{"id":3098,"date":"2019-01-02T01:24:08","date_gmt":"2019-01-02T01:24:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marcmangel.net\/?page_id=3098"},"modified":"2019-01-02T01:24:08","modified_gmt":"2019-01-02T01:24:08","slug":"vayeishev-5779","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/?page_id=3098","title":{"rendered":"VaYeishev (5779)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Drash Cards for VaYeishev 5779<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>by Marc Mangel<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Susan and I are sponsoring the Kiddush as a kind of thank you\/celebration for the continued recovery from my knee replacement.<\/li>\n<li>Recovery is a process: one is both healing and far from healed. Every day I can do a bit more than I could even a day before, and certainly than a week before.\u00a0 I am healing.\u00a0 However, I am quite unable to do the things that I used to do &#8212; the PTs ask me to assess my status relative to where I want to be.\u00a0 The lowest value they have is 1 out of 5 and I am still there (but hope to move up to 2 out of 5 soon!).\u00a0 I am far from healed.<\/li>\n<li>Our reading from the Torah today (Ch 39:1 to the end of the parsha) emphasizes the importance of process. Here\u2019s my focal question: why did Joseph have to get thrown into prison.<\/li>\n<li>Ch 39, v2-5: \u201c[Joseph] became a successful man, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master\u2026[Potiphar] put him in charge of his household, entrusting all that he owned to his care. As soon as he had put him in charge of his household and all that he owned, God blessed the Egyptian\u2019s household in Joseph\u2019s merit. God\u2019s blessing was evident in everything that Potiphar had, both in the house and the field.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>We then have the incident with Potiphar\u2019s wife and Joseph ending up in prison (v 7-20).<\/li>\n<li>But in prison [v 21-23] \u201cGod was with Joseph and made him well-liked [among the inmates]. God also made the warden of the prison favor him. The warden of the prison placed all the prisoners who were in the prison in Joseph\u2019s charge, and whatever was done there was done under Joseph\u2019s direction. The warden of the prison could not find fault in anything that was under Joseph\u2019s charge, and God granted him success in whatever he did\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>We then have the story of the cupbearer and baker, their dreams, and the outcomes (cupbearer restored, baker hung \u2013 with some interesting Midrashim about why).<\/li>\n<li>But here\u2019s an alternative story line: God makes Potiphar recognize how exceptional Joseph is and then Potiphar tells Pharaoh about him, saying \u201cThis is somebody you can use\u201d and Pharoah appoints Joseph immediately. We avoid prison, and the stories of the baker and cup-bearer. After all, Joseph could have just as easily interpreted Pharoahs\u2019 dreams if he were already in an administrative position.<\/li>\n<li>Why don\u2019t we have that story line?<\/li>\n<li>The answer is this. The incident with Potiphar\u2019s wife and prison has to happen because it is necessary for Joseph\u2019s maturation and development. \u00a0Beginning with encountering the man when looking for his brothers, Joseph is undergoing a process.\u00a0 No matter how good his organizational and administrative skills are in Potiphar\u2019s house, Joseph is not fully ready for the task ahead of him.\u00a0 He needs the prison time and experience as part of the process to make him the leader he needs to be. It is all about process, not end point.<\/li>\n<li>The same is true with our own spiritual development: it is a process. Indeed, the word for Jewish law is \u201cHalacha\u201d\u00a0 &#8212; to be observant is to be on a path.\u00a0 It is the process of going on the path that matters, not the end point.<\/li>\n<li>Torah reading is a good example. Nobody is born knowing how to read Torah. Learning to do it is a process: learn how to read Hebrew, learn the trope, develop the confidence to stand in front of people (of which there are two kinds \u2013 those who know how hard it is to read the Torah and are thus forgiving and those who are not yet on the path and so are in awe of anybody who does), and then to get better and better with practice. It is a process.<\/li>\n<li>Spiritual development is a never-ending process for everyone. In his commentary on this week\u2019s portion, Rabbi Michael Fine (Modern Orthodox), tells the following story about Moshe Feinstein, one of the three luminaries of Orthodox Judaism in the 20<sup>th<\/sup> century, the others being the Lubavitcher Rebbe and the Rav Soleveitchik.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cIt is reported that Rav Moshe\u2019s wife once urged him to sleep later than this customary 4 am rising. He responded that if he got up any later, his Torah learning would suffer and he would remain ignorant. This statement came at a point in his life when he had the entire world\u2019s respect as <em>gadol hador<\/em>, a leader of the generation.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cRav Moshe understood that even he needed to strive continually, and that no success comes automatically, and at the same time he understood the significance of his personal Torah study. He knew the meaning of the world having been created for him \u2013 and he urged others to recognize this truth and to act upon it\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Let us all act in the process of our spiritual development knowing that the world was created for each one of us.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Drash Cards for VaYeishev 5779 by Marc Mangel Susan and I are sponsoring the Kiddush as a kind of thank you\/celebration for the continued recovery from my knee replacement. Recovery is a process: one is both healing and far from healed. Every day I can do a bit more than I could even a day &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/?page_id=3098\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":51,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"full-width-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-3098","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3098"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3099,"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3098\/revisions\/3099"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/51"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcmangel.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}