A Quick Thought -- Vayigash

After Yosef reveals his identity to his brothers, he instructs them “maharu vaalu el avi v’amartem eilav ko amar binchah Yosef, samani Elokim l’adon al kol Mitzrayim..., hasten up to my father and tell him, ‘This is what your son Yosef said, “Hashem has placed me as a lord over all Egypt”’” (45:9).

Four pesukim later he tells them: “V’higadtem l’avi es kol kevodi b’Mitzrayim v’es kol asher r’isem, u’mihatem v’horadtem es avi heina, and you will tell my father all the honor I have in Egypt, and all that you have seen, and hasten and bring my father down here.”
Why does he seem to repeat the command to bring Yaakov? And what does he mean when he tells the brothers to recount to Yaakov “all that you have seen”?

Simply, in his first instruction, Yosef was telling the brothers to tell Yaakov that he acknowledges that Hashem put him in this position of power and he asks that his father come down. The second time he is telling the brothers to describe his power so Yaakov can be assured that Yosef can provide from them, and to encourage him to go.

He may also have meant for them to tell Yaakov all they saw in how he, Yosef, had behaved: that he had let Shimon out of prison as soon as they left (Rashi, 42:24), that he ate his meals separate from the Egyptians (43:32), and that he sent everyone out of the room so that he would not cause his brothers unnecessary embarrassment.

An additional way to understand this may lie in the phrase “kol asher re’isem, all that you have seen.” In last week’s parashah, when the brothers first returned from Egypt, “vayagidu lo es kol hakoros osam, they recounted to Yaakov all that had occurred to them” (42:29). They described how Yosef had spoken to them harshly, how he demanded that they bring Binyamin, how he had held Shimon as surety. But although they had, in Egypt, seemingly acknowledged that this was a result of their having sold Yosef, (42:21) they presented everything to Yaakov as mikreh, happenstance; a series of inexplicable events and challenges.

But now that Yosef had disclosed his true identity, everything made sense. The puzzle was complete. They saw how it all came together.

They now had to tell Yaakov that this whole episode was not mikreh, it was all part of a plan.
Indeed, the same brothers who sought to kill Yosef derisively saying [at least according to the simple meaning of the passuk] “v’nireh mah y’hiyeh chlomosav, let us now see what will come of his dreams” (37:20) now saw the first of those dreams come true.

Yosef told them to tell their father what they had now seen ... and that all that remained for the second dream to be fulfilled was for Yaakov and his family to come down and be subject to Yosef’s rule (see Rashi 37:10).

In this light, Yosef’s first instruction is a straightforward request for his father to come down to Egypt. His second instruction is saying far more: Tell my father the position I have here, and that you bowed to me and saw how my first dream came true. Now quickly bring my father here so that the second dream will be fulfilled as well.

In fact, when the brothers returned to Yaakov and told him that Yosef is alive and is the ruler in Egypt, Yaakov doubted their words. He was only convinced, and he only decided to go down, after "vayedbru lo es kol divrei Yosef asher dibeir aleihem, they told him all the words Yosef told them" and he saw the wagons Yosef sent (45:26-27). Rashi tells us the basic peshat. But perhaps "all the words Yosef told them" refers to the entire story, starting with the dreams Yosef had told them, and ending with how everything they had undergone in Egypt connected to those dreams.

Even in the most unusual circumstances, it behooves us to remember that it is all part of a master plan. May we be zocheh that those circumstances always be wonderful ones in ways that we can see and understand, and that all our dreams and aspirations be fulfilled in the best way possible.

Gut Shabbos!