission of bringing Benjamin back to his father that seems to be the impetus for this repairing. It's not even a specific, you know, “I'm sorry for this, I'm sorry for that.” They didn't go to therapy. Sometimes it's just one act of giving, one act of chesed (kindness) that just tears down those walls and just allows you to almost magically forget about all the things you were fighting over.

Adina: Even though there isn't a satisfying conversation in the book of Genesis, I think what you're highlighting is they act with such cohesion. That is a turning point in the course of the book of Genesis, where you see Jacob and his sons act as a unit. And I think your point is, there was no dramatic conversation on a therapist's couch that the Torah just doesn't preserve for posterity.

It's that there was an action of this statement of Judah, saying, “I will return him to you, Dad.” Jacob was able to look at his sons and say, “I trust that you will,” and that action and that trust that they place in each other is, you know…speaks so much more than volumes of words, and restores and changes the course of their relationship.

Ari: Right, and who knows, maybe they did go to therapy later on.

Adina: Therapy is great. Everybody should do it.

Ari: I totally agree, but something has to get you there, right? Something has to reopen up those channels of communication, open up that relationship again and get you to the point where you're actually trying to work past it and you want to…you're actually motivated to try to repair things. Sometimes it's just that one act of giving, and I think this is just such a powerful lesson.

You know, whenever we have challenging relationships with other people in our lives, and we all do, to look sometimes in the least expected places for ways that we can repair it. Sometimes just the simplest things are really these opportunities lying in wait for us to repair even the greatest rifts.

Credits

This episode was recorded by: Ari Levisohn together with Adina Blaustein.

This episode was produced by Evan Weiner.

Our audio editor is Hillary Guttman.

Our video editor is Shoshana Brody.

Our production manager is Adina Blaustein.

Our senior editor is Ari Levisohn. 

Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll see you next week.