This piece was originally published in Hanassi Highlights on 25 December 2025. You can also read it in Hebrew (translated by ChatGPT) here.
From Revelation to Responsibility
This week we mark Asara b’Tevet—the fast commemorating the
beginning of the Babylonian siege of
Jerusalem. It is the first step in a slow, tightening process that ends in the
destruction of the Beit HaMikdash. A siege begins quietly, through mounting
pressure. But spiritual collapse, the Torah shows us, often begins more quietly still—not with armies, but with fractures in
our relationships.
Parshat Vayigash is a study in the opposite movement—not
constriction, but revelation; not estrangement, but approach. Yehuda steps
forward, speaks directly to power, and takes responsibility for his youngest
brother. Yosef steps out from concealment and answers his brothers not with
accusation, but with identity restored: “I am Yosef—is my father still alive?”
(Bereishit 45:3).
· Yosef cried for the two Batei M
ikdash that would one day stand in Binyamin’s portion and be destroyed.· Binyamin cried for Mishkan Shiloh, destined for Yosef’s portion, which would also be destroyed.
The obvious question is why Chazal saw the need to distance
Yosef and Binyamin’s tears from this direct encounter into visions of the
future? Why not simply say that their tears were due to the long separation
they had endured?
Rav Chaim Drukman zt”l explains that Chazal’s intent was not
to displace the simple meaning—of course brothers weep when decades of absence
collapse into a single embrace. Rather, they were illuminating a deeper
question: What created a world in which brothers could be torn apart, and
sacred homes could be torn down? What led to the tears? What led to the churban?
The answer goes back to the root of the fracture – when
jealousy and hatred between the brothers first begins to emerge:
“lo yachlu dabro
le-shalom—they could not speak to him in peace.” (Bereishit 37:4)
The tragedy began not with an invasion, but with a failure
of speech, recognition, and responsibility. The sale of Yosef was not merely a
family crisis—it was the prototype of a Jewish story that would tragically repeat itself
throughout the ages.
The correction occurs in our parsha. Two decades after
proposing the sale, Yehuda returns and this time does something entirely
different. He becomes a model of arvut—personal responsibility for the
welfare of his brother.
Asara b’Tevet reminds us how a siege begins. Vayigash
reminds us how a nation heals—through the courage to speak, the willingness to
step forward, and the refusal to let a brother face darkness alone.
In days of mounting pressure, we must choose which language
to speak: the silence of fracture, or the speech of peace; the logic of
distance, or the loyalty of responsibility.
May this week strengthen in us a renewed commitment to
clarity, unity, and mutual responsibility, so that the chain of churban
that once began in silence will, in our days, end in rebuilding.
Shabbat Shalom!
