parashat vayeshev Destiny Done Differently
The weekly Torah portion read in synagogues around the world this week is parashat vayeshev. Parashat vayeshev runs from Genesis chapter 37 verse 1 to chapter 40 verse 43. We’ll read only chapter 37 verses 14-17
“He said to him, ‘Go now and see regarding the shalom of your brothers and the shalom of the flock and bring word back to me.’ So he sent him from the Hebron valley and he arrived in Shkhem. A man found him. Now behold, he was wondering in the field. The man asked him, saying, ‘What are you looking for?’ He said, ‘I’m looking for my brothers. Tell me please where they’re pasturing’ The man said to him, ‘They journeyed from here, for I heard them saying, ‘Let’s go to Dotan.’ So Yosef went after his brothers and found them in Dotan.”
Our Torah doesn't normally devote space to realistic dialogue. What's the point of including this conversation of how Yosef catches up to his brothers in Dotan? The point is that if Yosef had continued wandering in the field without locating his brothers, he’d have gone home. If Yosef hadn’t met someone who knew where his brothers were, he wouldn’t have gone on to be sold into slavery—to be brought down to Egypt—to be wrongfully imprisoned—to interpret Pharaoh’s dream—to save his family from starvation. If Yosef hadn’t met somebody with directions in the field at Shkhem, he wouldn’t have met up with his destiny.
All the normal factors conspired to prevent the realization of Yosef’s destiny: his father’s favoritism, his brothers’ hatred, the boss’s wife’s accusation. Yet these adverse circumstances are what combine to facilitate the realization of his destiny and his dreams.
But can destiny happen only one way? Could God have saved Yosef’s brothers from famine without their betrayal and without Potifer’s wife’s accusation? Could God have maybe arranged another way to feed the world?
The place was Bismark, North Dakota. An army wife in that remote frontier outpost announced that this year she’d be hosting a Christmas party. Being remote from trees, as well as from civilization, some of the soldiers fashioned a mock tree from bunches of sage and cedar brush. The soldiers cut tin stars from discarded tin cans. The soldiers covered nuts with silver paper from cigar wrappers. The refreshments were likewise improvised with considerable ingenuity. The mailman delivered fresh eggs inside his buckskin shirt. He kept the eggs against his bare skin to prevent them from freezing. From those precious eggs, together with condensed milk and gelatin, Mrs. Katherine Gibson concocted ice cream.
The Christmas party was a big hit. After midnight, when all had retired to quarters, Mrs. Gibson was cleaning up by candlelight. She was startled by the faces of native children pressed up against her living-room window. The children were fascinated by the Christmas tree with its colorful decorations.
Cautiously, Mrs. Gibson opened the door to invite them inside. The children remained frozen in place, until the tallest boy dragged a shivering little girl inside. The others followed single file. They were shy, but curiosity had gotten the better of them.
Mrs. Gibson led them to the odd-looking tree in the middle of her living room. She found a small present under the tree and gave it to the little girl. Before long the rest of the children were helping themselves to the decorations on the tree.
Mrs. Gibson plied her unexpected guests with hot chocolate, popcorn and what was left of the ice cream. She went upstairs looking for whatever warm clothing she could find. When she came downstairs with her disbelieving officer husband, the children were dancing around the tree, chanting and clapping their hands in perfect rhythm. Faster and faster they circled the tree, until the circle collapsed on the floor in a fit of giggles. Before they disappeared into the darkness, Mrs. Gibson gave each child something warm: mittens, a scarf, a blanket, leggings.
The party between enemies was a success because the innocence of children overcame the suspicions of their elders. The party was a success because somebody remembered hospitality. That’s what happened in 1875 at the winter quarters of the US 7th Cavalry.
Every American knows the rest of the story. During the new year the white man continued to ride the path of broken promises. The “Great White Father” in Washington, D.C. determined to settle the native population behind barbed wire. In desperation the Dakota people painted their bodies and took to the warpath.
On June 25, 1876 the scouts of Sitting Bull detected the approaching detachment of the 7th Cavalry without giving away their own position. At the Little Bighorn, the Dakota warriors overran Lt. Colonel Custer’s hasty defense and wiped out the 7th Cavalry, including Katherine Gibson’s husband.
The Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876 is the history that was; the Christmas party in 1875 shows us the history that could have been. The fact that people of two very different cultures were capable of relating to one another for a few happy hours proves that the Battle of Little Bighorn could have been averted. What if someone had thought differently? Americans could have shared a different history.
God is not locked into doing destiny only one particular way, and we should never feel locked in, as though only one fate awaits us. God does not have only one design for your life. God is supremely flexible. God has a thousand ways of achieving his purpose. Destiny can be done differently. The small moments in life demonstrate things could be done differently.
According to ancient Jewish tradition the man in the field at Shkem was an angel sent by God to put Yosef back on track with his destiny and his dreams. Midrash Tanchuma,
“’Now a man found him,’ ― A man spoken of here is none other than Gabriel. As Scripture says, ‘The man Gabriel who I had seen in vision’ (Daniel 9:21).” [Tanchuma vayeshev 2]
Midrash Tanchuma exploits Daniel 9 as a prooftext for the notion that the man who finds Yosef was the angel Gabriel. Daniel 9 calls the angel Gabriel “the man,” so Midrash Tanchuma suggests “the man” in Genesis 37 was also Gabriel. Rashi in his commentary on Genesis follows Midrash Tanchuma in this regard.
Genesis Rabba suggests three angels found Yosef in the field at Shkem.
“Said Rabbi Yanai, ‘Three angels appeared unto him: number one, ‘A man found him,’ (Genesis 37:15) number two ‘the man send him,’ (37:15) number three ‘the man said.’ (37:17)’” [Genesis Rabba 94,15]
Genesis Rabba derives the number three from the three explicit references to the man in Genesis 37. Presumably, had the Torah wanted to indicate only one angel, it would have used pronouns for repeated references. Since the Torah repeats the noun “the man” three times, Genesis Rabba presumes three different angels were involved.
Ramban follows the midrash in speaking about angels in Genesis 37, but for Ramban angels aren’t necessarily supernatural creatures. For Ramban angels can be human.
“For the Holy One blessed be he arranged Yosef a guide, unbeknownst to him, to bring him into the hands of his brothers. This is the intent of our Sages when they said that these men are angels. Not for nothing the story happened, but to inform us that ‘The council of HaShem is what shall stand’ (Proverbs 19:21).” [Ramban on Genesis 37:15]
An Israeli pilot tells the story that three years after the Six Day War, the border with Syria began to heat up. He was ordered to fly low level at supersonic speed over the business district in Aleppo in order to send a warning to the Syrian government. He carried out the mission, and the border promptly settled down.
Ten years later, the pilot was driving from Haifa to Tel Aviv when he picked up a hitchhiker in IDF uniform. He discovered that his passenger was a Syrian Jew whose family had made aliya by walking all the way from Aleppo. The hitchhiker recounted the following story.
He was just the age for his bar mitzva when an Israel plane buzzed the business section in Aleppo at low level right near his parent’s house. The sonic boom was deafening; everybody had a good scare. Storefronts shattered up and down the street. Although thankfully nobody was hurt, damage was considerable. From the hitchhiker’s perspective it was a great miracle, since only the Syrian stores had their display windows shattered; nothing happened to the Jewish stores. As a result, his father decided it was time to leave Syria and move to Israel. Many other Jewish families in Aleppo did the same.
When the pilot who flew the mission first heard the story, he had a perfectly naturalistic explanation. The Syrians didn’t allow Jewish businessmen to front their stores on the main street, but only along side streets. Since he flew parallel to the main drag, Jewish shops weren’t affected by the sonic boom. But the more he thought about it, the pilot realized he was an messenger sent from God to bring a Jewish family out of Syria while the going was good. Ordinary events can be miraculous.
Ramban writes in his commentary that this conviction in hidden miracles is the very foundation of our Torah.
ומן הנסים הגדולים המפורסמים אדם מודה בנסים הנסתרים שהם יסוד התורה כלה, שאין לאדם חלק בתורת משה רבינו עד שנאמין בכל דברינו ומקורינו שכלם נסים אין בהם טבע ומנהגו של עולם בין ברבים בין יחיד. “And from the recognition of the large-scale miracles a person is led to acknowledge the hidden miracles, which constitute the foundation of the entire Torah. For a person has no portion in the Torah of Moshe our Teacher until he or she believes all our affairs and chance occurrences are miraculous, that they are not due to nature or the routine of the world, whether public or private.” [Ramban on Exodus 13:1]
End of quotation. To pray as children of Avraham and Sara is to perceive God’s hand in the routine of everyday of events. For all of us who are their children, this is our heritage. There’s nothing in your life, however terrible or trivial it may seem to you, that’s beyond his concern. Nothing in God’s world is ordinary. Your life too is a series of hidden miracles. What we call “chance” or “coincidence” does not escape his supervision. Hebrews 11:6.
“Without confidence it is impossible to be acceptable, for it is necessary that the person praying to God has confidence that he is and that he proves a wagepayer to those who seek him.”
