Vayeshev: December 12, 2020/26 Kislev 5781

 After first being introduced to Jacob's sons in previous weeks, the narrative shifts from the Patriarchs to the first Israelites. The story picks up with Joseph, now 17, shepherding his father's flocks alongside his brothers. Now, being the firstborn of Rachel, Jacob's favorite wife, Joseph was the favorite child. In recognition of his special affection for Joseph, Jacob bought his son a k'tonet pasim, a striped or ornamented tunic, sometimes translated as a "coat of many colors." The 11 other sons of Jacob may have understood that the relationship between Jacob and Rachel would mean that her eldest son would always have a special place in their father's affection, but this obvious statement of how much more Joseph was loved (commentators understand the text to mean that Jacob loved Joseph more than all his other children combined) made the rest bitter, and understandably so. Joseph's coat annoyed his brothers, but what made them mad were the things that he would tell them of the dreams he often had. He would regale them with reports of dreams seeming to indicate that he foresaw his lording over them. There was the dream where 11 stars, the sun, and the moon all bowed down before the brightest star, and then there was the dream where all 12 of Jacob's sons were sheaving wheat, and the sheaves being bound by his brothers all bowed down before Joseph's sheaf. The accuracy of these dreams, the brothers did not know, but one thing they were sure about - the dreamer had to go.

One day, when Joseph went out to check on his brothers, they grabbed him and planned to murder him, throwing his body in a pit to make it appear that he was mauled to death by an animal. Reuben, the eldest of the brothers, makes the argument that, rather than kill their brother themselves, they ought to just throw him in the pit alive. The Torah lets us know that Reuben's intent is to return later and rescue Joseph, but the argument he makes to his brothers is, essentially, "We all want him dead, but killing people is wrong. Let's throw him in the hole, and he can starve to death." And the brothers accept that reasoning, even going so far, according to Chizkuni (the 12th-century French commentator Rabbi Hezekiah bar Manoah), as to move him to a different pit which had snakes and scorpions in it. As has been a running theme in this series, just because someone is a character upon whom we are supposed to look favorably, that doesn't mean they are a perfect person or that everything they do is a good thing, and this case is no different. Once they have thrown their brother into the pit, taking the special coat, they sit down to have lunch, and they notice a caravan of traders en route to Egypt. Deciding that maybe killing him is a little extreme, they decide to just sell him into slavery instead and get rid of him that way. Again, selling someone into slavery is a very bad thing; it's just maybe less bad than murdering them. And, as we will see in the future, perhaps Joseph's enslavement may have served a greater benefit than anyone could foresee. From there, the brothers go home, dipping the coat in blood and tell their father that Joseph has been killed (and if you believe Andrew Lloyd Webber, singing a country song about it).

Reuben, by all rights, ought to have been the leader of the Israelites. After all, he was the firstborn, and Jacob even calls him "my might and the first fruit of my strength, exceeding in honor and exceeding in glory" in his blessing to his sons on his deathbed. Why then does Reuben not get the status befitting his birth order? Why is temporal power vested in the tribe of Judah and spiritual authority in the descendants of Levi? The late Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, former Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom, describes Reuben as lacking confidence in his role, connecting the weak advocacy for his younger brother with previous episodes where Reuben's attempt to help backfires - the incident where he picks mandrakes (which were reputed to have an aphrodisiac effect) and shows them to his mother, Leah, sparking a fight between her and her sister and the famous story where, after the death of Rachel, Reuben supposedly sleeps with Bilhah, Rachel's handmaid and Jacob's concubine. Only, that's not necessarily what happened. The Talmud relates that what Reuben did was actually just move the beds around so that Jacob would stay in Leah's tent. It was one thing to have her be the unfavorite compared to her co-wife, but having to play second banana to a concubine seemed unfair to Reuben. However, in the episode with Joseph, it doesn't seem to be a lack of confidence that plagues Jacob's eldest son, but rather a lack of decisiveness. He could have told his brothers to stop their plotting and that it was wrong to try to kill someone, whether directly or indirectly. Had he more effectively lobbied for Joseph's safety, convincing the other 11 to abandon their fratricidal intentions rather than planning a surreptitious rescue, it would not have happened that Joseph ended up in slavery in Egypt. But, seeing his righteous intentions, our sages say that this is why when the Children of Israel would eventually enter the Land of Israel, the Cities of Refuge (a legal construct to protect those who commit involuntary manslaughter) went on to be established in the territory of the Reubenites.