Lifelines

 By Rabbi Pinchos Lipschutz

The eight days of Chanukah, which ended this week, were a celebration of many things, among them emunah and bitachon. The Chashmonaim went into battle vastly outnumbered, armed with nothing but faith. That faith was richly rewarded, as the Chashmonaim merited ridding the Jewish people of their tormentors and restoring to them the Torah, avodah, and kedusha of which they had been robbed.

The Chofetz Chaim would often find reason to repeat the following moshol. A visitor once came to town, and on Shabbos he watched in amazement as the gabbai distributed the aliyos. The person who appeared to be the most prominent figure in the shul was passed over, as was an elderly talmid chochom whose appearance suggested seniority and distinction. Finally, unable to contain himself, the visitor approached the gabbai and questioned his choices. The gabbai smiled patiently. “You’ve been here for a week and already you have opinions?” he said. “Stay a few more weeks and you’ll begin to understand. The g’vir has a yahrtzeit next week and will receive an aliyah then. The talmid chochom made a simcha last week; he and his family all received aliyos. Everything I do has a cheshbon. But to appreciate what I do, you need to stay here long enough to see the whole picture.”

The Chofetz Chaim would conclude, “Ich bin shoin an elter Yid. I have lived a long time, and only now am I beginning to glimpse signs of the plan with which Hashem runs the world. Sometimes a person must wait fifty years to see how events come full circle.”

That is the message of Parshas Vayigash. What appears confusing, painful, or even senseless in the moment is often part of a larger design that reveals itself only with time. The darkness is real, but it is never final. The light may be delayed, but it is inevitable. And when it comes, we will see that every step, every setback, and every tear was leading us there all along.

The history of the Jewish people is marked by dramatic peaks and deep valleys, moments of extraordinary prosperity and strength followed by stretches of poverty and powerlessness. At times, the darkness seems absolute, with no light visible on the horizon. And then, often without warning, a sudden illumination appears, the course of events shifts, and what was bleak is transformed into clarity and hope.

On a personal level, we kindle small lights in the hearts of others, never knowing whether they will take hold. We don’t know if the flame will flicker and grow or be extinguished by stormy winds. We do our part. We do what we can. We hope and we daven. We believe that one day all the scattered flames will merge, igniting a great fire of emunah, bitachon, Torah, and avodah that will spread across the land. Each of us works to bring that day closer, as we await the ultimate fire of revelation and redemption.

Until that day arrives, the news of the moment can be difficult to bear. Life delivers cruel twists, and at times we can feel beaten, overwhelmed, and devastated. At such moments, Yosef calls out to us across the generations and says, “Al tei’otzvu! Do not become despondent.” It is all for good. People may mock you, betray you, take advantage of you, and question your worth and stability, but do not give up. Al tei’otzvu. Hold fast to your faith and you will overcome even an adversary stronger than you. It may take time. It may feel like a Sisyphean task. But eventually, Hashem’s kindness will be revealed.

In the previous parshiyos, we read the painful account of Yosef being sold into slavery by his brothers. They constructed a cruel deception for Yaakov Avinu, presenting Yosef’s garment soaked in the blood of a goat and telling their aging father that his beloved son had been killed. Yet, as Chazal tell us, Yaakov refused to accept their story. Something within him would not allow it.

Time passed and famine struck the land. The brothers were forced to descend to Mitzrayim in search of food. There, they encountered the viceroy, who was harsh, unyielding, and seemingly intent on tormenting them. He placed obstacle after obstacle in their path, denying them food, accusing them of crimes, and plunging them into anguish.

At the opening of Parshas Vayigash, Yehudah recounts the entire ordeal. He describes how the ruler questioned them about their father and a younger brother, how they explained that their father had already lost one son from that mother, and how losing the second would surely kill him. The viceroy appeared unmoved. If they wanted food, he demanded that they bring the youngest brother.

They complied, and upon their return, Binyomin was seized. Yehudah describes the devastation awaiting them at home, how they could never face their father without returning with his youngest son, and how Yaakov’s heartbreak over the loss of Yosef still haunted their lives.

Then, at the very moment when confrontation seemed inevitable, the viceroy shattered the tension. “Ani Yosef,” he declared. “Ha’od ovi chai? Is my father still alive?”

Yosef knew the answer. His question was itself an answer — a silent rebuke. “You speak now of concern for our father? Where was that concern when you tore a young boy from his arms and sold him into slavery?”

The Torah tells us that the brothers could not respond. “Velo yochlu echov la’anos oso.” They were stunned into silence, overwhelmed by shame and recognition.

Yosef then drew them close and said the words that echo through eternity: “Al tei’otzvu ve’al yichar be’eineichem.” Do not be depressed. Do not be angry. Hashem sent me here before you losum lochem she’airis ba’aretz, to prepare for you a place of survival.

“It wasn’t you who sent me here,” Yosef told them. “It was Hashem. This was not a mistake. You were not villains in a tragedy, but instruments in a Divine plan.”

He instructed them to hurry home to tell their father that Yosef was alive, honored, and powerful in Mitzrayim, and to bring Yaakov down with the entire family, where Yosef would sustain them through the famine.

The reunion was overwhelming. Yosef and Binyomin wept in each other’s arms. He embraced the other brothers and they cried together.

The brothers returned home bearing news that should have restored Yaakov’s soul: “Yosef is alive and he rules in Mitzrayim.” Yet, astonishingly, Yaakov did not believe them. “Lo he’emin lohem.”

How could this be? Yaakov had refused to accept Yosef’s death. Why would he now reject the news of his life?

Perhaps the answer lies beneath the surface. To accept that Yosef was alive meant accepting how he had survived. It meant confronting the unbearable truth that his own sons had sold their brother and deceived their father. That reality was harder to absorb than death itself.

But then the brothers told him kol divrei Yosef — not just the facts, but the message. They told him Yosef’s words: al tei’otzvu. They told him that Yosef said that this was all Hashem’s doing, that suffering had been the pathway to salvation.

And then, “vatechi ruach Yaakov.” Yaakov’s spirit returned. He was revived not only by the knowledge that Yosef lived, but by the emunah that Yosef embodied.

Yosef had endured abandonment, humiliation, temptation, and imprisonment, yet he emerged without bitterness, without resentment, convinced that there is a Master of the world who writes and directs the script. What appears destructive is often preparatory. What seems like a curse may be a blessing in disguise.

The great mashgiach, Rav Yeruchom Levovitz, would say, “We are always in His hands. Amol di rechte hant, amol di linke hant — Sometimes the right hand, sometimes the left, but He is always carrying us.”

This is the depth of the drama in these pesukim. This is the enduring lesson Yosef taught his brothers — and us.

Al tei’otzvu.

Jewish history is replete with people planted in a location where they could best impact others. Sometimes they had to be uprooted and replanted elsewhere, causing no small amount of hardship, but in the end, the Divine precision became clear.

This was true in our recent history, when the Holocaust devastated the European Torah world. A few hardy souls were waiting in America to greet the limping remnant. Most of these European immigrants had come to America before the war because they were forced to, perhaps due to hunger or some other threat. In time, it became clear that they were sent there lefleitah gedolah.

My grandfather, Rav Eliezer Levin, was one of the many who survived what appeared at the time to be tragedy. He had taken a leave of absence for one year from his rabbonus in Lita when his relatives dragged him to America. Fearing for his life as the winds of war circled over Europe, they brought him here and arranged a rabbinic position in Erie, PA. Needless to say, he could not adapt to Erie and wanted to return to his beloved Vashki and to his wife, children, and baalei batim.

The thought of bringing his family to die a spiritual death in Erie frightened him, but he could not return to his hometown. He had left his rabbinic position there in the hands of a trusted friend, who agreed to serve as rov until he would return from America. The friend would gain serious experience, aiding him in his pursuit of a position. However, when Rav Levin wrote that he was coming home to reassume the position, the friend was devastated. He said that he would never get another job and pleaded with Rav Levin to let him stay there, asking Rav Levin to find himself a different position.

Although it was his father-in-law’s position, which he had inherited and occupied for a number of years, Rav Levin did not have the heart to unseat the man from the job. Meanwhile, his family members secured a rabbinic position in Detroit for him. With no choice, he moved there and sent for his family. With their meager possessions, several of Rav Levin’s seforim, along with kisvei yad of his father-in-law, the family set sail on one of the last boats to leave Europe before the war broke out. They arrived just ahead of the destruction of Lithuania. The rabbi of Vashki and the entire town were wiped out. No one survived.

Rav Levin played a key role in establishing a Torah community in Detroit and actively assisted the roshei yeshiva of Telshe as they started their yeshiva in Wickliffe, Ohio, after being stranded here. His own children would emerge as prominent rabbonim and roshei yeshiva in this country, providing “michyah,” spiritual sustenance, “she’airis,” and “pleitah gedolah” as the generation faced starvation.

Examine the history of the rebirth of Torah in this country and around the world and you will find similar stories of people who had been doomed to living far from their homes, surviving the war, and planting the seeds of a blossoming nation.

More recently, although October 7^th was an awfully tragic day, survivors told stories of miraculous salvation that day, which led many to recognize Hashem’s existence and begin to practice Torah and mitzvos. People who were taken hostage that day and held in subhuman conditions in Gaza relate how they felt the hand of Hashem keeping them alive and eventually attaining freedom.

Stories of Hashgochah Protis abound. Stories are often told about a person being in the right place at the right time, thinking that they are in the wrong place and bemoaning their fate, only to learn that fate had intervened on their behalf. These stories depict how the Divine Hand reached down from Heaven and plucked the protagonists from disaster, with neither their knowledge nor acquiescence.

We know stories of people who thought their world was closing in on them and their life was ending, only to learn later that their salvation was cloaked in what they had perceived at the time as suffering.

But it is not enough to read and be reminded of such stories if we do not realize that our entire life is comprised of such stories.

And when those distressful times come, we have to hear Yosef as he calls out to us through the ages and says, “My brothers and sisters, grandsons and granddaughters, al tei’otzvu. Don’t despair. Don’t be desperate. Don’t think it’s all over. Never give up.”

When it seems as if the bad guys are winning, when you feel all alone, when your teacher, boss, or partner has screamed at you, or when you feel as if you’re at the end of your rope, know that it is not yet over and the plot can thicken and change. Sometimes it happens quickly, while other times it takes a while to see the sun behind the clouds. But you must know that it is always there.

Emunah and bitachon are our lifelines, motivating and driving us. Without them, we stumble and fall.

Every day, Eliyohu Hanovi would visit Rav Yosef Karo, author of the Shulchan Aruch and Bais Yosef. His teachings are recorded in the sefer Maggid Meishorim. The Bais Yosef writes in Parshas Behar that “the maggid,” as he referred to him, told him not to let a day go by without studying from the classic mussar work Chovos Halevavos, which reinforces concepts of yiras Hashem, emunah, and bitachon.

This is both a religious obligation and good advice. One who is lacking in understanding these ideas becomes depressed and lost, misguided and misdirected, in what can be a cruel and crushing world.

No matter what comes over us, we must remain positive and upbeat, continuing to live and do without hatred and contempt. Learning Torah and Chovos Halevavos, as well as Mesilas Yeshorim and other seforim of mussar, does that for us.

Dovid Hamelech says in Tehillim, “Aileh vorechev ve’aileh basusim.” Some trust in their tanks and some trust in their cavalry. “Heimah koru venofolu va’anachnu kamnu vanisodad.” They crumble and fall, and oftentimes when they go to battle, the weaponry they had worshipped fails them. Those whose lives are directed and guided by Torah and emunah will be able to rise and be strengthened, because their value system is not dependent on temporary, fleeting powers that can be, and are, susceptible to defeat.

Al tei’otzvu. No matter how daunting the challenge you are facing appears, it can be overcome.

The danger of entering a downward spiral and becoming entrapped in a lethargic state, brought on by the maddening acts other people are capable of and an inability to escape their harshness, has ruined many people, thwarting their ambitions and hopes for growth and a better day tomorrow.

What they so desperately need is to hear the comforting, loving call of al tei’otzvu. Don’t pay attention to those who seek to suppress you and usurp your innate human desire for success. Ignore those who seek to make you small and gravitate to the ones who try to expand your horizons, sharpen your focus, and broaden your vistas.

Don’t blame yourself for failure—al yichar apchem—and don’t let others pin blame upon you either. Know that you and every Jew are blessed with the potential for greatness. Know that whatever happens is for a higher purpose than you can understand.

The posuk states that when Moshiach comes, hoyinu kecholmim, we will be as dreamers. The Slonimer Rebbe explained that the posuk refers to the “dreamer,” Yosef Hatzaddik. On the day of Moshiach’s arrival, we will all be as the brothers were when Yosef told them that their struggles and suffering should be understood and perceived as causes for joy.

May that day and its revelations come soon. Until they do, al tei’otzvu.

No matter how daunting the darkness, we must remember that we are never abandoned. Like Yosef in Mitzrayim, like our ancestors uprooted and replanted in distant lands, we may face moments that feel insurmountable, when suffering seems unending and hope appears to vanish. Yet, each hardship and each challenge is a thread in a tapestry that only Hashem can see in full. What seems like despair may be the groundwork for future yeshuos. What feels like loss may plant seeds for much future growth.

Every generation witnesses unique challenges. In the Holocaust, families were torn apart, communities destroyed, and Torah worlds threatened with extinction, yet from those ashes, Torah blossomed anew in Israel, America, and across the globe. October 7^th reminds us that even amid the most immediate dangers, Hashem intervenes in ways hidden from our eyes. People survive, are strengthened, and come to a deeper awareness of His guidance. Last week’s tragedy in Australia could have been much worse. The murderers threw bombs into the crowd before they began shooting. Many lives were miraculously spared when the bombs did not go off.

These are not coincidences. They are expressions of Hashgocha Protis, the Divine hand at work in the lives of each Jew.

And so it is in our personal lives. When work overwhelms, relationships strain, or challenges appear insurmountable; when words wound, doors close, or plans fail; Yosef’s call echoes across the centuries: Al tei’otzvu. Do not despair. Do not surrender. Do not allow fear or frustration to deter you. Even when the world seems to press in, the Divine plan is at work. Emunah and bitachon are not abstract ideals. They are lifelines, anchors that allow us to navigate the storms with clarity, courage, and purpose.

When Moshiach comes, we will be like Yosef’s brothers, able to see the purpose in what once seemed like chaos, to recognize joy in trials that shaped us, and to understand that every struggle was a step toward redemption. Until that day, we hold fast to Yosef’s timeless message. We persevere. We endure. We hope. And we live with the knowledge that Hashem’s light is never far, even when the night seems endless.

No matter how heavy the burdens, how unfair the world seems, or how impossible the challenge appears, remember Yosef’s words: Al tei’otzvu. Trust Hashem, keep moving, and the light will find you.

May we merit the coming of Moshiach very soon.