Bulletin Bechukotai

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Shabbat Shalom • ouka ,ca
Shabbat Parshat Becukotai
24 Iyyar 5784 • June 1, 2024
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SHAVUOT
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12 TH
JUNE
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Yahrtzeiten
Anniversaries
May 31 Beth & Albert Blumberg (43)
June 3 Gayle & Steven Chizzik (51)
June 7 Lee & Joe Henson (55)
vfrck oburfz
June 1 • 24 Iyyar Rubin Levin – Father of Samuel Levin
Simon Cherkasky – Father of Belle Agronin
June 2 • 25 Iyyar Anne Goldfine – Mother of Mel Goldfine
and Elaine Kamin
Joyce Tanenbaum – Sister of Gayle Levy
June 5 • 28 Iyyar Max B. Green – Father of Judith Chaloff
June 6 • 29 Iyyar Harry Myers – Father of Marian Engel
Neil W. Randall – Son of Libby & Leroy Randall
Harry J. Dunn – Father of Norma Rosen
Al Pavlo
– Father of Francine Kaufman
Elaine Weinstein – Wife of Barton Weinstein
June 7 • 1 Sivan Martin Weiss – Father of Judy Fant
Simon Mest – Brother of Stuart Mest
Victor Rosenberg – Father of Alan Rosenberg
Ira Schwartz – Brother of Elliot Schwartz
Birthdays
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June 1 David Siegel June 2 Ruth Jason
June 3 Debra Silow, Susan Schwartz
June 4 Howard Gilbert June 7 Nancy Garfinkel
Shabbat Kiddush Sponsored by:
Ed & Paulette Margulies
In honor of Rabbi Chorny and
the Beth Tikvah congregation
Mavens: Steve Chizzik & Fran Kaufman
Assisted by: Elaine Kamin, Mel Goldfine,
Isabel Ramos, Shep & Linda Scheinberg
Sponsor a
Kiddush
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Contact Arleen Sivakoff:
dsivakoff@aol.com • 239.455.8811

Torah & Haftarah Readings:
Shabbat Bechukotai: Leviticus 26:3–27:15 (Cycle 2) (Etz Hayim p. 746)
1. 26:3-5 2. 26:6-9 3. 6:10-46 4. 27:1-4
5. 27:5-8 6. 27:9-11 7. 27:12-15 M. 27:32-34 (p. 756)
Haftarah: Jeremiah 16:19–17:14 (p. 763)
Torah Commentary
D’var Torah:
Joseph’s Hidden Blessings - Bex Stern-Rosenblatt
Joseph is a man whose dreams come true. Joseph is a man who can reshape
reality to correspond to his will. Joseph is a man who saves multiple nations.
But I wouldn’t want to be Joseph. I wouldn’t want to go through what he
has had to go through to get where he is. And even at his peak, at his most
successful, I would not trade places with him. He is feared and revered,
untouchable and apart. Even when his family returns to him, he never quite
returns to the bosom of his family. He is a man apart, a troubled lad who
becomes a lonely administrator. He is not my idea of blessed.
And yet, his story hides behind the blessings in our parashah. We find it first
in the phrasing of Lev. 26:6, “And I shall set peace in the land, and you
will lie down with none to make him tremble, and I shall make evil
beasts cease from the land, and no sword will pass through your
land.” The term “evil beasts,” vgr vhj appears in two cases in the Torah - in
our parashah and in the story of how Joseph was killed which his brothers
conspire to tell his father and which his father imagines into being for his
brothers. It’s a horrifying story. It’s a story of lying brothers and a complicit
father. It’s a story of near murder. It’s a tragedy that breaks Jacob’s heart.
What’s more, it’s a story about evil beasts who do not actually exist. There are
no animals who tore up Joseph. Joseph is still alive. The very idea of an evil
animal is hard to understand. Humans can do good and bad. Animals, even
animals who kill humans, are surely not acting maliciously. In the curses
section of our parashah, we find animals, this time animals of the field or
wild spaces, who will cause bereavement by killing domestic animals and
humans. But those animals are not classified as evil. They are simply acting
according to their nature.
When God tells us, as a blessing, that he will make evil beasts cease from the
land, it is almost a threat. Hidden in the blessing is an acknowledgement of
how much worse the situation could be. There are currently no evil animals
planning on killing us. But imagine if there were. Being blessed, in this sense,
is a realization of the fragility of our situation and an appreciation that it
could be worse. Being blessed, in this case, is Joseph lucky to be alive, even as
a slave sold and on the way to Egypt.

The Joseph story haunts the rest of our parashah. We count our blessings
and fear curses largely based on whether there will be food to eat. Joseph’s
coup de grace for Egypt was finding a way to store food from year to year,
to have abundance even in a time of curses, of famine. In the context of last
week’s parashah, God provides us with food when we let the land lie fallow
for Shmita and the Jubilee Year. In the context of the Joseph story, Joseph
provides us food whe the land cannot be made fruitful. God’s blessing that
we shall “eat the long-stored supply and you shall take out the long-stored in
favor of the new,” promises that after Joseph and after a Shmita year, we will
still survive and thrive. Rather than God taking us out of Egypt, it is us who
will be taking out food. We all become little Josephs, managing our
Joseph and his brothers do not seem blessed. They are the ones who
started our descent to Egypt. They are the ones who acted as evil animals,
condemning their own brother. None of them really lives happily ever after.
Their father’s final remarks to them can hardly be called blessings.
And yet we choose to bless our children that they be like Joseph’s children,
like Ephraim and Mannaseh. God chooses to present the ideal world, the
best of the best, to us with the tragedy of the Joseph story hiding behind it.
Perhaps, we are invited to believe that we are blessed even when life seems
cursed. Perhaps we are reminded that, like Joseph, we can transform years of
scarcity into years of plenty. Perhaps, we can hold out hope that our children
will be like Ephraim and Mannaseh even when we are like Reuben and
Simon.
✺ Join Rabbi Chorny
for his weekly discussion
group, Tuesdays at
12:15 p.m. via
and IN Person
Beth Tikvah of Naples
1459 Pine Ridge Road
Naples, FL 34109
239 434-1818
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