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The Ancients -- Like Angels
by Rabbi Yerachmiel Kram
"And they despised him and they could not speak with him in peace" (Bereishis 37:4).
Each year we return to the weekly portion which tells us about the hatred the brothers bore unto Yosef and their inability to maintain normal speaking relations with him. These portions are difficult to understand. They are veiled and concealed with a thousand barriers that defy our ability to fathom what is really going on.
For the nonbeliever, it is no problem to read these portions at their face value and to think he understands them. Whoever sees in Reuven and Shimon a mirror-image of this or that neighbor, can somehow match them with the behavior the latter seems to enact and skim through the passages. Others, whose faith is split or wishy-washy, ostensibly believe that the Torah is Divine but they are hard put to believe that the ancients resembled angels and that their conduct is totally beyond our conception, even regarding their everyday, common talk.
And when they come upon the words, "And they despised him and could not speak with him in peace," they encounter no difficulty. They, themselves, have tasted "similar" animosity, they believe, hatred such as that which might have led to the dismissal of another person from his job.
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Until the End of Time
by C. Ofek
FICTION
9:00 AM on the dot. Twenty avreichim jump off the van which brought them from Tel Aviv to Bnei Brak, and rush into the kollel in order to begin their studies. Once in the kollel, mundane conversations cease, including exchanges of information about the latest gemachim. From then on every moment is devoted solely to Torah study.
Quite rapidly the kollel's seats filled, and a pleasant gemora niggun pervaded the beis medrash. Nonetheless, one seat remained empty: Yitzchok Weissfish's.
Naftoli Bloom, Yitzchok's chavrusa, looked at the empty seat in bewilderment, while a large question mark formed in his heart. Where is Yitzchok? Perhaps something happened to him? Maybe he needs my help?
R' Naftoli strained his mind: "Did Yitzchok tell me that he would be absent today? I don't think so."
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