Ilustration Credit: Rivka Tsinman
Midrash מִדְרָשׁ
What can we learn from the brothers’ suffering?
Yosef’s goblet is found in Binyamin’s bag. The brothers believe that now Binyamin will be taken as a slave, and they tear their clothes in mourning (Bereishit 44:13).
"וַיִּקְרְעוּ שִׂמְלֹתָם" - אָמַר לָהֶם הַקָּדוֹשׁ בָּרוּךְ הוּא, אַתֶּם גְּרַמְתֶּם לִקְרֹעַ בִּגְדֵי אֲבִיכֶם בְּדָבָר שֶׁל חִנָּם, כָּךְ תִּקְרְעוּ אַתֶּם עַל דָּבָר שֶׁל חִנָּם.
“They tore their clothing” - The Holy Blessed One said to them: You caused your father to tear his clothes in sadness for no reason (when he thought Yosef had been killed) (when he thought Yosef had been killed), so now you will tear your clothes in sadness for no reason (now that you think Binyamin will become a slave).
This midrash connects the brothers’ tearing now to the time when the brothers sold Yosef into slavery and lied to Yaakov about it, making him think Yosef had been killed. Because of the brothers’ actions, Yaakov tore his clothing in his sadness and pain (see last week’s parashah; Bereishit 37:34). The punishment they experience now is an example of what Hazal call מִדָּה כְּנֶגֶד מִדָּה (middah k’neged middah, measure for measure), which means something like “the punishment fits the crime.”
We saw the idea of middah k’neged middah last year in Devash for Vaera, as an explanation for the מַכּוֹת (makkot, plagues), and how God punished the Egyptians in ways that fit how they hurt Benei Yisrael.
When punishments are middah k’neged middah, it helps us see justice and fairness in the world, and also helps us understand the consequences of our own behavior.
- What can we learn from the way the brothers suffer in this story? What does it teach us about what they had previously done wrong?
- This midrash focuses on the pain the brothers caused to their father, Yaakov. What was so wrong about that? What about the pain they caused Yosef - what might be the punishment for that?
- What’s it like to receive a punishment that feels “random” or unconnected to what you did? What are the kinds of punishments you learn and grow from, and what punishments are not that way?
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