Tag: Vayigash

Protection!

Tomorrow, Friday December 22, is the public fast day of Asarah B’Teves – The Tenth day of the Hebrew month of Teves. Our prophets established it as a day of fasting to commemorate a tragic event that took place in our history on this day. As we are well aware, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem …

Continue reading

Pristine Scroll!

I’ll share some of the laws and traditions involved in the writing of a Sefer Torah.   Hashem entrusted us, His special nation Klal Yisroel, with the responsibility of representing Him in this world by upholding and observing the Torah He gave to us. On the last day of his life, our leader Moshe wrote …

Continue reading

Emotional Reunion!

  The Torah describes the emotional reunion that Yosef had with his brother Binyamin. “He fell upon the neck of Binyamin his brother and wept; and Binyamin wept upon the ‘necks’ of Yosef.” Rashi explains the deeper meaning behind what occurred. Although both brothers were weeping tears of joy over their reunion after a separation …

Continue reading

Oh Boy!

Almost every year Parsha Mikeitz is host to Chanukah and we read the Haftorah connected to Chanukah themes. This overrides the Haftorah that is associated with the theme of Miketz which concerns dreams. Last week, when Parshas Mikeitz was after Chanukah, the Haftorah for Miketz that deals with the famous and intriguing story of King …

Continue reading

Huge Celebration!

Yesterday, on the first of January, in the North American Continent alone, hundreds of thousands of Jews in more than 100 cities convened to take part in a celebration of the Siyum Hashas which occurs once every seven and a half years. This celebration marks the completion of a cycle of learning the entire Babylonian …

Continue reading

Remedy Depression!

For twenty-two long years our forefather Yaacov mourned continuously over the loss of his beloved son Yosef. The Torah relates that all of Yaacov’s children tried to comfort him during this time, but he rejected their words and remained in a state of despair. The question raised is, usually when one faces a devastating loss, …

Continue reading

Optimism!

(Torah Portion Vayigash) Optimism! In the Book of Iyov – Job, the verse states, “He (G-d) placed a limit on darkness.” The Medrash says that this refers to Yosef, and explains, “G-d fixed the amount of time that Yosef would be in jail.” Rabbi Shimon Shwalb o.b.m. explains: Yosef languished in jail for twelve years …

Continue reading

Reunion

(Torah Portion Vayigash) Reunion! Our forefather Yaacov continually mourned over the loss of his beloved son Yosef for twenty-two years. He suddenly received the surprising and wonderful news that Yosef was alive and was the Viceroy of Egypt. Yaacov, at the age of one hundred and thirty years, journeyed with his entire family from Israel …

Continue reading

Our Heroes

(Torah Portion Vayigash) Our Heroes Yosef, who had become the Viceroy of Egypt, came face to face with his brothers, who twenty-two years earlier, had sold him as a slave. Yosef recognized his brothers; however they did not recognize him. Yosef saw this event as an actualization of his prophetic dreams which had predicted that …

Continue reading

Cant you tell its Me

(Torah Portion Vayigash) Can’t You Tell It’s Me! There was a severe famine in the Land of Israel and our forefather Yaacov sent ten of his sons to Egypt to obtain food. The Land of Egypt was also experiencing a famine; however, because of Yosef’s foresight, Egypt had a stockpile of food, and was able …

Continue reading