Joseph in Egypt
The Book of Exodus opens with the names of the children of Israel who went down to Egypt at the end of the book of Genesis. After listing eleven of Jacob’s sons and giving the total number of seventy souls, the passage concludes, ve-Yosef hayah b’Mitzrayim, “And Joseph was in Egypt” (Ex. 1:5).
The plain meaning of this verse, as is made clear by the translation that appears in the Etz Hayim Humash is that Joseph was already in Egypt – as we know from the concluding chapters of Genesis. But Reb Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev (Ukraine, 1740-1810), an early Hasidic master, points out that the language of the verse is excessive: since the opening verse already establishes that the children of Israel are going to Egypt, the verse about Joseph could simply have stated, “And Joseph was (already) there.” Why does the verse need to specify that Joseph was in Egypt, when that is already obvious both from context and from the preceding stories in Genesis?
Reb Levi Yitzhak reads the verse differently: rather than telling us where Joseph was located, he reads the verse as saying, “And he was Joseph, (even) in Egypt.” Joseph had climbed to the very pinnacle of Egyptian power and society – he had even taken an Egyptian name, Zaphenath-paneah (Gen. 41:45) – but, in Reb Levi Yitzhak’s interpretation, he never forgot who he truly was inside: an Israelite.
Joseph’s story resonates powerfully for Jews in America today: like Joseph, we have moved from the immigrant fringes to the center of American life; we have taken on American names, American cultural references, and American lifestyles. Nevertheless, the strength of our community comes from our always remembering that in our essence, beyond all the surface trappings of mainstream America, we are Jews – heirs to an ancient moral tradition who bear the responsibility of living by our ancestral values and passing them on to future generations.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Abe Friedman
