CHOCHMAS NASHIM: THE ENVY NATION
By: Suri Davis
Looking back at the last few Torah portions, there is a lot of space taken about Joseph and his rise to Pharaoh’s viceroy. His brothers are jealous of Joseph’s favored status with their father, Jacob. Joseph was the eldest of Rachel, who was Jacob’s favorite wife. We discussed his being thrown into a pit, sold as a slave, thrown into jail, but he rises to the top of Egyptian royalty.
Joseph has two sons, Menashe and Ephraim. Jacob blesses them and says that they should multiply in abundance over the land. The word Jacob uses for multiply, Vayidgu, is commented upon by Rashi. Rashi states that the root of the word Vayidgu, is dag, a fish. It appears that the ayin harah/the evil eye does not rest upon fish even though they multiply prodigiously. So Jacob blessed Joseph’s children that even as they multiply to cover the land, that there will be no evil eye on them/us.
Exodus begins with Pharaoh who was unfamiliar with Joseph and his work on the Egyptian nation’s behalf to stave off hunger and death. Pharaoh says to his people, Exodus 1:9: “Look: the people, the Israelites, are becoming more numerous and stronger than we.”
Thousands of years later, we have the story of Esther. Haman tries to poison Achashverosh’s view of the Jews by saying: Esther 3:8: “Haman then said to King Ahasuerus, “There is a certain people, scattered and dispersed among the other peoples in all the provinces of your realm, whose laws are different from those of any other people and who do not obey the king’s laws; and it is not in Your Majesty’s interest to tolerate them.”
Joseph was handsome. Jacob and his family were wealthy. So it is that when Jacob blessed Joseph’s sons, he understood that those who invite envy, invite the evil eye, a negative energy, where others wish you ill, and would celebrate your downfall.
There is a concept in the American jurisprudence in the field of torts, injuries to one another. The principle Attractive Nuisance, states that one who has something on his property that attracts those who hurt themselves is liable for the other’s injuries. One would think that when another person trespasses on his property, it is the trespasser who assumes full risk for his own injry on said property. Not so, for instance, when a property owner has a pool, which is an attractive nuisance, and the owner has to take greater care to prevent injury even to those who break the law and trespass on his property.
The Jews, as a nation, seems to be an attractive nuisance. We were forged in the fire of two hundred years of slavery. We have kept our distinct laws and appearance. In every generation, for over five millenia our very existence invites other nations to try and change our religious practice, whether Greek, Roman, Spanish and more. They have tried to bring us to extinction, as Hitler attempted most recently.
As we enter the book of Exodus, and we wonder why G-d would have us go through two hundred years of hard slavery, it is to forge a nation that is the envy of other nations throughout history. We are God’s chosen nation, as Joseph was Jacob’s chosen son. There is an honor, but it comes with a heavy cost. Our very existence invites challenges by all other nations throughout history, including certain anti-semitic people and groups in Europe and America, who feel they can succeed in challenging Jewish existence. Our very existence through the ages, our distinctiveness and our nationhood are the envy of all other religions and nations.
We commemorate the exodus from Egypt each year on Passover at our seders. We sing loudly and with relish the “v’he sheamdah” song, “in every generations, enemies rise against us to annihilate us, but God saves us from their hands.”
We are a people who are different. We are a light unto the nations. We relish our distinction and are proud of being role models of ethics and brotherhood. Our very existence through our historical hardship is testament to G-d’s personal intervention in matters of our survival, which invites envy, and evil eyes, that which Jacob hoped to ward off, in his blessing to Joseph’s sons, as he prepares to die.
Achdut. Unity. Community. Ethics. Morality. That is our core existence, root to our survival, the envy of other nations, the secret of our redemption from Egypt, and the ultimate redemption by Moshiach speedily in our time.
Shabbat shalom.
-Suri