In Vayigash we read about the revelation of Yosef to his brothers. The stunned brothers were unable to respond because they were fearful of Yosef, literally “afraid of his face” (Bereishit 45:3). When Yosef revealed himself, his face shone with a Divine radiance (Meir Panim).
After selling Yosef, the brothers had remorse. When the ten brothers travel to Egypt for the first time to procure grains, the Midrash tells us they resolved to find Yosef and rescue him, at whatever cost. They split up and entered from ten different parts of the country and went searching for Yosef. The first place they began was – the red-light district! Of all the possible places Yosef could have ended up, why there? Why not first check the prisons, the hospitals, the farms, the police station? It had been over 20 years since they had seen him last. The first place to look was in the brothels! Such a high opinion they had of their brother?
Yosef knows they are in Egypt and has them arrested. He accuses them of being spies and throws them into prison for three days and then releases them. He tells them if they ever want to set foot in Egypt again, it has to be with their youngest brother. Then Yosef adds three words – “I fear G-d” (Bereishit 42:18). The brothers hear this from an Egyptian gentile, a viceroy of Egypt – where the only gods were Pharaoh, the Nile – and it doesn’t arouse any suspicions?
The second time they descend to Egypt, with Binyamin, Yosef greets them warmly, releases Shimon who he kept hostage and invites them to lunch. Yosef reassures them “Don’t worry, it is all Kosher, OU Mehadrin” (Bereishit 43:17) – the “Gid HaNasheh,” femoral tendon, has been removed. The brothers don’t think to ask how an Egyptian viceroy knows about such things, they simply sit down to eat?
What about the seating arrangements? There were three tables – one for the brothers, one for Yosef’s staff and a third for Yosef himself. Not so strange, he is a viceroy after all. But wait a minute – the bread that the viceroy’s staff ate was different than the bread served to the brothers. The Egyptians were revolted by the Israelite bread, so that was understandable, but the viceroy is not eating the same Egyptian bread as the staff, he is eating the same bread as the brothers, the Israelite bread. The brothers think nothing of this, it doesn’t register with them?
After discovering the cup in Binyamin’s bag, we read that Yehuda “approached” Yosef. The Midrash says that his first response was aggressive. Yehuda had a hair on his chest that when he became angry would bristle up and it was like a spear that could impale you in an instant. In response Yosef picks up his stone throne, weighing tons, and shatters it into pebbles. When the brothers see this, they think “Only someone from the house of Yaakov could possess such supernatural strength!” Yehuda’s demeanor immediately changes from aggression to appeasement. The brothers don’t stop to think however “Who can this person be?”
After Yosef reveals himself to them and they get over their initial shock, the Midrash says – they wanted to kill him! Kill him? Just a few hours earlier they were intent on rescuing Yosef, and willing to pay any price to do so. Now that he is standing in front of them, they want to kill him?
After all these tough questions we can begin the shiur.
We first need to understand a concept brought by the Alter of Kelm, Reb Simcha Zissel Ziv Broida – called “first impression.” The first impression a person has of something, is the most ingrained in his brain and to alter that first impression is almost impossible.
The 17-year-old Yosef that the brothers knew before they sold him into slavery was to their mind, someone suffering from delusions of grandeur. The boy Yosef would constantly play around with his hair. According to Chazal the yetzer hara preys on people who are overly focused on their hair.
When the brothers saw that Yosef was overly involved with his hair, combined with his “hallucinatory” visions of becoming king and everyone bowing down to him, they thought – here is someone over which the yetzer hara has a strong hold. There is only one place such a person can end up – and that is in the red-light district. That was their first impression of Yosef and therefore when the brothers entered Egypt and started searching for Yosef, they began with the place they most thought someone who played with their hair could end up – in a brothel.
It was inconceivable to them that someone like that could become anything else, let alone ruler of Egypt. When a person has such a strong first impression that dictates his perception, he tends to miss things that are right in front of his eyes. The brothers missed all the signs, because their prior perceptions blinded them. It was not possible that the person in front of them could be Yosef. It did not matter if he mentioned Hashem, if he knew about ritual slaughter, if he ate Israelite bread, if he had strength only one of the 12 Tribes could possess, even if he admitted to them that he was Yosef – they still could not believe it! Their perception would not allow them to believe it.
According to the Midrash, they only believed when Yosef showed them that he was circumcised. And then what was their reaction? They wanted to kill him, because to them he was still that same 17-year-old boy who played with his hair when they saw him last – there was no way he could have changed.
But Yosef had changed. His test with Potiphar’s wife was the direct result of and the remedy for the boyish notions of “playing with his hair.” When the brothers reunited with him, he was already Yosef HaTzaddik, who had been tested by G-d and had passed the test, like Avraham, who passed his ten trials.
The brothers did not realize this until he said “I am Yosef, is my father still alive?” and they saw his face shining with a Divine radiance. This ultimately shattered their first impression of Yosef and altered their perception.
Parshat HaShavua Trivia Question: Why did Yosef send back gifts to his father Yaakov in ox-drawn wagons?
Answer to Last Week’s Trivia Question: For Yaakov and his family there was no shortage of food during the seven years of famine – Yaakov had millions of sheep. Why did he need to send his sons to Egypt to procure grains? Although they had a lot of meat, they had no grains to make bread and in order for the Divine blessing to reside on the tents of the Imahot, they had to separate challah from bread dough (Meir Panim).
