Rabbi's Derasha

In addition to the Bar Mitzva, there are other celebrations today.  Two longtime members of the community will be getting married soon.  One was the Kohen this morning (Yoel Mlynash), who is getting married in a month.  The other (Joseph Borison) was supposed to be the Levi, but he was under the weather this morning so his father took the Aliya.  That wedding is in two weeks.  Both of these young men will take on the status of an Avrech.  This is the term used in the Parasha to describe Yosef.  The word denotes someone who is an Av (a father) in wisdom even if he is Rach (tender) in years.  

Of the many themes running through Yosef’s life, the most salient is his wisdom.  One could characterize it in many ways.  He is a statistician, a demographer really.  A civic planner.  He’s also a great psychologist, a dream interpreter.  He also has acute practical wisdom, the ability to get from A to B to C in the most efficient manner.  This is the type of smarts that excels at business school.  He’s also a plotter, a conspirator, a schemer.  Also useful in business school.

The figure in Tanach with whom he is often compared is Shlomo Hamelech.  The Haftora for this Parasha isn’t always read because Miketz often falls during Chanuka and so we read the Haftorah for Chanuka.  But there are years, like last year, when Shabbat Chanuka is Vayeshev, and Miketz is read after the Chag.  In those years, we read about King Solomon in the episode of the two mothers, one who has lost a child and one who is trying to establish that it was not her.  

This story comes right after Shlomo has a dream in which Hashem tells him that he can be granted any attribute he wants.  If you ask most people, they will tell you that Shlomo asked for “wisdom.”  And the words Chachma and Navon, wisdom and understanding, are used to describe him.  But that’s not what he requested.  The exact words were a “Lev Shomea Lishpot,” a heart that could hear in order to judge.  An attentive heart, one which discerns and perceives subtle but telling differences.  

Famously, King Solomon’s remedy for the dispute between the mothers is to split the remaining baby in half.  But this is really just a test to see if what he has already discerned is true.  From the way the women speak about the problem, he already knows who is the mother of the living child.  For she has asserted that her baby is alive, while the other mother has declared which baby has passed.  One is motivated by a mother’s anxious love while the other is moved by the bitterness of loss.  This is when we see that Solomon is also a great psychologist.  [Freud made much of the fact that his own Hebrew name was Shlomo.]  He designs a test which will bring out the differences in the two mothers.

Yosef does not have to deal with this kind of dilemma.  But he also shows a discerning heart.  He can interpret Paro’s dream because he listens to it carefully.  The Egyptian wise men say from the start that Paro has had two dreams while Yosef quickly announces that it is really just one dream.  That’s how Paro himself knows immediately that Yosef has surpassed the local wise men. That’s an attentive ear.    

The smartest teacher I ever had is a rabbi I’ve described here several times. He visited twice here as a scholar in residence.  But he was actually a member of this community back in its infancy in the 70s, when he came to Stanford as a postdoc in his early 20s.  He had gone to Princeton as a 15 year-old and came out a short time later with both a BS and a doctorate.  He was religious all of his life but he only learned full time in Yeshiva after he left Stanford.  When he entered the Beit Midrash, he finished all of the Talmud in just a few years.  

Many of us have met this type of prodigy.  But the most amazing thing about R’ Meir Triebitz is not any of those intellectual achievements.  It is that he is an attentive listener.  He has a compassionate heart that discerns the needs of those around him.  

Our Beracha to the Bar Mitzva and to the Avrechim is that they indeed put to use the many mental skills they possess but that they also pursue the attribute of an attentive ear, one who is able to hear things other people miss because he has humility and care.