Parsha Miketz (Chanukah) - November 30, 2013

Parsha: Miketz (Chanukah)

Kislev 27/November 30 

By: Alexandra Hart 

The comment jolted my memory. Gerardo Joffe was recounting his escape from Germany 65 years ago to the day. The Gestapo officer who provided his exit visa said, “remember me" and so he did, although never seeing him again. Without the man, it's unlikely he'd have lived.

We read that particular comment from Joseph at the end of Vayeishev. He speaks to the butler who, having served his term, is released from prison, leaving Joseph behind. It sets the stage for the opening of Miketz and we see Joseph's release two years later at the start of our parshah.

The commentary on Joseph's request is extensive, ranging from criticism that previously he had been solely reliant on G-d and now he was turning for help from another, resulting in a delay of two years before being released.

It's suggested (Bereishis Rabbah 89 as well as the Ramchal) that each of his emphasized comments:  remember me' as well as 'mention me' added a further year. I wonder if there's any space for this being simply a moment of desperation, where Joseph is willing to cling to anything for help. Perhaps with the peculiar comment of the Gestapo officer, he knew what could happen to him and maybe he was shoring up support.

We're told that the butler forgot. There are times when we too forget. We become immersed in the everyday and sometimes we're all too keen to forget. Vasile Grossman (Life & Fate) writes on love unrequited, "He had lived without her before. He could get over it! In a year or so he'd be able to walk straight past her without his heart so much as missing a beat. He needed her as much as a drunk needs a cork! But he understood all too quickly how vain these thoughts were. How can you tear something out of your heart? Your heart isn't made out of paper and your life isn't written down in ink. You can't erase the imprint of years."

Joseph's brothers are slow to respond to the famine in Canaan. They too may be hoping for an alternative solution to materialize but it results in a rebuke from Yaacov, "why do you look at one another?" They are slow to step up and take responsibility to feed their family. This is not an inherently Jewish trait. Ordinarily, we as Jews are on the front line, taking care of each other and saving the world. Rabbi Sacks (Covenant & Conversation 5772, Miketz) writes just that. One of the IDF's cries is 'acharai!' ('after me!') and a group of Aish yeshiva students at the start of the first intifada, with soldiers and civilians killed in a short time, was beseeched with the words, "Israel's at war! What are you doing about it?"

The danger is in forgetting. In parshat Lech Lecha, G-d says to Abram, "your offspring shall be strangers in a land not their own." The Chasam Sofer writes, "the more we try to draw closer to the other nations, we forget Jerusalem and the more they place a yoke on us the more hated we become in their eyes." Rav Yisrael Salanter focuses on the philosophy of this posuk and writes, "they will not succeed in becoming citizens in the other lands and forgetting their own land."