Parashat Veyeishev - Hats and Coats

 It is one of the most memorable quotes in a film brimmed with them.

Having sung the mournful ‘Anatevka’ the villagers look at each other.

Golde says, “Eh, it’s just a place.”

Mendel, the Rabbi’s son adds, “And our forefathers have been forced out of many, many places at a moment’s notice.”

At which point, Tevye shrugs his shoulders and says philosophically, “Maybe that’s why we always wear our hats.”

I have always felt a deep level of sympathy for Jacob.  It seems to be that whenever he thinks he’s managed to find contentment, it evades him. 

In Parashat Toldot, he was given no option by his mother but to deceive his father in order to receive the blessings that had been promised by Gd to both his grandfather Abraham and his son Isaac.  In doing so, he incurred the murderous wrath of his brother. 

He finds true love in Rachel and is himself deceived by his uncle when poor Leah is substituted under the veil.  Last week, we learned how his beloved Rachel died in childbirth (our Rabbis tell us that she was only 36).  If this was not tragic enough, his daughter was violated by Shechem and the subsequent massacre of the male population of the town of Shechem was carried out by two of his sons.  The family, who had spent ten years travelling from Charan, were forced to flee.  Can’t the poor man settle down and enjoy life?  Will he ever be able to lay his hat down in his tent and call this abode ‘home’?  (I’m paraphrasing the popular song). 

The first verse in this week’s Parasha seems to indicate that this is the case.

Genesis 37:1

Now Jacob was settled in the land where his father had lived as a stranger, in the land of Canaan.

Chizkuni, a 13th Century French Commentator writes that this verse follows the description of Eisav and his descendants' settlement of Edom and Mount Seir, an area which lies in Southwestern Jordan between the Dead Sea and Aqaba and includes the ancient city of Petra.  He says that, in the same way that Eisav had settled the land, although he had initially entered it as an alien to the area, Jacob was also able to claim Canaan as his birth right.  This is contrasted with his father and grandfather's existence as 'strangers' when they inhabited the country.

For all intents and purposes, the Torah is telling us that Jacob was finally home and his nomadic existence had come to an end.  He could take his hat off and place it safely on the biblical version of a hatstand.  If we work out the arithmetic, we can see that he was 108 years old when Joseph was sold into slavery (He died at 147 and lived his last 17 years in Egypt having been reunited with his son after an absence of 22 years). 

Seder Olam Rabba, a 2nd Century CE Jewish chronology, tells us that Jacob and his entourage finally arrived in Canaan nine years before the events that are about to be described took place, when Joseph was 17.  His life too had been tumultuous, having left his grandfather Lavan's house two years previously and then losing his mother Rachel at the young age of 36, six months earlier in Bethlehem inside the border of the land.  He'd lived in Hebron for less than a decade.  He was too young to wear a hat, so he might have used the 'hatstand' for his expensive new coat!

We know what happened next and how the family was splintered as a result of the nefarious selling of Joseph by his brothers (excluding Benjamin) and his transportation to Egypt.  This episode is followed by the sad tale of Judah who, after the sale, was rightfully blamed by his brothers for their actions and as we are told 'left his brothers' (see Chapter 38).  He doesn't reappear as part of the family until Chapter 43, after they have returned from Egypt having met Joseph for the first time in over a decade.

If we consider the impact all of this has had on a very elderly man and his offspring, we have a pretty sad state of affairs.  We began reading the Parasha with such a sense of hope.  Didn't we say that Jacob was settled in the land?  Didn't we emphasise the fact that he had finally started to see that the promise given to his grandfather and then passed on to his father, was coming to fruition?  By the time we reach Chapter 43, our history is anything but settled.  As for Joseph's coat, the hatstand may still be in place, but the once beautiful garment now lies tattered.  Lord knows where Jacob’s hat can be located.

'England has been all she could be to the Jews - The Jews will be all they can be to England.' Thus was writ the banner outside the offices of the Jewish Chronicle at the start of World War 1.  By the end of the war, no less than 2,425 Jewish servicemen had been killed, along with 6,500 wounded.  Another 700 were killed fighting for this country during the Second World War.  Over 3000 Jewish citizens died protecting the United Kingdom over the span of both wars.

I know that many of us saw the recent David Baddiel documentary 'Jews Don't Count' on Channel 4.  Some of us also read the book.  The programme made for depressing viewing, didn’t it?  Baddiel stated that it wasn't aimed at us but at our non-Jewish fellow citizens.  How many viewers asked the question that occupied my mind, both when reading the book and watching the programme?

It went along the lines of:

We were readmitted to this country over 350 years ago.  We fought to be recognised metaphorically and physically.  To be represented in Parliament.  To be able to attend university, followed by our children.  To take up any profession or skill that we could.  We strove to be treated as equals in the eyes of our countrymen and women.  Why, after more than three centuries, have we come to the conclusion, according to Mr Baddiel and many others that 'we don't count'?

Do you feel settled?

Do you feel as important as anyone else?

Did you or your father or grandfather risk his life to protect the entire nation, irrespective of their religious background?

In short, are we settled?  Can we truly feel secure in being able to place our hats and coats onto the hooks or coat stands that greet us as we open our front doors?  Are we able to send our children to school in Stamford Hill truly safe in the knowledge that they will come home without being attacked?

Must we really spend thousands of pounds of money that we don't have, to pay for security guards and CCTV systems and the exorbitant costs that go hand-in-hand with maintaining these?

 

Tonight, we will start celebrating the festival of Chanukah, where we commemorate the miracle of the Menorah that should have provided enough light for one day but miraculously lit up the Beit Hamikdash for a further seven.

People tend to forget that the victory of Yehudah HaMacabee, and his four brothers, in ending the Seleucid rule over Israel was fought on two fronts.  The first, against the Syrian Greeks themselves and the second, against the Hellenized Jews who controlled the Temple.  In both cases, a culture that was alien to our nation had infected the deepest foundations of our faith.  Our Holy Beit Hamikdash had been defiled.  Where we thought we had settled, having returned from the Babylonian Exile, we had instead settled, in a different way - by allowing ourselves to lose our national soul.  The Maccabees returned our people to the land of Israel physically, by fighting against the prevailing army, and spiritually, by reinstating and repairing the Beit Hamikdash to the point that the Hasmonean brothers smashed up the defiled altar and built a new, pure one.

The victory of the Maccabees was all the more significant as it showed that, when we put our minds to it, we can prove that Jews DO count.  In spite of the desire of others to question our legitimacy as rightful citizens of the land (as sadly, do many in the world today, when it comes to recognising the State of Israel), we stood firm and we prevailed. 

Tragically, in ancient Israel, our residency was cut-short just over a century later but we didn't lose hope and forever considered ourselves 'permanent settlers' for nearly two millennia.

Jacob's desire to settle is pitted against the events that transpired to change his plans.  This is our story - the history of the Jewish people.  Where we sought to lay down roots and remove our hats and coats, we were frustrated in our efforts.  Yet, we have never given up hope of achieving this.  Jacob’s journey to Egypt eventually led us into centuries of slavery, but didn't quell our desire to maintain our faith, despite the hardships his descendants faced. 

Although our presence in the United Kingdom over the last three and a half centuries is not analogous to the bitter and cruel conditions that faced our ancestors, there is the sad fact that some of our fellow citizens question our legitimacy as equals living in the same country. 

Jewish history is a chronicle of how we settled and were unsettled.  How we donned our hats and coats in the belief that they would remain for a while in situ and how we found ourselves having to wear them sooner than we had envisaged, as we faced a hostile climate.  How we were, in the words of Mendel, 'forced out of many, many places at a moment's notice' and how we, like the Maccabees, didn't give in when given a chance, to fight for our legitimacy as equal citizens of the countries in which we resided.

Jacob eventually settled in Egypt and didn't live to see his descendants returning to Israel, many, many times, leading to the miraculous events that rocked the world in 1948.

Our ancestors settled in England and look what we have achieved, despite the challenges we have faced. We might wear our hats and don our coats, but these days, it's to help protect us from the cold weather - just like everyone else.

Perhaps, we can gain some comfort from the lyrics of the famous song:

‘Grab your coat

Grab your hat, (baby)

Leave your worries on the doorstep

Just direct your feet

On the sunny side of the street’

When it comes to being settled in this country, history has shown us that, despite the will of others, we aren't leaving any time soon.  As always, we hope and pray that sunnier days lie ahead.  May Moshiach bring them speedily!

Shavuah Tov and Chanukah Sameach!