Va-Yehi 5762

Shabbat Shalom-

"Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years, and the days of Jacob, the years of his life, were seven years, and forty and one hundred years." (47:28). It is interesting that Jacob lived with Joseph 17 years before Egypt and 17 years in Egypt. The sages (2-6th CE) comment that these 34 years were the only truly happy years of Jacob's life, as hinted at by the phrase "And he lived, VaYeHI", numerically signifying 34 in the Hebrew. That leaves him 113 years without Joseph, or perhaps "BaL MiLVeH, without loans" to pay. Of course, we know parents prefer having their children around than paying their loans.

Anyhow, I thought that since this week's portion is the last in the book of Genesis it would be appropriate to talk about the book as a whole and what it's trying to do. Genesis is a microcosm of biblical literature. It contains the seeds for all of biblical literature, appropriate for a book of beginnings. What Genesis does is set the stage for the book of Exodus and the covenant at Sinai. On a grander scale, Genesis is a treatise on knowing who we are. A Jew need merely look at the book of Genesis and he sees that his ancestors walked with God, made covenants with God, and ultimately how God came to form a special relationship with his people.

But Genesis is not a history book. It contains variant accounts, contradictions, and anachronisms without any attempt to harmonize them. That makes it more a book of traditions faithfully recorded, preserved for their value to subsequent generations than a straight history. Ever since Jews left Babylonia in the 5th century BCE and accelerating in the last 200 years, people of the book have been searching for their past, for that lost relationship with God so gloriously portrayed in the Five Books of Moses.

Current opinions in archeology tend to see the biblical account somewhat sympathetically. Geography, language, customs, motifs, and even literary styles are preserved in many of the stories. Archeology has induced the history of the near east, the wars, conquests, jewelry, and foods of kings. But history is only relevant insofar as we learn from it. We can learn where we came from and maybe understand ourselves a little better. But in the end, archeology just paints political and social stories. Archeology is a dead thing. The Biblical narrative, for all its difficulties and lost nuances, leads us to a sense of identity and how to be a better person in a way no archeology text can.

Joseph the man lived only once some 3300 years ago. He died at the Egyptian's ideal age of 110 (50:26) and was mummified. His body, however, could not return to the resting place of his fathers until his lessons had been learned, the narrative tells us. In exchange for selling the Egyptian people into slavery (47:23), his bones must await the slavery of his people before they receive their land and take him to his heritage (Exodus 13:19, Joshua 24:33). Only then could he return. The historical ownership of Egypt has long since passed, but its lessons await discovery anew every day.

For some brief articles on the topic, see the links below.
Historicity of Exodus On Biblical History On Biblical Archeology

Have a caring week!
Benjamin Fleischer
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