Brothers-in Law- Parshat Chayei Sarah 2018/ 5779

Insights and Inspiration

from the

Holy Land
from

Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz

"Your friend in Karmiel"

November 2^nd 2018 -Volume 9 Issue 5 24^th Cheshvan 5779

Parshat Chayei Sarah

Brother in Laws

Luzy, you’re in trouble. Or maybe not. First of all, you’re a lucky guy. You got Rivky, my sister to agree to marry you. This was no small feat. On the other hand, did you do all your due diligence? See they hid something from you. I know you they told you that you met the whole family. And they’re great. I’m sure you wanted to be part of the Schwartz clan. My mother is a really great shvigger, her two daughter-in-laws and son-in law will surely attest to that. She’s a great cook as well. And my father, wow did you really luck out. They don’t make ‘em better. The most generous, easy going, giving person you ever met. They never meddle and are always there when you want or need them. So hey, it was no-brainer. But you see they “forgot” to tell you about me.

Perhaps in passing they may have mentioned something about some brother that lives in Israel. But they quickly changed the conversation, Please pass the chulent, and how about dem Mets, style. Secret- they can’t even name you three players on any baseball team. Now every family has the brother or relative they don’t talk about. And hey, I understand them. We’ve been waiting a long time for Rivky to get engaged. Nobody wanted to shake anything up. But she’s wearing a ring now. A nice one by the way. Good going. There’s no trade backs anymore. So pleased to meet ya Luzzy. My name is Ephraim and I look forward to being your future brother-in-law.

Now I don’t blame them. Gedalia is the brother they wanted you to know about. He’s a doctor. He’ll make sure you get free glasses all your life and he may even get you a smartphone if you ask him to. Aharon Shlomo, is a lawyer and a Rabbi. He can help you with your taxes and find a way to tell you how the delicious quiche that Rivky will cut with the meat knife, or the steak that she made you for dinner that was put in the oven without Koshering it in between is still fine. But the tour guide brother who got chucked out of a few yeshivas and ended up out in Iowa and Virginia and now hides out in some city in Israel that no one has ever heard of is not the guy they wanted you to hear about. But you should’ve checked better. Don’t you know the famous gemara in Bava Basra?

110. Ravah said: If a man wants to marry a woman he should examine the character of her brothers...It was taught in a Baraita: Most sons resemble their maternal uncles.

Now don’t feel too bad. There’s still some hope for your kids, god willing, besides banking that Gedaliah’s genes are the dominant ones. See this week’s Torah portion tells us about someone else who got married and it seems that they didn’t do too much checking into the brother as well; none other than the first shidduch ever our matriarch Rivkah who is betrothed to Yitzchak this week. Now Rivkah’s brother was certainly no big tzadik, his moniker Lavan the Arami or “the swindler” probably should have been a little clue. The fact that his eyes lit up every time Eliezer, the matchmaker/servant- I don’t think they called him Luzy, but it would be cute if they did- mentioned his master Avraham’s bank accounts and the way that he ogled all the jewelry he gave Rivka should have been a dead giveaway. And yet not only does the shidduch go through, but in fact every Jewish bride gets blessed by the chupa with the blessing that Lavan gave Rivkah.

Bereshis (24:60) Achoteinu at tihiyii lalfei rivava v’yirash zaraych es shaar sonuv-  "Our sister, may you become thousands of myriads, and may your seed inherit the cities of their enemies.”

Now the truth is one can argue that it didn’t really work out that great either. The Chasam Sofer even suggests that their first child Esau was pretty much a rotten apple off the old brother-of-the-mother tree Lavan. In fact, the blessing above that Lavan gave to Rivkah diabolically was meant to bless her that her children should be just like his side of the family. It’s why he specifically said “achoteinu-our sister” when he introduced the blessing. He wanted him to inherit the gate of his enemy- the famous known halacha is that Esau Soneh es Yaakov- Esau is the enemy of Yaakov. Yet the Chasam Sofer points out that it is precisely why we bless every bride with precisely the same words “Achoteinu- Our sister. You’re our sister, not Lavan’s. You come from a Jewish home. You come from the children of Yaakov. There are no rotten apples in our side of the family.

The grandson of the Chasam Sofer, the Chatan Sofer takes this incredible idea even further. He notes that parents bless their children every Friday night with the blessing

Yisimcha Elokim K’Ephraim u’Kmenashe- Hashem should place you like Ephraim and Menashe

This is the blessing that Yaakov gave the two children of Yosef and ordered bicha yivarach yisrael- in you shall Israel be blessed. What it is the blessing of Ephraim and Menashe? In an incredible connection he points out that in the last parsha of the Torah when Moshe gives his final blessing to each of the tribes he says.

Devarim (33:17) V’heim rivios Ephraim vheim alfei Menashe and they are the myriads of Ephraim and they are the thousands of Menashe

Sound familiar? Rivivos and alfei- myriads and thousands? That’s right it’s the same blessing of Lavan. Except that we’re co-opting it. The tens of thousands should come from our side of the family. The 'spark' of Yosef is what will put out the 'straw' of Esau. We will overcome any challenge from the gate of our enemy Esau. Our brotherhood is the power that will overcome theirs. That is the blessing each parent gives their child.

So perhaps the brother of the Kallah is not such a powerful factor to consider after-all. Truth it was slim pickings out there for Yitzchak. There were not too many girls that Eliezer had to choose from who were ready and worthy of joining the family of Avraham. Perhaps that’s precisely why Eliezer had to make some type of divine sign to see if she had it in her to negate that brother’s swindler DNA. He had to know if she possessed the attribute of kindness to a crazy shlep-water-for-your-camels type of degree. Because he understood that to overcome her family and her upbringings natural narcissistic indoctrination, she would have to possess the temerity to transform the love of oneself to the caring and love of another.

If that’s the case Luzy you’re in good hands. Rivky is a shlep-water-for-your-camel type of girl. She would even wrap the water in some fancy wrapping paper and decorate it with a nice ribbon and a card with a poem on it. Not that camels could read, I would tell her. But that’s why she didn’t tell you about me.

Truth is this parsha, and the Jewish people are really not just about the two of you either. It’s about all of us. It is the power that our saying of achoteinu- our sister, our brother has to overcome the hatred and plots of our enemies. When the nations call us their brothers and bless us, it is not a time for us to sit back and say “Cool! They love us!” “We’ve got friends in the White House, the UN, Brazil and even Saudi Arabia” It’s a time for us to recognize that if they are calling us their brothers than it is a call for us to strengthen even more so our own sense of brotherhood. It doesn’t matter if you’re Orthodox, conservative, Reform reconstructionist or unaffiliated. It doesn’t matter if you’re from Ethiopia, Paris, Boro Park, Lakewood, California or Pittsburgh... Whether your Sefardic Ashkenazic, Chasidic or whether you even wear a Kippa never interested those that seek to destroy us. They know we are all related. We are all one and the same, the people of Hashem and his Chosen ones. And that we have the power to reveal His oneness if we could only find it amongst each other.

Every Bride and Groom are blessed that they should merit to build a bayis neeman in Yisrael- a faithful house in Israel. A Jewish marriage is not an island. Every marriage, we incidentally learn out from Lavan as well, again precisely for that reason, has to take place in the presence of 10 Jews, a minyan. Your home is a home in Israel. It is part of our one people, one family. You are achi and achoteinu- my brother and sister. I know we have another 2 months’ god willing until we’ll be dancing together. I hope your practicing your Zorba. That’s another Schwartz tradition they haven’t told you about. But that’s way too risqué for me to tell you about now. Just get your Greek dancing skirt ready, Luzy… achoteinu- sister J

Have a Mazlel-dikeh Shabbos,

Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz

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RABBI SCHWARTZ’S FAVORITE YIDDISH PROVERB OF THE WEEK

“Vayber zaynen gebildet un kenen tsvey shprachn: eyne far der chasene un eyne noch der chasene.”- Women are educated and can speak two languages: one before the wedding and one after the wedding.

RABBI SCHWARTZES NOAH COOL VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

 https://soundcloud.com/ephraim-schwartz/rivkah   -  In honor of my sister Rivky and Luzy’s engagement and this weeks Parsha my latest amazing composition. “Rivka Achoseinu”- let me know what you think

https://youtu.be/m6bWnoGfdD8- On of my all time favorite slow wedding songs, but really about yerushalayim as well sung then and now by Ari Goldwag cool to see he hasn’t lost it!

https://youtu.be/u3Pk7mMPH0I- Benny Friedman sings Vsechezaena a Yitz Berry  fantastic ne composition!

https://youtu.be/XlBJaCeAUnk– Naftali Kempeh a new Carlebach?

RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM QUESTION OF THE WEEK

answer below at end of Email

Q  The name for Damascus Gate in Arabic is:
a) Bab al-Amud
b) Bab al-Khalil
c) Bab al-Asbat
d) Bab Jaffa

RABBI SCHWARTZ'S “LOMDUS” CONNECTION OF THE WEEK

Parshat Chayei Sarah– OK you guys have graduated a bit. It’s already five weeks into this column, let’s move to a really lomdushe shtikel. Last week we mentioned the Brisker style of lomdus. This week I’ll share with you a piece from the person that the Brisker Rav himself called the Rav of Brisk, none other than Reb Yehoshua Leib Diskin. He asks a simple question that a lamdan would ask on the parsha which is how did Eliezer betroth Rivkah for Yitzchak. We know that he did so because we derive the laws of blessing of eirusin- betrothal from Lavan after the act. The question is how did that work?

Now the knee jerk would be to say that he was a messenger, and agent or shaliach for Yitzhak. A man can appoint a messenger to betroth a woman for him. There are two problems with that. The first, which I’m not going to fully address is that not only don’t we find anywhere that he appointed him, it seems that Avraham took care of the whole thing and appointed him {Seemingly that is a problem as well as although a father could appoint an agent to marry off his daughter, that does not necessarily work for the son- but that would be a lengthier piece, but feel free to discuss}. The second problem is that even if Avraham, did appoint the agent, A non- Jew or servant is not a legal agent to betroth a woman. Since he can’t marry a Jewish woman himself, he can’t be an agent for someone else.

Now in lomdus the next step is usually what you can’t say. So, you can’t say that Eliezer converted because Avraham himself tells Eliezer that he is considered cursed and that’s why his daughter can’t marry Yitzchak. The only solution would be it seems is that Avraham would have freed Eliezer, which would then allow him to convert to being Jewish in order to carry out this agency. However, the Rav asks, there is a biblical prohibition for a Jew to free a slave. L’Olam bahem ta’avodu- they are meant to work for you forever. (The logic perhaps being that as a servant he has higher spiritual status and is obligated in some commandments and by freeing him you would lower his spiritual state.) So how could Avraham free him?

So in a brilliant lomdushe answer he suggests that there is an exception to that rule. When there is a slave that is half-slave and half free- for example if he was shared between two partners and one of them freed him. So know he is in a bit of a bind. Most significantly he can’t get married. As part of him is still not Jewish as he is a slave, the other part of him upon his freedom is like a regular Jew with conversion. So the Talmud tells us that in order to fulfill the mitzvah of marriage and being fruitful and multiplying than it is permitted and appropriate for the master to free him.

If that is the case, then over here as well, since Eliezer was the only trustworthy person to go off to find a spouse for Yitzchak. (Yitzchak himself was not permitted to leave the land of Israel) So in order to fulfill the mitzvah of marriage, the Rav suggests, it would be permitted and even appropriate for Avraham to free Eliezer to betroth Yitzchak. And as a free man he would have the status of a regular Jew that could of course carry out that agency.

Wheww… is brain hurting? Or are you singing and dancing. That’s how you know if you have a lomdushe kup!

RABBI SCHWARTZ'S ERA’S AND THEIR PLACES AND PEOPLE IN ISRAEL OF THE WEEK

Battle of Midian- 1272 BC- The battle against Midian stands out in the Torah as one of the fiercest, bloodiest and most miraculous. Fierce and bloody for our enemies of course and miraculous for us. The battle we are told is to avenge the vengeance of Hashem and the Jewish people against Midian. Vengeance for what?  For the daughter of the king of Midian, upon the advice of Bilaam the Midianite prophet, beginning a major seduction campaign of the Jewish men. That campaign led to the wrath of Hashem falling upon the people and 24,000 dying in the ensuing plague. This was a religious war. Our first jihad.

We went about the war way outnumbered. 1000 from each tribe were recruited and another 1000 were set up to study and pray for their success according to our sages; A man for a man. This was a war against 10s of thousand and five kings and their armies. We won. Not one Jew was lost. It was a clear miracle. We killed every last man. Yet, we spared the women and infants. It seems that was a mistake.

When the soldiers returned Moshe yelled at them. What kind of business was this leaving the women alive? The whole point of the battle was for the soul of the Jewish people. These women were the reason we were all here. So they killed the women too. Pretty wild. The truth is this would be a preparation for the land of Israel as well when we were commanded to wipe out every one that did not agree to make peace with us. But yet, it is brutal. It certainly would seem to go against every grain of our being and certainly our western civilized “ethics of warfare”- an oxymoron within itself.

Rav Kook explains that the reason for this brutal response is because the function of warfare when dealing with a brutal enemy is to insure that they will never attack you again. A disproportionate response is the only language they understand. As well it had to be engrained in the people that when we are battling for our soul, and the wars we are fighting ae for the vengeance of Hashem, that we can’t double guess those commands.  A Jew doesn’t go to war on their own unless they are being threatened this battle was divinely ordained and thus it had to be followed as per commanded. We don’t have wars like that anymore. Hashem’s not talking to anyone and we don’t have a Sanhedrin that can order a war. But the story in of itself is certainly one that has be to discussed. It’s Torah, it’s Israel and my tourists deserve to hear it.

But where? Well Midian is in Saudi Arabia and so we can see it and talk about it from up on top of Mt. Tzefachot in Eilat. But in general I find that there are a few places we can talk about the lessons we derive from this war. The first is in the many yeshivot Hesder in this country. These are schools where young idealistic religious Zionist young men dedicate their early years to partial army and partial Torah service. They do extra years in the army as a result of this then their secular counterparts. But they understand that it is the study of Torah that gives our army its strength. I like going to the Yeshiva in Gush Etzion, or in Mitzpe Ramon, or Hakotel in Jerusalem which are beautiful buildings with hundreds of students studying.  As well many times I will visit army bases or army posts and we can see young religious men with guns in one hand and a volume of Talmud in the other. That’s called doing your duty.

In terms of miraculous victories. All of Israel’s victories have been miraculous. Hey, Hashem put us in a nasty neighborhood. Yet perhaps the most miraculous has been The 6-day War that was truly almost biblical in terms of the fact that we blew away close to a half million again with our fledgling army of about 50,000. Estimates of minimal of 10,000 casualties were ultimately less than 900. So we ever I speak about the 6 Day war in Chevron where the Mearat Hamachpela was conquered singlehandedly by Israel’s chief Rabbi or in the old city of Jerusalem where not even a bullet was fired, I make the connection.

Finally when we stop off at Netiv Halmed Hei in Gush Etzion and we speak about the 35 soldiers who died trying to bring supplies to the Kibbutzim in the Gush Etzion bloc that were under siege, I mention it as well. Those soldiers died because their officer Danni Mass decided to spare the shepherd who ultimately revealed their plan to the arabs who massacred them. I find that a good place to speak about the issues of “ethical warfare” that guides our soldiers and the price we pay when we engage in it with an enemy that doesn’t respect it.

War is part of our country and the Torah teaches us many messages, sadly there are too many places where we can talk about these terrible battles.

RABBI SCHWARTZ’S TERRIBLE FAMILY JOKES  OF THE WEEK

Chaim was helping his younger brother Shmuly learn how to ride a bike, but every time he would start riding his Yarmulka would fall off. So their father suggested that Chaim keep his hand on Shmuly head. But after a few minutes, Chaim grew impatient and took his hand off Shmuly's head. 
Their father said, "What are you doing? Put your hand back on your brother's head." 
Chaim replied, "Am I my brother's kippah?" 

Three brothers age Berel, Shmerel and Mendel aged  92, 94 and 96 live in a house together. One night the 96-year-old Berel draws a bath, puts his foot in and pauses. He yells down the stairs, "Was I getting in or out of the bath?"

The Shmerel the 94 year old yells back, "I don't know, I'll come up and see." He starts up the stairs and pauses, then he yells, "Was I going up the stairs or coming down?"

Mendel 96-year-old was sitting at the kitchen table having coffee listening to his brothers. He shakes his head and says, "I sure hope I never get that forgetful." He knocks on wood for good luck. He then yells, "I'll come up and help both of you as soon as I see who's at the door."

Shortly after her husband's death, the Breindy the widow married her husband's brother. Hoping to avert small ­town criticism from the local yentas of such a hasty marriage, she hung a huge portrait of her late husband in the living room.
One day a visitor asked about the fine-looking man in the portrait. Dabbing away a tear with a hankie, she answered, "That's my poor brother-in-law. He died recently…

The Last Will And Testament of Samuel Benjamin Cohen

"I Samuel Benjamin Cohen, being of sound mind hereby declare this to be my last will and testament.
To my son Sheldon, my first born and the best dentist in the United States I leave one million dollars tax free.
To my daughter Jayne who was wonderful and always helped her mother with the dishes and graduated from college. I leave one million dollars.
To my loving wife I leave (whatever is not in her name already) two million dollars. Enjoy, sweetheart. Enjoy.
To my brother-in-law Louie, who smoked fancy cigars, who lived with us ever since we got married, and who always said that I would never ever mention him in my will,
HELLO LOUIE!"

My dad died when we couldn't remember his blood type. As he died, he kept insisting for us to "be positive," but it's hard without him.

How many more times are my kids going to ask me if I know where something is before they realize they're asking the wrong parent?

My parents won't say which of their six kids they love the best, but they have told me I finished just out of the top five.

Told my wife I wanted our kids every other weekend and she reminded me that we're married and live together so I'd have to see them every day.

When I call a family meeting I turn off the house wifi and wait for them all to come running.

My fifteen year-old: "I don't want to be your daughter anymore. I QUIT!" No two-week notice or anything. She'd better not expect a reference.

Me: *sneaks out of the house* *drives to another state* *hides in a cave* *quietly opens a bag of chips* My kids: Can we have some?

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Answer is A–  Ooh ooh ooh oooh.. Another one I got right. This one by the skin of my teeth. I don’t know the Arabic names for any of the gates. And I don’t even care enough to google it for you. If you’re interested in that type of stuff I’m not your tour guide. But Bab al amud is the one that I know. Maybe because I got a kick out of the fact that the Arabic word is the same as the hebrew word for pillar- amud. It is called that because of the pillar which is at the entrance of that gate which is probably the remains of Hadrians victory gate that was built ther when he conquered Jerusalem. Incidentally this was not a gate to a wall just a nice archway that was like a victory arch that was at the entrance to the city. The walls around Jerusalem are from about 14 hundred years later from Suleiman the Magnificent.

And the score continues Schwartz is 4 for 4 on this exam so far.