Parashat Vayechi: The Generation Frame

When you walk into our living room and look at the left-hand side wall, you are greeted with an assortment of different sized framed family photographs.  A few depict Stephnie and me as children whilst others show our sons and daughters in various stages of their young lives to date.  There are photos of our departed (and very missed parents) along with other members of our close family (such as Stephnie’s sister).  They span the length of the wall and even extend to the adjacent one.  In each picture, the subjects are smiling and the entire collection is a wonderful site to behold.

If you cast your eye to the far end, you will see a column of official photographs taken at all four of my daughters’ graduation ceremonies and they hang chronologically from the top of the wall down to the bottom.

To the top left of my eldest daughter, Hadassah’s photograph is another graduation photo.  This one however was taken nearly a quarter of a century earlier.

There are three people in the photograph.  I am in the centre tightly holding my ‘prop’ certificate dressed in my blue gown and black cap.  My father is on the left of the picture with his hand on my elbow and my mother is on the right resting the palm of her hand on my arm.  The pride on our faces is palpable and the three of us are grinning like Cheshire cats.  It is March 1996 and I have just been awarded my MA.

Fast forward to July 2019 and the photo is slightly different.  Hadassah is receiving her BSc and is dressed in a black gown and hat.  Like me, she holds her prop close to her chest.  I am now where my father was, on the left, with my hand holding her arm.  My mother, whose hair was auburn in the previous photograph is now snow white and visibly older.  Her hand however is in the identical position on Hadassah’s arm.  The grins are the same but little did we know at the time that within two years, she would no longer be with us.

I am transfixed by the similarities in both photographs.  The positioning, the smiles and the pride that all three participants felt at the moment the picture was taken.

And then, a wave of sadness floods over me as I realise that in both cases, these photographs could never be taken again with the same subjects (setting aside the endless technological possibilities inherent in AI).

It feels as though, in the two images, the baton is being passed from one generation to the next.  Where I stood in one photo, my daughter takes my place.  Where my father was positioned previously, I am now the parent and in both, my mother remains there, previously younger and now older.

Vayechi is the only Parasha in the Torah which describes a scene that so many of us have sadly had to experience and can very much relate to.

The ageing patriarch Yaakov Avinu is on his deathbed.  He wants to ensure that he can spend the time he has left confined to his bed blessing his children and grandchildren.  We are not told how long this is and it is not important.  What does matter, however, is that he imparts to them the wisdom and blessings that they will need in order to continue the legacy that was handed to him by his father, Yitzchak and by extension through his grandfather Avraham, the first Jew.

He calls for his sons and says,

“Gather together so that I can tell you what will happen in the days to come.  Assemble and listen, Yaakov’s sons.  Listen to your father Yisrael…”

And with that, he addresses and blesses the twelve sons.  Some of his comments (according to Rabbi Sacks’ new Chumash) read ‘more like curses than blessings’.  But he notes something startling, that although there seems to be a ‘discernible tension’, the fact is that he is blessing ‘all twelve together in the same room at the same time’, which is not something that we have seen before in the Torah.  Avraham is not recorded as having blessed either Yitzchak or Yishmael.  We also know that Yitzchak gave separate brachot to Yaakov and Eisav (and let’s be honest, that didn’t turn out too well).

Rabbi Sacks continues,

“The mere fact that Yaakov is able to gather his sons together is unprecedented and important…because,” he writes “in the next chapter – the first of Exodus, the Israelites are for the first time described as a people.  It is hard to see how they could live together as a people if they could not live together as a family.”

The most important links we have to each other are through our families and I would add, by extension, the global Jewish mishpocha (family).  Who could not feel a sharp, gnawing and familiar numb pain when we heard about the recent terrorist attacks in Manchester, Sydney and Israel.  We may not have known any of the victims, but to us, ‘unsere’, our people are extended members of our own kin.

And tangentially, when we hear of a ‘broygus’ in families, we know that, beneath the anger, bitterness, hurt and tears, there lies a deep abiding love.  It may seem to be far below the surface, but when it comes to it, as Jews, we are all one large mishpocha.

In the immediate wake of the October 7^th massacres, our people united overnight, despite the events that had dogged our beloved country over the Judicial Reforms.  We came together because we love each other.  We did so, because we are one family.  One people with a single beating heart.

No-one will deny that families are complicated entities.  I recall that many years ago, John Cleese co-authored a wonderfully titled best-selling book called ‘Families and How to Survive Them’ which could be used as a moniker to describe this week’s Parasha!

Perhaps, subconsciously, he had read Sefer Bereishit and in particular Vayechi before deciding on the title!

Returning to my first reflections on those two photographs.  I will add that, like many people, my parents and I and my children and I have not always had the smoothest of relationships.  Very few of us do and there have been times when we’ve all said things we wished we hadn’t - but you wouldn’t know it when looking at those photos.

We are all human beings, warts and all but when it came to it, I would not have dreamed of having my graduation take place without my parents being present and likewise of not attending my daughters’ special days.  Standing next to Hadassah in the same way that my father stood by my side were some of the proudest moments in both our lives.  That my mother was able to be present for both events, at least to me, symbolises the inextinguishable flame that burns in the deepest recesses of our collective national Jewish heart.

Perhaps in a quarter of a century, Please Gd, a beaming Hadassah will rest her hand on her son or daughter’s arm alongside the graduate’s father who, carrying my metaphorical baton, will hold onto my grandson or granddaughter as they hold tightly onto their prop graduate certificate, continuing the half-century tradition.

One family which is part of our people with that single beating heart.

Shavuah Tov.