The men carry out a diamond heist. White flees with Orange, who was shot during the escape and is bleeding in the backseat of a car driven by White. At their hideout, White and Orange rendezvous with Pink, who believes that the job was a setup and that the police were waiting for them. White informs him that Brown is dead, Blue and Blonde are missing, and Blonde murdered several civilians during the heist. White is furious that Joe, his old friend, would employ Blonde, whom he describes as a psychopath. Pink has hidden the diamonds nearby and argues with White over whether to get medical attention for Orange, and the pair draw guns on each other. They stand down when Blonde arrives with a kidnapped policeman, Marvin Nash.
The beginning of the movie Reservoir Dogs is one of the most confusing sets of intricate scenes I can recall from a film. From the names themselves to the confusion that exists between the different players, each scene is meant to distract you from the vital piece of information that one of the men is not who they pretend to be. No two participants’ values are aligned, and, in the end, that intricate detail is what causes the demise of all the members of the real heist.
Parshat Vayeshev is structured in a similar manner, albeit the characters’ names are at least clear.
Yosef is given special treatment by his father, Yaakov, through the gifting of a particular coat. If this doesn’t make his brothers jealous, the two dreams that Yosef shares of his dominance over them surely do.
The brothers plot to kill Yosef, only for two of them, Reuven and Yehuda, to intervene and redirect their hatred. Reuven convinces them not to kill Yosef, just to imprison him in an empty pit. Yehuda is the one who ultimately coerces them to sell him to nearby merchants.
Reuven, in an attempt to find himself in better graces with his father, goes in the night to rescue Yosef, only to find the pit completely empty as his brothers sold him earlier in the day.
Yehuda, in what appears to be a completely unrelated and distant event, is found in contempt when his daughter-in-law, Tamar, presents him in court with the realization that he had a sexual relation with her under the guise that she was a prostitute.
This feels like either an episode of General Hospital or The Sopranos—not an element you would think would take place in the Torah, and, perhaps, one that even surpasses the unique family dynamics that plagued Yaakov and his progeny.
After reading through this parsha, we are left with one task: how do we make sense of it all?
Just like the various characters who participated in the diamond heist, the four characters in Parshat Vayeshev—Yosef, his brothers, Reuven, and Yehuda—all share one thing in common: they all believe that they hold the purest version of a life based on values, only to find that they are misaligned and misdirected.
Yosef was clearly a favored child. He knew it, his brothers knew it, and he was not going to allow anyone to squash his reveling in this heightened state. When he revealed his dreams—all of which ultimately came to fruition—he spared no emotional expense in how he packaged his interpretations. Yosef’s pursuit of the value of truth flew in the face of the moral responsibility we have to care for the emotions of others.
Reuven’s role as the firstborn and supposed leader of Yaakov’s sons has been fraught with miscues. His attempt to save his brother Yosef was just another notch on this ill-advised journey. As the Netziv, Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehuda of Berlin, explains, Reuven did not blame Yosef for his actions. It was simply the mistakes of his youth and nothing more. He was not able to convince his brothers to consider anything of the sort and resorted to delaying his brother’s execution in the hopes of saving him.
Reuven saw the value of his resurrection in the eyes of his father as more important than standing his ground and educating his brothers on how we interact with those with whom we disagree. He allowed his personal pursuits to cloud his moral compass.
Yehuda’s story with Tamar is perhaps the most astounding red herring in the Torah. The story seems misplaced, has no true connection with what preceded or followed it (unless you take Rashi’s interpretation into account), and truly places Yehuda in a terrible light—the very same Yehuda from whom the kings of the Jewish people descend and, ultimately, from whom the Moshiach will emanate. How are we to understand this event in the time and space it appears?
Perhaps we are not focusing on the true main character. This is not a story about Yehuda; it is a story about Tamar. Tamar was promised the opportunity to complete the commandment of levirate marriage with her late husband’s younger brothers, only to be prevented from doing so by Yehuda himself. Tamar, in a daring attempt to continue the lineage of her late husband, disguised herself as a harlot and seduced Yehuda.
Months later, after being discovered to be pregnant, she was sentenced to trial in Yehuda’s court with an impending guilty verdict all but inevitable. As Tamar attempted to defend herself, she showed items Yehuda had given as a down payment—his seal and staff—as a means to prove her innocence while preventing any untoward shame to Yehuda for how, in turn, she became pregnant. Tamar’s moral compass stared death in the face and would not back down. She was willing to die in order to retain the Jewish values that made up who she was and how she lived.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks zt”l explains that Tamar’s actions were the basis for rabbinic moral codes that forbade public humiliation. When Yehuda struggled to uphold his moral compass, he orchestrated Yosef’s being sold, years of his father’s sorrow, and, ultimately, the humiliation of Yosef at the hands of Potiphar.
Each of these characters was raised by a man who epitomized a life of moral fortitude and unwavering values. He was surrounded by a brother and an uncle who embodied the opposite at every turn. Yet, his sons were challenged to hold their own in that regard. This week’s parsha is a reminder for us to understand the true worth of a life of morality and the consequences—personal and communal—that exist when we are not willing to forfeit everything, even death, to sustain it.