The Strength of Yosef HaTzaddik | Rabbi Avraham Schorr

Chazal tell us that when Yosef HaTzaddik went through his Nisayon and said that he would not do an Aveira with her, she asked him for one thing. He should pick up his eyes and look at her. And Yosef HaTzaddik refused. She took a spear and stuck it into his cheeks to force him to pick up his eyes. And still, Yosef HaTzaddik stood by and said: No. He didn't want to look at her. With this, Yosef HaTzaddik gave us the strength that even in the hardest of times, when there will be comparison to a spear piercing our cheeks to just give a look, Yosef HaTzaddik gave us the ability to say no. How? וימאן. וימאן is ראשי תיבות it says in Sefer אמרי נעם, When a person knows how beautiful and how sweet the אהבה of the Aibishter is, he's not able to let go for a minute. He knows that when he will use his eyes to look at the world of Gashmius, the world that's trying to pull him down, he's pulling himself away from אהבת השם. And when he realizes וימאן, when he realizes, he's able to say וימאן, he's able to take the Ko’ach of Yosef HaTzaddik. Yosef HaTzaddik, who went through the Nisayon not for himself, but went through that Nisayon for all the דורות, that we should be able to have the ability and the strength to remember our אהבת השם, to remember how close we are to the Ribono shel Olam, and to remember that we don't want to be מנתק ourselves, we don't want to disconnect ourselves from this אהבה, even for one minute not. And that strength we have from Yosef HaTzaddik, Chazal tell us, Whatever happened to Yosef, will happen to Klal Yisroel, and that's the Nisyonos that we go through in עקבתא דמשיחא. The Nisyonos of a spear, כביכול, sticking into our cheeks, trying to tell us to pick up our eyes and look at what the world has to offer. And a person has the strength to say וימאן. How sweet אהבת השם is, and I'm not ready to be מנתק myself, I’m not ready to disconnect myself from that אהבה, to look at that אהבה Gashmius and to indulge into the pleasure of one minute and to give up that אהבה to the heilige Bashefer.