Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-1812) once told his
Chassidim: “One must live with the times.” The
Rebbe had neither Parisian literature nor Petersburg fashions
in mind, but the parshat hashavua, the weekly Torah
reading. The Torah is the Jew’s calendar, almanac and
“weekly planner”; the weekly Torah portion occupies
his mind, colors his mood, and is his point of reference
in the choices and dilemmas of daily life.
This week’s Torah portion, Vayechi (Genesis
47:28-50:26), begins with the verse: “And Jacob lived
for seventeen years in the land of Egypt.” Our sages
see in the number “17”—which is the numerical
value of the word tov, (“good”)[1]—an
allusion to the fact that these were the best years of Jacob’s
life.[2] Rabbi
Schneur Zalman of Liadi explains: as related earlier, Judah
had preceded Jacob to Egypt to establish “a house of
study from which would emanate Torah teaching,”[3]
making Egypt a spiritual as well as material[4] utopia for the children of Israel.[5]
Yet the verses immediately following relate Jacob’s
emphatic instruction to Joseph: “Do me a true kindness:
Please, do not bury me in Egypt... Carry me out of Egypt,
and bury me in the burial cave [of my ancestors in the Holy
Land].” Nor was Jacob content with an agreement or
promise on Joseph’s part, but insisted that his son
take an oath to fulfill his request.[6]
There is a lesson in this to each and every one of us today.
A Jew must constantly plead and demand: “Take me out
of Egypt!” He might find himself living a most ideal
life, a life of material comfort and spiritual fulfillment,
a life saturated with Torah, mitzvot and charitable works.
But galut (exile) can never be the true home of the
Jew. He must constantly feel that this is not his place,
constantly beseech G-d to take him out of Egypt.
He must not content himself with the guaranties and promises
written in the holy books that the redemption will eventually
come. After praying for the redemption in the morning prayers,
he must do so again in the afternoon prayers, and yet again
in the evening prayers. He must approach G-d every day,
many times a day, to plead and clamor: “Take me out
of Egypt!”
Based on an address by the Rebbe, Tevet 10, 5743 (December
26, 1982)
__________________
[1]. In the Holy Tongue, every letter is also a number,
so that each word also has a numerical value or gematria.
The three letters of the word tov add up to 17
(tet=9, vav=6, beit=2).
[2]. Baal HaTurim on verse; see Ohr HaTorah, Vayechi
354a.
[3]. Genesis 46:28; Rashi, ibid.
[4]. Jacob and his family were granted the most fertile
province in the land of Egypt, Goshen, where they lived
under the protection of Joseph, the viceroy and de
facto ruler of the land.
[5]. “When the Tzemach Tzedek (Rabbi Menachem Mendel
of Lubavitch, 1789-1866) was a young child, and he learned
the verse, ‘And Jacob lived for seventeen years in
the land of Egypt,’ his teacher interpreted the verse
according to the commentary of the Baal HaTurim: Jacob
lived the best seventeen years of his life in Egypt. When
the child came home from cheder, he asked his grandfather,
Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi: How can it be that the
best years of our father Jacob, ‘the choicest of
the Patriarchs,’ should be the years he lived in
Egypt, ‘the depravity of the land’? Replied
Rabbi Schneur Zalman: It is written: ‘And [Jacob]
sent Judah ahead of him... to show the way to Goshen.’
The Midrash explains that this was to establish a house
of learning, where the sons of Jacob would study Torah.
When one studies Torah, one is brought close to G-d, so
that even in Egypt one can live a true ‘life’
” (from a letter by Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak of Lubavitch,
quoted in Hayom Yom, Tevet 18).
