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In this week’s parshah, Mikketz, Joseph, age 30, is appointed second in command of all Egypt, entrusted with the task of saving the country from starvation by collecting surplus food during the seven years of plenty and redistributing it during the coming years of famine.  Pharaoh elevates Joseph from prisoner to vizier, appointing him to this daunting task with the following charge:

אתה תהיה על־ביתי ועל־פיך ישק כל־עמי רק הכסא אגדל ממך

“You will be over all of my house,
by your mouth/command all of my people will X;
Only with respect to the throne will I be greater than you.”  (Genesis 41:40).

This is clearly quite a coup for Joseph, conferring on him an office of almost unimaginable power.  Yet the exact nature of Joseph’s role remains unclear to us because of the most unusual language Pharaoh chose:  v’al pichah (by your mouth/command) yishak (will X?) kol ami (all of my people).  The rabbis struggle with how to understand the word yishak/ישק in this context.  It can potentially have several different meanings, which, given the context, can impact how we understand the role Joseph played in Egypt.

Rashi, the great 11th century French commentator, understands this word to mean “will be fed/provided for,” a clear reference to Joseph’s role overseeing the distribution of food during the coming years of famine.  For proof, he cites Genesis 15:2, where Abraham’s chief servant is referred to as ben meshek beiti/בן משק ביתי – “the one in charge of my household.”  Rashi understands the word yishak/ישק to come from the same root as meshek/משק, which, in the case of Abraham, meant the person in charge of making sure the household was fed and provided for.  This interpretation envisions Joseph’s role as caretaker of the people of Egypt.

Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra, the 12th century Spanish scholar, suggests that yishak/ישק comes from the root neshek/נשק – “weapon.”  Ibn Ezra understands Pharaoh’s charge to mean: “By your command will my people be armed” and suggests that Joseph was actually the head of the military, responsible for arming the soldiers in time of war.  This suggests a much different role for Joseph, but one that makes sense in light of the years of famine that lie ahead.  Scarcity of resources always brings with it the likelihood of violence or war.  Placing an inspired leader in charge of the military would have been a sensible precaution for Pharaoh to take.

Rav Sa’adia Gaon, writing in 10th century Babylonia, suggests a third meaning.  Rav Sa’adia translates yishak/ישק as yitnaheig/יתנהג – “to conduct oneself” – a statement that the authority Pharaoh is vesting in Joseph is absolute.  Anything Joseph commands, the people must obey.  By this reading of the text, the word yishak/ישק comes from the root nashak/נשק – “to kiss.”  Literally translated, the phrase means: “all of my people will kiss your mouth,” using the image of two sets of lips pressed together to express how the people of Egypt will cleave to Joseph’s command (“his mouth”).

The image Rav Sa’adia’s reading suggests is quite striking.  But what does the Torah gain by using such an unusual colloquialism?  If the Torah were merely trying to convey Joseph’s absolute control over the people, it could have used much more straightforward language, as it does several verses later: “I am Pharaoh, yet without you no one shall lift his hand or his foot in all the land of Egypt.” (Gen. 41:44).

I would like to suggest that the wording of this phrase reflects Pharaoh’s advice to Joseph on how to exercise his authority.  Many people in Joseph’s position throughout history have used their power to rule by fear.  We have seen in our own day how dictators have used starvation as a tool of oppression, securing their people’s subservience, but also their hatred.  By using the image of lips kissing, Pharaoh is suggesting to Joseph to wield his power with benevolence, using it to win the people’s love and affection, while still accomplishing the grave task at hand.

While few of us will ever hold the kind of power Joseph held, this is a lesson of leadership we can apply at any level.  Whether as a supervisor at work, a parent at home, or in a position of communal responsibility, we all have important things that we exercise authority to get done.  And, to be sure, leadership often times requires making unpleasant decisions.  But how we exercise authority can make all the difference.  Do we lead with integrity and fairness?  Do we exercise authority with compassion?  Are we sensitive to the human impact of the decisions that we make?  In the long run, how we lead and how we make decisions will be remembered more than most of the individual decisions themselves.

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The Talmud (Shabbat 21b) presents two opinions about the proper way to light a menorah on Chanukah.  Beit Shammai (the School of Shammai) hold that one should light eight lights on the first night and reduce the number by one each successive night.  Beit Hillel hold that one should begin with a single light and increase the number of lights by one each night until the full eight lights burn on the last evening.  Like most instances in which Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel disagree, we follow Beit Hillel, as we know from our practice today.  But what is at stake in these two opinions?  What can we learn about the meaning of this holiday from the way we light our candles?

The discussion in the Talmud continues with R. Yosi bar Avin and R. Yosi bar Zavid offering two opinions of why each school argued the way it did.  One sage suggests that these answers relate to the passing of time: Beit Shammai lit lights to count how many days of Chanukah remained, while Beit Hillel counted how many days had passed.  According to the other opinion (the Talmud does not tell us which opinion belonged to which sage), Beit Shammai’s lights represented the sacrifices offered on Sukkot, which the Book of Maccabees tells us was celebrated belatedly as part of the original Chanukah celebration, which descended in number each day.  Beit Hillel’s practice of increasing the number of lights, on the other hand, reflects the rabbinic principle: “we increase holiness, we do not decrease it.”

This second explanation of Beit Hillel’s position reflects a beautiful principle that the Sages use to guide many aspects of practice in the Jewish tradition.  But how does this principle manifest itself in our lives today?  What difference will this ultimately make if we go from one candle to eight, or eight to one?

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Life in the 21st century seems to pass faster than it ever has before, our time consumed by personal and professional obligations that grow more numerous by the day.  In the midst of these demands, how often do we take the time to stop and really think about our own needs and our well-being as individuals and as families?

In this week’s parsha, Vayishlach, we find Yaakov in his ancient equivalent of 21st century overcommitment.  Yaakov, who fled Canaan 20-years before with nothing more than his staff, returns from his uncle’s house in Paddan Aram with considerable responsibility: four wives, 11 sons and one daughter to provide for, servants to manage, and great wealth in livestock to oversee.  And if that weren’t enough, Yaakov returns to his family’s home with the burden of a great destiny to fulfill.  What has been passed down to him by family tradition has been confirmed to him by God: he will inherit the land of Canaan and become the progenitor of all Israel.  His children will grow as numerous as the stars in the sky and the grains of sand on the beach.

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In this week’s parsha, Vayetzei, we read about Yaakov’s encounter at the well near the city of Haran after a long journey from his father’s house in the land of Canaan.  As he approaches the well, Yaakov finds three flocks of sheep and their shepherds resting nearby, and a large stone covering the opening of the well.  The Torah tells us that when all the flocks grazing in the area gathered each day, the shepherds would move the giant stone and water their flocks, and then roll the stone back into place.

When Yaakov reaches the well, he asks the shepherds where they are from and inquires about his uncle Lavan, whom he has traveled from the land of Canaan to see. After this exchange, Yaakov admonishes the shepherds: “It is still broad daylight, too early to round up the animals; water the flock and take them to pasture.” (Gen. 29:7-8)  In response, they explain what the Torah has already informed us: they have to wait until all of the flocks gather in order to move the rock and draw water for their animals.  Immediately after, Rachel, our ancestor, appears at the well with her family’s sheep and the attention of the narrative turns to the relationship that develops between her family and Yaakov as they go on to become the progenitors of all Israel.

In reading the story of Yaakov at the well, we generally focus on the main narrative of Yaakov meeting Rachel, which, of course, is of central importance to our history as a people.  But in focusing exclusively on this connection, we neglect the other details of the story which, if less well known, have much to teach us about the world in which Yaakov and Rachel lived, and about our own.  For instance, why did the shepherds of this region stop up their well with a giant stone?  What are we to make of Yaakov’s admonishment of the shepherds?  Why is the Torah bothering to tell us this in the first place?

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The Book of Genesis is full of stories of difficult family dynamics.  In this week’s parsha, Toldot, we read about Rivka’s plot to to make sure that Yaakov, her favored, younger son, receives the special blessing reserved for the first born from his father Yitzchak before Yitzchak’s death.  By dressing Yaakov up in his older brother’s clothes and arming Yaakov with freshly cooked meat, prepared just as his father likes, Rivka succeeds in ensuring that Yaakov, our father, is blessed to be next in line for the Abrahamic covenant, destined to be the progenitor of all Israel.

For many of us, this incident is difficult.  How could Rivka, our righteous ancestor, engage in such blatant deceit?  How could a wife take advantage of her husband’s old age and infirmity to gain the upper hand in privileging her favored son over his? How could it be that our beginnings as a people, living in covenantal relationship with God, could emerge from a deception that contradicts the very essence of our covenant, the basic norms of ethical behavior incumbent upon us as Jews?

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In this week’s parshah, Vayera, we see one of the great moments of chutzpah in Jewish history.  When informed by God about God’s plan to destroy the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, Avraham, our ancestor, challenges God, calling out the Source of Justice for all the World for planning to destroy the righteous people of these cities along with the wicked.  In response, God and Avraham start to bargain: If there are 50 righteous people, will You destroy the city?  No, I won’t.  How about 45?  Nope – I won’t do that either.  40? 30?  20?  10?  No, I’ll spare the whole city on behalf of those few righteous souls.

If you were Avraham, how far would you have bargained?  On account of how many righteous souls was it justifiable to save the wicked people of Sodom?

Avraham could have bargained simply to save the righteous while letting God destroy the wicked without protest.  Our Sages spill much ink in the Talmud telling us just how wicked they were.  But Avraham feels compelled to try to save them, using the righteous people of the city as an excuse to save every human life possible.

Given this goal, I find myself each year questioning Avraham’s stopping when he did.   Why 10?  If his goal were to save the wicked people of the city on account of the few righteous people who may be left, why not bargain down to one?  What an amazing statement that would be that God, the Source of Justice of all the World, is willing to save all the wicked of the city on account of the one righteous person in their midst!

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The Torah is a book that explores what it means to be human.  The Book of Genesis, especially, presents story after story that delves into the pain and joy and messiness of the human condition.

In this week’s parshah, we read about Sarai, our ancestor, and the great pain she endures as a result of infertility.  When we first encountered Sarai at the end of last week’s parshah, the very first thing the Torah told us about her, other than her being’s Avram’s wife, was that she was barren, unable to have children.  This introduction provides us a glimpse of how central this experience of pain was in Sarai’s life.

In this week’s parshah, the Torah gives us rich details that help us understand the depth and texture of Sarai’s pain.   When she tells Avram:  עצרני ה’ מלדת – “God has kept me from bearing children” (Gen. 16:2) – we learn about Sarai’s feeling of helplessness, her sense that the problem is beyond her control, that it comes from God and that she can’t do anything about it.

We feel her desperation as Sarai gives her servant Hagar to her husband Avram as a wife in a kind of surrogacy arrangement in which her servant’s child will sort of be her own, and her household will sort of be built up through her servant.  But only sort of.

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In this week’s parshah, we  read of the great flood that God sends to destroy life on Earth after people had become unbearably corrupt.  Lest life be completely lost from the planet, God chooses Noach and his family – the last, best man on Earth – to survive the flood and repopulate our species.

After commanding Noach to build an ark on which his family and the animals will ride out the flood, Gods says to Noach:

אני הנני מביא את המבול מים על הארץ

“For my part, I am about to bring the Flood (mabool) – waters upon the earth.” (Genesis 6:17)

The wording of God’s declaration seems to be repetitive: Why does God need to say that a flood is coming and then specify “waters upon the earth”?

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As my fourth day without electricity draws toward a close, I am acutely aware of my appreciation of the United Illuminating Company, whose absence during these days has affected many of my daily habits and routines, while leaving me peaceful evenings to relax by the candlelight in an otherwise dark house.  If this has caused me some significant, if certainly bearable, level of inconvenience, it has also been a profound way to spend Rosh Chodesh Elul, the beginning of the month leading up to the high holidays during which we begin our yearly process of self-reflection and repentance.

An extended blackout actually seems like quite an appropriate way to move into Elul.  Deprivation has a long and honored place in the Jewish tradition as a tool of self-reflection and repentance. Fasting, in particular, remains a widespread practice at critical points on the Jewish calendar.  By depriving ourselves of food and drink, we attempt to focus ourselves inward to consider our failings as individuals and as a community and to resolve to do better in the future.  Yet, this practice often times seems forced, since the deprivation we experience is voluntary and its duration predefined.  Too often, fast days become an exercise in endurance, counting down the hours and minutes until the moment when we can break the fast, rather than a true experience of reflection.

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The book of Devarim (Deuteronomy) that we began last week recounts the terms of the covenant between God and the people of Israel.  One of the central terms of the covenant is the prohibition of worshiping idols.  We read this week that if the people, once they are settled in the land, turn to worshiping idols, they will be wiped out, and the remaining few will be sent into exile in a foreign land.  And what will happen in that foreign land?  “There you will serve man-made gods, wood and stone, that cannot see and cannot hear and cannot eat and cannot smell.”  (Deut. 4:28)

When I first read this list of things that the idols cannot do, I assumed this was just a way of saying that these idols were inert, lifeless pieces of wood and stone.  But I think this list is actually more deliberate than that.  This list of things that the idols cannot do – seeing, hearing, eating, smelling – is actually a list of things that the Torah specifically tells us God does do.  For instance, when God and Moses meet at the burning bush, God begins by telling Moses: “I have seen the suffering of My people in Egypt and I have heard their cry.”  (Ex. 3:7)  And in the sections of the Torah describing the sacrifices, the Torah refers to them as God’s lechem - God’s food – and food is eaten.  Likewise, the burnt offerings are frequently referred to as reyach nichoach l’Adonai – a pleasing scent for God.  So in telling us what the idol cannot do, the Torah is actually saying: This idol cannot do what your God can do.  It did not see your plight in Egypt.  It did not hear your cry.  It cannot accept your sacrifices or find them pleasing.

But there is something missing.