Where do you come from, and where are you going? In my case, I grew up in Stockholm, Sweden, as many of you know, and gradually made my way to Wallingford, just outside Philadelphia, PA. My rabbi
growing up, Morton Narrowe, grew up in the Philly area, and became the Chief Rabbi of Sweden. I like to jokingly say that Rabbi Narrowe and I did the reverse commute and switched places. I mention this in order to invite you to contemplate your own journey through life, and also to highlight a similar situation in the Torah. I want to share with you a connection between two, seemingly disparate, stories, that I read in a wonderful Torah commentary this week, and it opened my eyes to something new and fascinating.
Rabbi Matthew Berkowitz, in writing about our parashah for the Jewish Theological Seminary, begins by noting something strange in Joseph's dreams. Joseph, a young shepherd living in Canaan, has two unusual dreams at the start of our Torah portion; one involves sheaves of wheat bowing down to a single sheaf,
and the other has the sun, moon, and stars bowing down before Joseph himself. Rabbi Berkowitz quotes another author, Leon Kass, who asks, "What kind of a shepherd dreams of sheaves of wheat?" Shouldn't he be dreaming of sheep? Furthermore, why does Joseph brazenly tell his brothers the dreams, fueling their hatred of him? His behavior seems foreign, alien, to Jewish values. It is, perhaps, as though he's already exhibiting Egyptian traits. In next week's reading, Joseph will tell Pharaoh to gather up wheat from all of Egypt, and then sell it back to the people during the impending famine. Again, are these values we admire in him?
The text may already be foreshadowing Joseph's journey down to Egypt, and his transformation into Tzafenat-Paneach, the right-hand
man of Pharaoh himself. Long before he made the move, he was already becoming an Egyptian at heart. Conversely, Rabbi Berkowitz mentions Moses, who will be introduced to us in a few weeks, when we read the Book of Exodus. Moses grows up in Pharaoh's palace, yet cleaves to the Israelites when he sees a taskmaster beating an Israelite slave. The two men, Joseph and Moses, are switching places, doing the reverse commute. And while Rabbi Berkowitz uses this image to urge us all to be more like Moses than Joseph, I would instead like to say something about journeys.
It is interesting to see where each of these leaders winds up, and how far away it is from where he began. So too in our lives, we sometimes look back at the path we've taken, and are simply surprised at just how long a trek it's been. We might also be surprised to discover how different an odyssey it was than what we imagined at the outset.
What emotions does that conjure up? Do you feel content, frustrated, filled with regret, elation, disappointment, or joy? Or maybe a combination of all. It is important to remember that all our experiences, together, formed who we are today. We would not be here, at this very moment, reading this blog, were not for each and every step we've taken up until now. I do agree with Rabbi Berkowitz that our Torah gives us two inverse models in Moses and Joseph, and we DO get to choose which one to follow and emulate. I also think it's important to give thanks for the journey itself. Stop occasionally along the way and be mindful of what came before, where you are right now, and what may lie ahead in the future. And if you also have a sense of the direction in which you're heading - and you know what your commute looks like - that helps too.
Photos in this blog post:
1. Image of the inside of the Great Synagogue of Stockholm (my shul growing up)
2. Image of the tribal flag of Issachar (the sun, moon, and stars), as depicted on a mosaic art panel in our synagogue sanctuary; picture courtesy of Allan Baron.
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