Parshas Miketz
and
Chanukah
See the Light
By: Daniel Listhaus
“Then Pharoah said to Yosef, 'Since G-d has informed you of all this, there is no one so discerning and wise as you'.”
-Miketz 41:39
After Yosef had interpreted the dreams of Pharoah to Pharoah's satisfaction, he advised that the Egyptian government do something to prepare itself for the years of famine. Yosef advocated that there should be overseers set up to organize gathering food during the seven good years so that they would be able to make it through the seven years of famine. Pharoah immediately demanded that Yosef take the position. He commanded that everyone listen to whatever Yosef tells them to do. Yosef's tale was the ultimate from-rags-to-riches story. Yesterday, he was a slave thrown into prison; today, he has the entire Egypt at his fingertips having to answer to no one but Pharoah himself.
One of the most fundamental laws of Mitzrayim (Egypt) was that a slave cannot rule. As a matter of fact, when Pharoah was bothered by his dreams and the Sar HaMashkim informed him of Yosef – the master dream interpreter, the Sar HaMashkim told Pharoah that Yosef was a “youth, a Hebrew, and a slave”. Rashi explains that the Sar HaMashkim was hinting to Pharoah that Yosef was a fool, not capable of greatness, not familiar with the culture and language of Mitzrayim, and is anyway unable to rule because it says in the constitution of Mitzrayim that a slave may not rule or even wear royal clothing. If this was true, why did Pharoah allow Yosef to take such a high position?
When Pharoah appointed Yosef as the overseer of Mitzrayim, he said, “Since G-d has informed you of all this, there is no one as discerning and wise as you. You shall be in charge over my house and by your command shall all my people be sustained; only by the throne shall I outrank you.” The Beis HaLeivi writes that Pharoah actually changed some details of his dream to test Yosef. However, Yosef saw through these fabrications and was able to construct a logical and true explanation of Pharoah's dreams, even including the parts that Pharoah left out.
There is something basic missing from this whole picture. What is so special about being able to interpret dreams correctly that merits such respect? Interpreting dreams sounds like something anyone can do. As a matter of fact, the Gemara brings a statement from Rav Huna, who said, “A dream that has not yet been interpreted is like a letter that has not yet been read.” The Gemara continues and says that all dreams follow after the mouth. It sounds from the Gemara that a dream alone is meaningless, and until it is defined by some interpretation, it will remain having no effect on anything. Only once it is explained will it come to fruition in this world. The Gemara offers a story of someone who had a dream and went to twenty-four different interpreters. Each of these interpreters gave their own interpretation, and all twenty-four came true. Through each one's explanation, many realities came into being. How could we understand this concept? Why do dreams follow after the mouth of the interpreter? Also, still, what is so special about being able to interpret dreams, and furthermore, what does it mean to do so properly?
In the society we live in where animals are given almost as many rights as people and cats inherit their owners, it is sometimes hard for us to realize what in fact are the differences between man and animals. Animals and people seem to share a lot in common. We both are not only alive, but can move around. Animals seem to have different attitudes and emotions, just as people do. We both get hungry, both need sleep, and both could get sick. However, if one were to stop and contemplate about some of the most fundamental and basic differences between man and animals, there are two things that immediately come to mind. The first is that humans think. Although at times we may seem to sometimes be operating on auto-pilot or instinct, one of the incredible qualities that we have is that we have the ability to think, discern, and reason. This is something that we acknowledge and thank Hashem for multiple times a day.
Another incredible aspect of man is his ability to speak. Speech is something unique to humans who were created b'tzelem Elokim (in the image of G-d). Speech is a quality which is special to Hashem. Every day in davening we declare, “Baruch She'amar V'haya Ha'olam” - Blessed is he who spoke and the world came into being. Furthermore, the Mishnayos describe that the world was created with ten utterances. It was through Hashem's speech that the world was created. There is something G-dly special about the power of speech, and yet, that ability was given to man to utilize.
It is not a coincidence that these two G-dly factors are essential parts of us. Thought and speech are inter-related, and depend heavily on each other. The mouth is the tool we have to transform our thoughts and materialize them into words. Speech is the medium between the spiritual, intangible world, and the physical world we live in. One can not tune one's ears to hear someone else's thoughts; however, with speech we could translate the language of thought into something that could be physically heard.
The halacha is that when one davens one must move his mouth and utter the words. Simply thinking the tefillah is not enough, davening has to be actually expressed in words. This idea is a little difficult to understand. Why is it so important to mouth the words? If we know what it means and we are taking the time to think about it, why should Hashem care how we express ourselves? However, with our comprehension of the connection between thought and speech, this concept makes perfect sense. When we daven, we are trying to make a connection between us and Hashem. The first step in connecting our physical bodies to Hashem is through translating our thoughts into speech.
When one has a dream, the Gemara tells us that it is like an unopened letter. Depending on how it is interpreted, it will come to fruition in different ways. However, the quality of the interpretation itself depends on how much a person is in-tuned to the spiritual world. The better one has an understanding of the messages that Hashem tries to send us through dreams, the higher the quality of his interpretation. Such a person has a stronger relationship with the spiritual realm and therefore his mouth better conveys what people's thoughts and dreams are trying to communicate.
This is what Pharoah realized about Yosef. Yosef did not simply make up an explanation to fit into Pharoah's dreams, rather he demonstrated that he knew precisely what the dreams were trying to forewarn. Someone full of sheker (falsehood) will try to fit his definition into a dream. He will squeeze whatever information he is given to make the shoe fit, like Cinderella's step sisters trying to squeeze their feet into the glass slipper. However, someone like Yosef who understood, on his level, the ways of Hashem, had a deep comprehension of what messages the dreams were trying to convey. His power of interpretation was strongly linked to his da'as Hashem. He was therefore able to give Pharoah not just an explanation, but the explanation with perfect accuracy.
Let us now take this whole idea a step further. There is only one Torah and the Torah is emes – absolute truth describing the ultimate way that man is supposed to live. Having said that, Torah is comprised of two elements, two sides of the same coin: Torah she'bichsav (the written Torah) and Torah she'ba'al peh (the Oral Torah). Torah she'bichsav is the written Torah we have from Har Sinai. Torah she'ba'al peh, on the other hand, is its explanation, using the tools and guidelines Hashem gave us to decipher the Torah. Torah is obviously an incredible gift Hashem gave us to help us try to understand the world from Hashem's viewpoint, and live according to the system that the Torah demands. However, perhaps the most profound aspect of Torah is the Torah she'ba'al peh. Hashem tells us that the Torah is not in the heavens, however, it is more than just 'not in the heavens', it is in the hands of man to achieve great levels and interpret the Torah in a way parallel to da'as Hashem, by utilizing the tools Hashem gave us.
The fact that one who honestly learns the Torah for the sake of trying to understand Hashem's ways has the ability to define what the Torah means to say, is something which is almost too hard to comprehend. Yet, even this is not the extent of the responsibility that man has in keeping the Torah. We all know that the Torah is the blueprint of the world. For example, the Torah titles certain animals as not kosher and others as kosher. As Jews, we are prohibited from eating non-kosher animals. We do not necessarily understand why Hashem decided that there should be these differences among animals. However, we do understand that because there is a prohibition in the Torah against eating such animals, there becomes something inherent to the animal which will cause us to somehow be endangered if we eat it – even if it may be in spiritual ways which we do not understand. So, let us re-examine what it means that man was given the privilege to interpret the Torah: If Hashem gave us the ability to understand the Torah in different ways, and the Torah is the blueprint of the world, a conclusion could be drawn that a talmid chochom (Torah scholar) has the power to affect the way of the world by defining the blueprint in a way he has determined to be emes.
There is a famous story of a person in the city of Volozhin who suffered from a certain form of lung disease. The man decided that he should move to Switzerland where the air quality was better. However, one night, the man's father came to him in a dream and warned his son not to leave Volozhin. The father explained, “The type of lung-illness you have is one which is the subject of a machlokes (dispute) between the Beis Yosef and the Rama, regarding if such an illness in an animal renders it treif. In other words, is such a lung illness one which is life-threatening. The Rama holds that such an illness is indeed life-threatening and therefore considers it treif. The Beis Yosef, though, maintains that it is considered kosher. The Rama's opinion is followed by the Ashkenazic Jews throughout Europe, including Switzerland. However, in Voloshin, the Rov is the Sha'agas Aryeh who rules like the Beis Yosef that such an illness is not life-threatening. Therefore, just as in Volozhin such animals are considered one-hundred percent kosher, so too your condition, by definition, must be not life-threatening.” This man's father therefore urged his son to stay in Volozhin and not move out to Switzerland where he would be putting himself in mortal risk. The son listened to his father's advice and ended up living into his eighties, despite having this lung disease.
Similar to interpreting dreams, a person with da'as Torah has the ability to define Torah she'ba'al peh. However, unlike interpreting dreams, one cannot do so unless one has worked on himself tremendously and achieved a level of emes and learning with a clarity. One cannot just force an explanation into Torah, it must follow the guidelines we have from Hashem for learning the Torah and must match with all the intricacies of Gemara and halacha. When there is a machlokes whether a certain illness is deemed as treif, it is not just a ruling pulled out of a hat. Rather, it is a conclusion drawn from mesorah (tradition), drashos (exegeses), and s'varos (logic). A person who is on the level to be a poseik for the Jewish people has the enormous responsibility to use correct s'varos to reach true halachos. The person who has trained his mind to think along the lines of da'as Hashem is able to convert that into p'sak halacha through speech.
Another basic result of man having the ability to act as a medium between the physical and spiritual world is that, with our thoughts and speech, we have the power to transform even the most mundane things we do into actions of kedusha. By saying brachos and having the right intentions, we could modify our lives to be one of eternal purpose.
Chanuka is the time when we celebrate these ideas. The Greeks tried to spread the Hellenistic culture throughout Europe and Asia. They were particular disturbed about Judaism because so many aspects of Judaism were so diametrically against their culture. We recite in “Al Hanisim” (“For the miracles”), that the Greeks wanted to “…Ulehaviram meichukei retzonecha…” (they wanted to remove us from Hashem's decrees). Chukim (decrees) are the mitzvos for which we do not know a reason. The reason that the Greeks were so adamant regarding the chukim was because the Greeks only believed in things that could make sense to the human brain. Only things that made sense scientifically were things which they believed to be true. Therefore Greeks heavily worshiped the human body and believed only in things having to do with the physical realm. As Jews, however, we do not limit our beliefs to things which are comprehensible to the human brain. Rather, we receive our charges from a source that is boundless in knowledge- the creator of the world Himself.
To better illustrate this message, take the following parable. Imagine you have two people sitting together in a restaurant. One is a food cognoscenti and the other happens to be the son of the chef. Both are given the same dish and are challenged to guess which ingredients it contains. The connoisseur takes a bite and moves it around in his mouth for a while and then states his conclusion: “Ah, this meat contains pepper, salt, minced onion, garlic dressing, bar-b-que sauce, and a pinch of oregano.” The son of the chef takes a quick bite, swallows, and declares, “I agree, I would just like to add one other thing- that there is a tiny drop of pumpkin juice.” The connoisseur turns to the son of the chef and calls him a liar, because he was so sure that he had not tasted any trace of pumpkin juice in the meat. The son of the chef turns to the connoisseur and says, “That may be true, but I know that my father always puts a tiny drop of pumpkin juice in all his recipes, so I know it must be in there.” Their argument is stemming from the following: a person tasting the food is only going to believe what a food consists of if he actually tastes it in there. The loyal son of the chef, though, trusts his father as to what was put in. After all, who would know better which ingredients are in a dish, than the chef himself.
We believe that there is a deep connection between our world and the spiritual one. Torah connects us to Hashem and when we think and speak in Torah we have the ability to tie these two worlds together.
The separation of Jewish and Hellenistic beliefs is what Chanukah is truly about. We can see this idea symbolized by the miracle of the olive oil. A single flask was somehow left undiscovered, untouched, and uninfluenced by the Hellenistic Greeks, later to be found by the Jewish people. As Yehuda HaMaccabee re-lit the Menorah in 165 B.C.E. with this very oil, he was showing that the continuity of the Jewish people lies within their purity and special identity.
The halacha is that even a poor person must sell what he owns in order to acquire the minimal amount to fulfill the obligation of lighting the menorah. One might ask, who gave the Rabbis the authority to make such a rule that the poor should sell their possessions and clothing to buy Chanukah candles? However, according to everything we have said so far, perhaps we could see their reasoning clearly. The Chanukah lights, with their unique requirement of parsumei neesah (publicizing the miracle), are a reminder of the separation between our ideology and that of the rest of the world. This is the foundation of being a Jew and for this it is worth giving up everything.
There is only one people in this world who have a Torah she'ba’al peh, and that of course is us. Torah she'ba’al peh is what separates us from the goyim. Everyone has a ‘bible’ of some sort, but only we have a Torah she'ba’al peh. It was this that the Greeks were fighting against – the irrational uniqueness of the Jews because of our oral law. The fact that we have the ability to make real differences in the nature of the world through various applications of Torah was something that the Greeks could not understand and would never admit to.
The Greeks made many decrees targeted specifically against Judaism. Among these decrees included the outlawing of performing bris milah, keeping Shabbos, and declaring the Rosh Chodesh each month. If one thinks about the decrees that the Greeks made against the Jews, it is hard to imagine why these specific decrees were made. Bris Milah is something which is kept private. Keeping Shabbos is at best being passive-aggressive. It is not like we do some religious Sabbath-dances or offer people as sacrifices, it is simply a day of rest. Neither of these seem to be things that the Greeks should have gotten so upset about. Even if we could come to an understanding as to why these decrees were made, we would still have to work hard to figure out why they would make a law against keeping Rosh Chodesh. Declaring the new moon is definitely not one of the things that come to mind first when thinking about the weird activities Jews do. What was the reason the Greeks chose to make these specific three decrees?
Perhaps with everything we have discussed until now we could understand the underlying interests and goals of the Greeks. The Greeks were fighting a war on spirituality. Unlike by the story of Purim when Antiochus and Haman wanted to wipe out the entire Jewish nation, the Greeks wanted to do no such thing. They wanted every Jew to convert their beliefs to Hellenism. The three most threatening mitzvos that they saw were exactly these three – bris milah, Shabbos, and Rosh Chodesh. When we do Bris Milah, we are taking the naturally created human body, and turning it into a source of kedusha by making a sign with Hashem. Shabbos is something intangible that we cannot feel or see, yet somehow we accept this invisible force and feel compelled to stop ourselves from doing certain activities. There is no room for such invisible forces within Hellenism. The Greeks believed only in what they were able to see and nothing more.
The concept of declaring Rosh Chodesh is really fascinating. This first mitzva that was given to the Jewish people as a whole, is one which commands the Sanhedrin to declare Rosh Chodesh. Every month is either malei (full – 30 days) or chaseir (missing – 29 days). This will depend on when the new moon is seen and when Beis Din officially declares it Rosh Chodesh. It is not too hard to understand the types of ramifications which could potentially occur as a result of Beis Din deciding when to declare the new moon. It could make a difference when a boy becomes a bar mitzva or when the Yomim Tovim (Holidays) fall out.
As a matter of fact, there is an incredible story in the Mishnayos which demonstrates this idea. The Mishnayos relate that Rabban Gamliel (the head of the Sanhedrin at the time) had diagrams of the shapes of the moon on his wall. He used to show these to the witnesses who would come testify about the new moon, and would point to these diagrams and ask, “Did you see it like this, or like that?”
One time, a pair of witnesses came in and said, “We saw it at its proper time”. However, on the following night it could not be seen. Yet, Rabban Gamliel accepted them as good witnesses. Rabbi Dosa ben Hurkanus, however, said that they were false witnesses, and Rabbi Yehoshua agreed that they were indeed false witnesses. Obviously, with this dispute, there would be major practical differences in the Jewish calendar, as they were arguing over what day of what month they were in.
Rabban Gamliel then sent a message ordering Rabbi Yehoshua to appear before him on the day that Yom Kippur fell out according to Rabbi Yehoshua's calculation with his staff and wallet in his hand. After Rabbi Yehoshua had received this letter, he was greatly troubled. Rabbi Akiva came to him and convinced him not to worried because whatever Rabban Gamliel rules is the truth. He explained that Rabban Gamliel is the leader of the generation, the head of the Sanhedrin HaGadol. What he says therefore represents the Toras emes and we cannot argue. Now confident, Rabbi Yehoshua took his staff and wallet on the day that he had calculated to be Yom Kippur (which Rabban Gamliel did not because of the difference in calculations) and he went to Rabban Gamliel. Upon seeing him, Rabban Gamliel stood up and kissed him on the head and said to him, “Come in peace, my master and my disciple! My master in wisdom, and my disciple because you have accepted my words.”
This principle, that Hashem gave the power to the Sanhedrin to literally change when the end of a month and beginning of the next would be, is what bothered the Hellenistic Greeks so much. A culture so steeped in the physical world and worshiping the body was not able to comprehend that Jews believe that there is a purpose of living in this world and that it is our job to turn physical things into spiritual experiences. We could transfuse a kedusha into anything. The way we explain and interpret Torah she'ba'al peh through da'as Torah has real ramifications on this world, and the way we define our actions alters the quality of what we do.
The Orchos Tzadikkim states that really, because of the strong connection our neshamos have with Hashem, we should be able to see the deep secrets of the world, and even see into the future. However, because our neshama spends so much time with our body, it is hard for us to tap into this resource. Only at night, when our body is asleep and the neshama is not working full-force to serve it and create a balance, do we have a chance at getting a glimpse at this truth. However, because our dreams are connected to our thoughts, and not all of our thoughts are emes, therefore not all of our dreams are emes. If one were to work on himself, though, and accustom oneself to only think pure and true thoughts, then at night such a person will be privileged to see ma'ros emes (visions of truth). In this way, one could know the future like malachim.
The gift of thought that Hashem gave to man is essentially a personal writing board in the spiritual realm. It is essential that we keep ourselves honest and real in order to keep this medium unadulterated. The one who is able to do this is someone who will be able to bring things from the intangible world and into our world. Such a person will be able to interpret dreams in a perfect way, will have the ability to understand the truth of Torah she'ba'al peh, and will be able to live life in another dimension – one which transfuses kedusha into even the most simple and mundane activities on Earth.
Every motzei Shabbos we recite in Havdalah, “Blessed are you, Hashem…who distinguishes between the sacred and the secular, between light and darkness, between Israel and the nations, between the seventh day and the six days of labor…” When we say this, we are thanking Hashem for making us special and lifting us above the other nations. The Mishna mentions a similar concept: “He [Rabbi Akiva] used to say: Beloved is man that was created in the image of G-d…. Beloved are the Jews that are called sons to Hashem…” We have to be proud of the fact that we are Jews, children of Hashem and princes to the one and only King. Furthermore, we must realize our responsibility to act as a light for the other nations to show that there is a Hashem who is involved in our daily lives, and that there is a real connection between the spiritual world of kedusha and this world. With the ability to think and speak comes an incredible responsibility to use these tools correctly and keep them pure in emes.
May Hashem help us see the light and continue the job that Yehuda HaMaccabee reignited, by assisting us in shining light over the darkness and being role models for the other nations to look up to.
