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In this week's Email:
- RCA Updates
- In Our RCA Family
- Chomer Lidrush
- Manning the Media
RCA Updates
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RCA Halacha Line is Live! See here for more details!
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Winter Missions 2.0 – in January and February. Join us as we provide support our brothers and sisters – and colleagues – in Israel. Click here for more information.
- Thanks to all those who renewed their membership with 2025 dues. Please click here if you have not yet done so. We apologize for any technical hiccups you may have experienced.
- Please see below regarding Rabbi Zohn’s important efforts surrounding Shabbos Vayechi. That shabbos is an ideal time to focus on issues such as Halachic Living Wills, Estate Planning K’Halachah, Burial Conversations with Family, Reaching out to Prevent Cremation and Strengthening Chevra Kadisha.
In Our RCA Family
- Mazel Tov to our chaver Reuven Chaim and Yael Shira Klein on the upcoming Bar Mitzvah of their son Binyamin Eliezer, and the recent publication of the sefer, לחם ממרחק: חלק ההלכות, (See Free Preview Here) in honor of the occasion.
- Mazel Tov to Rav Moshe and Cheryl Abramowitz (Beit Shemesh) on the birth of two great-granddaughters (!), born in Israel, to their grandchildren, Devorah & Yeddiya Gross and Chaya & Matanya Bar-lev.
Chomer Lidrush
A few ideas to turn your gears heading into the parsha.
1) “Why Do You Look So Sad?”
In our parsha, we’re introduced to Yosef’s personality as a caring person, even in less-than ideal circumstances. Rabbi Emanuel Feldman notes that when Yosef – who by then was no “stam” prisoner of Paroah – encountered the baker and butler in prison, he asks an important question: Why do you look so sad today?
That a prisoner of high stature would notice someone “beneath him” is startling enough, but, as Rabbi Feldman points out, Yosef did not simply say “hello, how are you” – he inquired, deeply and meaningfully: “מַדּוּעַ פְּנֵיכֶם רָעִים הַיּוֹם – why do you seem so sad today?”
Noticing the other – to express concern for someone else – is a very Yosef-esque thing to do. Rabbi Feldman develops this theme across Yosef’s life, ultimately tying to that vexing question of how Yosef was never able or willing to send a message to his father to let him know he is alive; simply, Rabbi Feldman suggests, so as not to “risk unleashing [Yaakov’s] wrath upon his brothers.” Full text of this timely and powerful essay here.
2) To Heal a Fractured World
An important chapter in Rabbi Sacks’ To Heal a Fractured World focuses on Reuven (amongst others) and the complexities of his choices and characters displayed in our parsha. Reuven is depicted as having good intentions, but nonetheless faltering in execution, often hesitating at critical moments.
Reuven persuades his brothers them not to kill Yosef outright, devising a plan to "buy time." However, his hesitation allows Yosef to be sold into slavery, forever altering the course of history. This stems, Rabbi Sacks suggest, from Reuven’s childhood experiences—being the son of Leah, the unloved wife—where his birth brought hope of earning Yaakov's love, yet it failed to do so. Had Reuven acted boldly – perhaps pushing back against his nature and upbringing – Yosef’s fate, and perhaps history itself, could have been different. See the brief chapter in its entirety here.
Did our chomer help you over Shabbos? Want to see more or less of an idea? Let us know!
Manning the Media
For Yours Thoughts:
1) Home for the Holidays
Coming home can be tougher for some more than others, and holidays – Chanukah included – can be a difficult stretch around family. While not Chanukah-centered, Faith Hill in The Atlantic gives a tip or two that we might find helpful to pass along to a congregant, or maybe be sensitive from the pulpit. (PDF)
2) Power of Imagination
Yosef avoids certain peril by picturing his father – see what imagination can do? The Free Press’ Douglas Murray reflects on the writer JK Rowling’s – the world’s most successful writer – commencement at Harvard, focusing on the power of dimyon.
For the Kiddush Conversation:
It’s been a week for news – again. Which has us thinking, it’s been quite a year for news! Luckily, The Wall Street Journal published their timeline of major stories this past year, through this past Tuesday – though, the way things are going, we won’t be surprised if there’s plenty more to add to this list in the last two weeks of the year. (PDF – with pictures!)
Read something that made you think? We’d love to read it, too – and then feature it! Drop us a line and let us know how we’re doing.
Help spread the word! You can partner with us in our newsletter and in Tradition.
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