Vayeshev
Genesis 37:1-40:23
Amos 2:6-3:8
Part of the sting of our current economic crisis comes from the role that greed has played. At a time when, as a nation, we were flush with wealth, both corporate leaders and consumers pushed for more.
It was not enough for many within the finance industry simply to earn generous salaries. Instead, they set aside historic standards for risk management, in order to gain wealth on a scale that defines greed.
As for we consumers, many of us forgot that real saving is built though patience and sacrifice, rather than by seemingly endless growth in stock and home values.
We now find ourselves in an unfolding financial crisis, whose depth we can only guess. Few things are as private as our financial lives, and our fear is compounded by an isolation that has settled over us.
Even if we have not lost jobs, had our salaries cut, or actually had to redeem equity and bond holdings, we feel our world has been turned upside down. If we are not in crisis, we feel as if we are on the precipice.
Many of the stories that fill the Torah are about people in crisis. In this week’s portion, Joseph is seized by his brothers, cast into a pit, sold into slavery, tempted by Potiphar’s wife, and banished to jail.
In addition, Tamar, Judah’s daughter-in-law, is consigned to a childless life and the social ostracism that accompanies it, as she waits, in vain, to marry his remaining son. Each of these moments has the feel of a life unraveling.
Moral choices
In spite of their trials, Joseph and Tamar continue to be tested. Joseph’s test is the most obvious when Potiphar’s wife tries to seduce him.
Many passages from Midrash portray Joseph as an eager player in the situation. The great medieval commentator Rashi notes that as Joseph settles into the rarified life of Potiphar’s home, he begins to adopt the Egyptian vanities of grooming and gourmet eating.
He does not stop with these temptations, but in Rav Samuel’s words, Joseph, “deliberately entered the house in order to be seduced by her.” Only at the last minute does he pull back from temptation.
The tradition offers a number of explanations for this. A passage in the Talmud tells us that when Joseph confides to Potiphfar’s wife that he is worried about what will happen if they are caught, she replies, “I will murder him [Potiphar].” Joseph than realizes that this means not only will he be an adulterer, but also an accomplice to a murder.
In another midrash, Jacob’s face appears before Joseph and his passion immediately cools.
Joseph’s restraint is not trivial. As the Zohar, a key text of Jewish mysticism, reminds us, “Is there among the virtuous a greater hero than a young 17-year-old” who manages to resist sexual temptations?
Tamar’s trial is different. Pregnant with her father-in-law’s child, and possessing his staff and seal as a deposit for his having slept with her, when she posed as a harlot, she is in a position to humiliate him publicly.
Although when he learns of her pregnancy he threatens to burn her for shaming the family, she refrains from publicly announcing that he is the father. Instead, she sends him the items he has left as a deposit, placing her life in his hands.
According to the Talmud, we learn from this that it is “far better for a person to risk death … than to shame another person publicly” (Tractate Sotah 10b). Tamar’s sensitivity to Judah’s honor, despite how she has been treated, is a tribute to the primacy she gives to the teachings of the Torah.
There is little question that many of us will face personal trials in the months ahead. Financial tribulations may bring moral ones in their wake.
Many of the challenges we face in the months ahead may be more moral than financial. It will take great character to do the right thing, especially if what is at stake are the basics of our families’ financial lives, such as housing and education.
Joseph and Tamar serve as great exemplars of what it means to make a moral choice when people find themselves alone, with their backs against the wall, and temptation looming large.
Rabbi E. Daniel Danson is spiritual leader of Mount Sinai Congregation in Wausau.
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