Vayeshev - Chanukah and Yosef

listening to the weekly partial podcasts with our Eagle drag recorded with Russians never-ending assistance in remote vision wishes rel 5780 2019 this week's car shows marches of a chef and in our partially the story of Yosef at Sadiq we have all of the all of the the guild Ghulam all of the different things that went on one thing led to another led to another you know safe there's a beautiful man or a handsome man ends up in Egypt ends up in Potiphar's house 24 his wife lays her eyes upon him and he ends up in jail due to the do to this woman tries to get out of jail at the end of our parsha and he's he ends up doing too much Estados trying too hard to get out he's there for another two years which leads us to the next week's partner which we'll see in social next week I'd like to focus on a few interesting points in regards to the story Oh safe I'd like to see the broader picture in regards Theo save and I'd like to understand also how it connects to Chanukah because we always read the partial yo safe and the brothers as we are celebrating Hanukkah and I think that there's a very profound and deep connection I think is important to understand important to notice so I'd like to share that with you and you know let's start off with some questions I want to understand Yosef at Sadiq so as I mentioned he's a very good-looking person and the Torah goes out of its way to tell us about your safe that he was very good-looking and that he was somebody who was sought after by Potiphar's wife but we find that it's true in regards to sorry I'm a known and rifka and Dina the Torah repeats this theme where we have a story if someone who's very good-looking and in in you know the way that we perceive it I was kind of nice maybe that the very good-looking person is trying to be taken by the the king of the land there's in each other in each of the stories but you know obviously it's not a very good thing on the person who is speaking about as married I was sorry on rifka and what is the idea why is it turns stress to us why didn't I repeat this story why is it so important for us to know this story about sorry you may know and rifka and then Deana being taken by SRAM and then why do we need to know about Yosef at Sadiq that he had such a what is the or what it really deeper what's the the lesson of the fact that each of these people were outstandingly beautiful and they went through the the challenges that they went through it's very interesting by Sarah and Rivka so we see that as a result of those challenges they were taken in the Aqua - were clad to reveal himself to that particular leader and say you know don't start don't don't put your don't touch this woman she belongs to this Ummah she's married and in the end they end up with lots of riches they end up with money what his ideas kind of a strange story a strange message yosef exotic also we could say you know he goes through this whole difficulty ends up ten years in jail and twelve years in jail and the ultimate result is that it because of his time in jail he ends up meeting the the SAR Amash Kim the cupbearer of the Pharaoh and he's able to be brought in there because he's interpreted the dreams to be able to repair his dreams so certainly it's clear that he had to be in that jail in order to meet this person in order for his ultimate redemption an old friend to ultimately become a leader over Egypt and a leader over all of the Jewish people but what is the idea of the fact or what is the significance of the fact that it's a result of this very challenging situation that he finds himself in Potiphar's not because of his beauty because of his extreme good looks that's a question I want to understand also I want to understand when we look at the Jewish people and this is connected to Chanukah and it's it's also I believe connected to yo safe when we look at the Jewish people and we look at the success of the Jewish people the Jewish people are perhaps the most ancient civilization in the world and yes we've been removed from our original homeland for 1800 years we weren't or very we had a very insignificant amount of people living in artsy style in the Land of Israel but we're an ancient civilization we've been around for over thirty three hundred years since the Torah was given and if we caught if we count back to Avram Aveeno to Abraham so we've been around about thirty eight hundred years so we have a very powerful and distinct past and an incredible longevity which no can explain now what is the difference between when we look from a from a broad perspective from a perspective of a suit of the civilization what is the difference between the success of the Jewish people the success of our culture as opposed to the success of other ancient cultures that perhaps to exist until this day or or existed for a long time whatever it is how do we how can we define a difference between them I want to also understand when we look at the story of Chanukah so the theme of Chanukah is that the Jewish people survived really the Jewish people were living in Eric's Easter we were living the land to visit all the time we had a temple gonna be some big dish on the Temple Mount and despite that there was a culture called the Greeks and they came in and they wanted to they wanted to take over they wanted to push away the Jewish culture and replace it with their Greek culture I wonder stand with the motivation what is the motivation of a Greek culture what do they care let let you know do what you do what you do and let us do what we do like why do you have to start up with us why do you have to already have to push out our faith our culture why do you have to come in that way we have to take over our temple and bring your idols into our temple what is the idea what is the difference between the power of a culture for all other cultures as opposed to the power of the Jewish people the culture of the Jewish people and I'd like to say that Yosef is an example of something which we all know to be true but it's important to understand that we it's important to bring it out is important to speak it out you know Yosef Assad we find that the word Yosef the name you know save the kamati of the word Yosef is 156 and then I might hear the word cm see on which means Zion which means it's a reference to to the Jewish people or it's a reference to that to Mount Zion which is where the base of English was built so so the word see own as a single match 156 cause I'll tell us a comedy really a severe let's see a commercial or let's see an eerily ISIF whatever happened to Joseph happened to Zion or whatever having the design happened to you safe so there's a parallel between Yossi abusive is somebody who is a small like like a bringing together what's the word microcosm that's the word I'm looking for it was a microcosm of the Jewish people and whatever happens to us AIF really happens to all of us okay so we can look at Yossi because look at his store we can look at his life and we can remember we can understand something about him that will help us understand something about us so help us understand something about the Jewish people at large okay and here's the idea it's an amazing idea an important idea and that is that for the Jewish people for Yosef exotic everything that is good for the most eylem for the nations of the world everything that looks good on the surface for us is negative for us is bad it's the opposite for us or we'll see it it's not ultimately bad but the the first the first experience that we have of something which everyone else is great our first experience is bad now the ultimate result is that we have something positive which comes out of it and that the positive thing seems to come from that which everyone else thinks is positive but it's not it comes from the fact that what's truly positive for the Jewish people is something that seems negative okay I'm speaking in coats but now you're gonna see what the idea is like this sorry I mean she's beautiful she's gonna be the Queen the queen of Pharaoh who could ask for anything greater no it's the worst thing what a tragedy think about it s-sarah Malka you know we know the story of Esther we know the story of Purim wow she's chosen to be the Queen it's an amazing thing it's beautiful now she can say the Jewish people but let's talk about Esther from from her own perspective for a moment she had a terrible tragedy she was a Jew nice Jewish girl and here she was stuck being married to a Geisha King forbidden forbidden the Torah does not allow us to marry a non Jew right so it's a queen esther had the most terrible tragedy but her specific tragedy which which was a result of what which she was a result of her incredible beauty her incredible shame incredible grace that she had right so what normally everyone else would praise and think so highly of right in the secular world beauteous is powerful money is powerful all these things are powerful all these things are great but they're not good for us for the Jewish people power money Beauty prestige all these things are negative they produce a negative result Esther malko was brought to the palace against her will she had a terrible tragedy she lost her life she lost her life sorry man whose brim brought into the palace terrible tragedy rifka manna was brought into the parent palace terrible tragedy Dina has somebody who's the leader of the town wants to marry her terrible tragedy you know see what's a leak has the wife of a very powerful person one is interested in him terrible tragedy for kleiss well the thing that looks beautiful on the outside the thing that the whole world adores it becomes something negative but here's the amazing thing and followed closely because this is important the amazing thing that happens is like this the negative thing the positive thing which turns into something negative so now it spills out and and here we have Esther Marcos a good example we have her in the palace and she's she's stuck there she stuck with this man and she's there for a number of years right if you look at the story you look at the timeline it's a number of years before anything happens that she's able to use her power but she's there she's stuck there and that difficulty that tragedy that pain builds and it builds and it builds and the ultimate result is that now she hasn't to natee to stand up and save Chloe's throw she has the ability to - her name will be remembered for all time as one of the greatest heroines of the Jewish people throughout all time she was ready to give up her life for Chloe's trial but where did it come from it came because her beauty brought her into a place of challenging difficulty she went through that challenge for a number of years for a certain amount of time and the result was now she became someone who had intense spiritual power and was able to use that power to save the Jewish people you know see if it's a dick as well let's look at your safe he's somebody who had she had Kane he had tremendous amount of grace wherever he went people people were drawn to him they saw yeah he was just an amazing person an amazing ability everywhere he went he was successful passing tells us he was a good looking person and then her there he is stuck in jail for 12 years no end in sight but what is the result of that 12 years what is the final result of being in jail for 12 years following 71 years the rest of his life from the age of 30 till the age of 110 following 70 years he was a king he was a king over over Egypt was a king over the Jewish people so the result of this is how it works it's an amazing thing amazing his side he see the result of the outer thing which seems successful brings brings the Jew into a negative situation the negative situation it continues to a certain amount of time and this is true about Sarah and Rivka and Dina and but the result is that after the challenge after the difficulty some amazing spiritual power is received at the end at the end of the challenge so for Yossi if the spiritual special spiritual power was that he became the leader became the leader not just the Vita's above the Jewish people now let's turn back to the Jewish people because as we said Yosef at Sadiq yo safe represents the Jewish people so whatever happens to him it happens to all of us now when we talk about civilizations and we talk about power I want to understand why what is Greek why did the Greek culture want to destroy the Jewish culture we were an ancient culture even at that time right talking about 2500 years ago we had already been around for 800 years it's a solid I'm at the time Greek culture was very new at the time perhaps it was around 1500 years I don't know how long right so so what did they want from us why did they want to destroy our culture we're gonna wrap it so long can you respect the culture that's been around for longer ah so that's the amazing difference between Jewish culture and all other cultures all of the cultures and we could talk about Islam we could talk about Christianity but all other cultures the way that they work is they start to develop and the way that they prove that they are powerful is by swallowing up others by either by the sword you know by by convertors die or by just taking over by by walking in and and maybe blowing people away with their with their power how amazing they are those that's all cultures all cultures want to prove their power by decimating other cultures by you know steamrolling other cultures that's what happened like I said Christianity Islam that's what happened with the Greek culture the Greeks they were a new culture if you're a new culture what do you want to do do you want to prove your dominance so you walk in and you if you can prove you know the best place to prove that you are really powerful is if you take a culture which is an ancient culture and you can get all of those people to give up their culture and now submit to your culture now your culture has real power because you have swallowed up a very powerful culture so now your culture has power okay you know you want to understand why this Iran want to destroy Israel what is their beef what is their problem the answer is because the Jewish people are the most ancient culture that exists and so they feel threatened by our return to the Land of Israel okay you could talk about territorial you could talk about you know Islam you could talk about whatever you want but I'm talking about on a very simple basic level one civilization wants to prove its dominance and its power by swallowing up civilization and to the extent that you can prove your dominance over an ancient civilization has been around for thirty eight hundred years or thirty three hundred years whatever you want to call it so then that gives an intense power to your civilization okay so that's what's going on now here's the trick when it comes to the Jewish people what is the the great power of our civilization here this it's an amazing thing and it's very similar to what happened with the Oh safe the power of the Jewish people isn't we're the only civilization I believe in history that hasn't gone in conquest has not gone to try to destroy us another civilization to prove its own power the Jewish people's power is simply in its miraculous survival throughout all of our gullies throughout all of our exiles the fact that the Jewish people continue to exist the same exact people with doing the same exact mitzvahs putting on the same tefillin wearing the same sits as' learning the same Torah 3300 years hasn't changed we've been in every gullets we've been in every every we've gone through every different civilization we've we've had a civilization try to impose themselves upon us we've been inside of other civilizations and we still maintained our that our special uniqueness our commitment to the tire our commitment to our relationship with a collision berroco we didn't take new things you know of course the last few hundred years has been a tremendous loss of the Jewish people toward liberalism and that is the new civilization you know that is the new American civilization of American liberalism and and the Enlightenment in that whole that whole sad Aveda Zara frankly idolatry right but it's a sad thing but Lamesa the Jewish people remains despite the fact that we've lost so many to that and we've lost so many we lost so many in the Holocaust we lost so many to deliver the liberalism and enlightenment still the Jewish people remain strong there's still millions of Jews who remain dedicated to occur for who to God we still survive we continue we've returned to the Land of Israel not only have we returned and rebuilt the Land of Israel but we've returned and we've rebuilt our spiritual life we've rebuilt our commitment and connection to the Taira and that's essential to understand that the Jewish people what is powerful for the Jewish people I mentioned this before I have Maha Shiva quoting a particular historian who said that what you need to understand about the Jewish people is that for us a survival of a small amount of us is considered success that's unique in all civilizations and in all cultures the fact that we have survived that's the power of our culture that's the power of our civilization that is what's going on on Hanukkah on Hanukkah there's a civilization that wants to wants to obliterate us it's called the Greek civilization they want to destroy us they want to they want to replace our temple our place of worship to echo the Chamorro who you want to replace that with a temple of worship to idolatry and they want to they want to worship the human body and they want to get all involved in those things and and that that kind of idea will last for a few hundred years and then it will fade then another theory will come and that will fade the Romans will come and that will fade liberalism will come and that will fade but the Jewish people will always remain that's the power of the the story of Chanukah that's the power of the story of Yosef is that for us everything is the opposite the beauty that's not what's really important what's really important is the the challenge the challenge being in a place of difficulty news David son he goes through the difficulty he champions the difficulty he comes out the other end as a great leader for 70 years the Jewish people we go through we go through incredible difficulty we survived we survived the Golia Swee survived the exiles we survived being a necessarily being challenged by this civilization that wants to destroy the Iranians want to destroy us or the Jordanians or the Egyptians or the the Islamic world or the Western world whoever wants to destroy us and hates whatever it is but we continue to survive that for us is the spiritual power and that's represented by a yo civets addict who survives and then thrives we - we survive and we thrive it's also represented by this idea of the Hanukkah menorah of the Monaro the little lights the little lights that we place on our window and they shine through the night a little bit of light has the ability that's called survival it's not like this these massive lights like in Times Square and it's not like the massive lights that people hang up on their on their you know trees it's not like the massive lights that people hang up on their on their houses Colorado's lights are very simple and very small because we we survive we survive and that's our true spiritual power I could totally yellow LF the Pacific tells us that the small one the small one is the one who ends up being a thousand Chloe's Sorel is a small one Cloughley Sorel is the suffering servant of you Shia pregnant gimel the suffering one who you know Christians will say their version of who it is but the true version of who it is is the Jewish people who have suffered for millennia at the hands of the Christians at the hands of their Muslims right at the hands of all those who wish to destroy us that all of the civilizations who want to take away our faith from us but ultimately we survive ultimately we are the smallest and we will be the greatest ultimately just as Yosef came out of that jail and became the leader over the entire world so to the Jewish people ultimately our true dominance will be shown not because we have conquered all the civilizations and not because we have you know we have dominated and domineer all others in our path ultimately as you know as my chef draws closer when Messiah comes we will see all of the nations will submit to us - the Jewish people they all submit and recognize that Klaus RAL we have been the ones all along who have held that torch held that banner held that candle which was able to pierce through the night and to give us a connection to a Kurdish world I wanna bless you and I ask you to bless me I should help us and we should always be able to recognize that light recognize the challenges are those things that make us stronger bring us closer thank you so much for listening have a wonderful Shabbos this podcast was made possible through the gracious donations of listeners like you for more podcasts like this please visit www.gfi.com/webmonitor [Music]