676:Beis Moshiach 22/12/2008 8:58 AM Page 3 contents YOSEF’S SHABBOS 4 D’var Malchus TWO SHLUCHIM ACHIEVED WHAT 6 4,000 COULD NOT Terror in Bombay | Rabbi Naftali Estulin YOSEF WAS FORGOTTEN IN PRISON, 10 BUT NOT ME Feature | Nosson Avrohom THE LUBAVITCH LIBRARY FROM ALEF 12 THROUGH TAV Hei Teives | Avrohom Reinitz USA ONE OF THE TEKIOS CHILDREN 744 Eastern Parkway 24 Brooklyn, NY 11213-3409 Stories | Sholom Gurary Tel: (718) 778-8000 Fax: (718) 778-0800 [email protected] www.beismoshiach.org A DIAMOND AMONG DIAMOND 30 EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: DEALERS M.M. 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Beis Moshiach is not responsible for the content of the advertisements. 676:Beis Moshiach 22/12/2008 8:58 AM Page 4 d’var malchus prescription for Redemption applies even if the Jewish people observe Shabbos properly only YOSEFS once, being careful about the laws and its details just one time. Observance of Shabbos even once suffices to bring Moshiach immediately. SHABBOS We may well ask, why does Shabbos, of all the mitzvos in the Torah, have such a special Translated and adapted by Dovid Yisroel Ber Kaufmann relationship with Moshiach? Why doesn’t observing any of the other commandments, such as keeping kosher or eating matzo or giving Shabbos is a foretaste of Moshiach. tz’deka, also result in an immediate While all the patriarchs kept Shabbos Redemption? True, every mitzva contributes to the coming of before the mitzva was given at Sinai, Moshiach, as the children’s song says, “with every mitzva we do, we Yosef’s observance was unique. His add a brick to the Third Temple.” Equally true, as Maimonides says, preparations invested Shabbos into the that our next thought, word or deed may be the act that tips the world. Similarly, we must prepare the scale to the side of merit and world for “the day that is all Shabbos,” ushers in the Redemption. Nevertheless, the only act the time of Redemption. guaranteed to bring Moshiach immediately and instantaneously is Shabbos is compared to the World to Come. Many a universal observance of Shabbos. prayers acknowledge that observance of Shabbos A Midrash – a rabbinic insight – on one of the gives us a foretaste of the era of Redemption. For verses of this week’s Torah reading, Mikeitz, alludes instance, in the Birkas HaMazon – the blessing after a to the unique nature of Shabbos. (As an aside, it may meal – the following sentence is added on Shabbos: be mentioned that even the name of the portion hints “May the Merciful One let us inherit that day which at the Redemption, for the word “mikeitz” means “at will be all Shabbos and rest for life everlasting.” The the end.” When a Jew hears the words “at the end,” Mincha, or afternoon prayer, of Shabbos describes he automatically things of the “end” of exile and the Shabbos in words used about the days of Moshiach: beginning of Redemption.) “a day of rest and holiness You have given your people In this week’s portion, Yosef, in anticipation of a . a rest of love and generosity, a rest of truth and meal with his brothers, tells his chief servant to faithfulness, a rest of peace, serenity and security, a slaughter an animal for the feast and to “prepare” it. perfect rest with which You find favor.” Finally, The particular word used for “prepare,” the Midrash perhaps the most famous Shabbos prayer, Lecha notes, is associated with Shabbos observance. One Dodi, sung Friday nights to welcome in the Shabbos, who “prepares” is preparing – during the six days of is a poem about the coming of Moshiach and the the week – for Shabbos. Use of specifically this word Redemption, containing verses such as, “To the right tells us, according to the Midrash, that Yosef observed and to the left you shall spread out, and the Lord you the Shabbos before it was given. shall extol. And we shall rejoice and exult through the Obviously this doesn’t mean that Yosef didn’t keep man who is a descendent of Peretz,” that is Moshiach. any of the other commandments, or that his brothers Indeed, so closely bound are Shabbos and didn’t even keep Shabbos. Commentaries agree that Moshiach that our sages declare, “If Israel were to all twelve sons of Jacob kept the mitzvos of the Torah, observe properly the Shabbos twice, they would in accordance with G-d’s statement about Avrohom immediately be redeemed.” Other sources say this that “I have known him, in order he should command 4 29 Kislev 5769 BEIS MOSHIACH 676:Beis Moshiach 22/12/2008 8:58 AM Page 5 his children and his household after him.” Rather, Although Yosef’s brothers, like Avrohom, Yitzchok since the specific allusion is only to Yosef’s and Yaakov, kept the mitzvos before the Torah was observance of Shabbos, it means there is something given, they couldn’t take the principle of Shabbos – distinctive about Yosef and about his Shabbos total awareness of G-dliness – and invest it into the observance. physical world. They could only act symbolically, But if the Midrash wants to tell us that Yosef’s because Shabbos, like the rest of Torah, had not yet Shabbos observance was unique, why does it do so been given. obliquely, deriving the insight from the use of the Yosef, on the other hand, did implant Shabbos into word “prepare”? Also, why does the Midrash the world, which is why his observance of – his emphasize that Yosef kept the Shabbos before it was preparation for – Shabbos is alluded to in the Torah. given? Such a conclusion seems obvious, since Yosef Yosef’s brothers were shepherds, leading a life of lived three generations before Moses. contemplation, isolated from the world. They were In order for something to be given, it must already aloof from and had no influence on the mundane. exist. “Giving” means taking something from one Yosef, on the other hand, lived in Egypt, the most place to another, transferring ownership or dissolute and materialistic of nations. Nor was Yosef possession from one person to the an ordinary citizen; he was the next. In our context, this means viceroy, second to the king, and as that already at the time of Yosef, a result deeply involved in all the Shabbos existed. It had just not yet Since, “G-d was affairs of state, with little time to been given to the Jewish people. devote to his personal spiritual Therefore, the Midrash with Yosef,” he growth. Nevertheless, since, as the emphasizes not only Yosef and was able to Torah states, “G-d was with Shabbos, but also that Yosef kept Yosef,” he was able to observe the Shabbos before it was given. observe Shabbos Shabbos as G-d wanted, even At the time of creation, before Sinai, in a manner of Shabbos was designated as a as G-d wanted, complete tranquility, spiritual as unique and holy day, as it says, well as physical. “G-d blessed the seventh day and even before Sinai, We can now explain why sanctified it, because on it He Yosef’s Shabbos observance is rested from all His work.” At the in a manner of alluded to with the word time of the Exodus, G-d gave complete “prepare.” Shabbos itself, on Shabbos to the Jews, commanding which an individual ceases all them to “remember and observe” tranquility, creative labor, changes the person. all its commandments. The rest transforms him, physically Shabbos, then, is different than spiritual as well as and spiritually. The actions we all the other mitzvos. The other take during the week to prepare for mitzvos came into existence at physical. Shabbos, on the other hand, affect Sinai, at the giving of the Torah. the world. The very act of When Avrohom, Isaac, Jacob and preparation transforms the world, his twelve sons kept the commandments before the elevating it to a connection with the holiness of Torah was given, they did so according to their own, Shabbos. And this effect, this elevation, is carried human, capacity. However, Shabbos as a day of over into Shabbos itself, for the Shabbos meals must Divine rest came into existence at the time of be prepared beforehand. creation. But implanting that level of spirituality into This brings us back to Shabbos and Moshiach. the world had to wait until the revelation at Sinai, Just as we must get ready for Shabbos by when Shabbos was given to the Jews. transforming the world, utilizing its resources to That G-d rested on Shabbos and then gave it to the prepare our Shabbos meals, so too we must get ready Jewish people at Sinai means that human beings, by for Moshiach by transforming the world, preparing it themselves, cannot create Shabbos. The principle of for the coming Redemption. Now that we stand after Shabbos – and all the details that give it substance Sinai, when the principle of Shabbos has penetrated and reality – belongs to G-d alone.