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Beit Midrash
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- Parashat Hashavua
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The first example is the powerful and momentous dream that accompanied the Brit Bein Habetarim (Bereishit 15:11-18). After the procedure Avraham undertook involving animals he slaughtered as part of the covenant, Avraham fell asleep and was told about the exile of his offspring and their liberation and return to the Land. Avraham was a nasi (prince, leader) and Sarah was a princess of sorts, as her name indicates. They interacted on an ongoing basis with kings, and this prophecy related to the future of his descendants, as they emerged as a nation hundreds of years later.
In the next dream, Hashem appears to King Avimelech and warns him to stay away from Sarah and return her to her husband, Avraham. The dreamer is a king and the topic relates to a common practice of kings – abducting a woman that he desires. Yaakov’s dreams about the ladder, as he was leaving his homeland, and the one he had as the leader of the encampments returning home from Aram, dealt, as Chazal explain, with the rise and fall of empires over history. The Ba’al Haturim points out that the numerical value of "olim v’yordim bo" ([the angels were] going up and down on it [the ladder]) (Bereishit 28:12), is equal to the names, Bavel (Babylonia), Madai (Persia), Yavan (Greece), and Romi (Rome).
Even the dream of Lavan, at the end of Parashat Vayeitzei, is the dream of the leader of a camp. He was a leader in Aram, and he was in the midst of deciding the future of the relations between Aram and Israel. The dreams of the officers in Egypt, who were more than a simple baker and a simple butler (they were in charge of two important areas of the time’s superpower’s commerce (grains and water)), dealt with national issues. The dream’s outcome relates to the future dreams of Pharaoh about the famine in Egypt.
The conclusion to arrive at, which has implications for generations, is that the job of a prophet is to give guidance to help set the path of nations. They did not deal with private matters that affected the individual in his daily life. Therefore, whenever we see something that seems personal, we should look for the impact that it had on a much grander national scale.
May we merit a return of prophets to our nation to guide us in national and international affairs.
Rabbis in Midrash
Lessons
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Moreshet Shaul Hashem Is your Shadow – part I
Based on Siach Shaul, Pirkei Machshava V’Hadracha p. 420 – an address from 1941
P'ninat Mishpat A Non-Contractor in Changing Times – part I
(based on ruling 85128 of the Eretz Hemdah-Gazit Rabbinical Courts)
Moreshet Shaul Our King on Rosh Hashana, Our Father on Yom Kippur.
Based on Aroch Siach, p. 221 (Rav Shaul Yisraeli)
P'ninat Mishpat A Non-Contractor in Changing Times – part II
(based on ruling 85128 of the Eretz Hemdah-Gazit Rabbinical Courts)
Moreshet Shaul Hashem Is your Shadow – part II
Based on Siach Shaul, Pirkei Machshava V’Hadracha p. 420 – an address from 1941
Parashat Hashavua Happiness for the Right Reasons
[With painful longing, we share these divrei Torah from our co-Rosh Kollel for close to 40 years, Harav Moshe Ehrenreich zt”l.]
