A SCENARIO in a genocide: I am part of a targeted group. The enemy demands that the group turn over a specific member of the group to be put to death. Otherwise, the enemy says it will murder the entire group.
May the one person be turned over, to be murdered, in order to save the group? Or must the group refuse and sacrifice many lives?
This terrible dilemma occurred during the Holocaust. Something similar occurs in this weeks Torah portion.
Also this: In a natural disaster a famine, for example is pleasure permitted? Even if one is personally protected against the effects of the disaster, must one diminish ones pleasure out of solidarity with those who suffer?
This question is raised in this weeks Torah portion.
A related question: After a disaster strikes a fire burns down the entire town, a typhoon hits the Philippines, a tornado hits Washington, Illinois may a leader take any aid that comes his way?
IN this weeks Torah portion, a natural disaster a seven-year famine struck Egypt and the surrounding areas, such as Canaan, just as Joseph had predicted in his interpretation of Pharaohs dreams (Gen. 41:15-32).
Netziv (1816-1892), based on the Talmud (tractate Taanit 11a), picks up a subtle yet salient message in this seemingly innocuous verse:
Two sons were born to Joseph before the [first] year of famine, whom Osnat the daughter of Potiphar, the priest of Ohn, bore to him (Gen. 41:50).
Netziv notes that the Torah is careful to record that the sons were born before the famine, implying that their parents abstained from from intimate relations during the famine.
In Taanit, this point follows another: Whoever minimizes his eating in years of famine is saved from an unusual death.
The point is clear: During periods of massive human suffering, solidarity is expressed by eliminating or minimizing ones personal pleasure.
As is always the case in Talmudic law, exceptions and extenuating circumstances are dealt with.
What if one is childless? The sage Reish Lakish rules that for such a couple intimacy is required even during a natural disaster, such as a famine.
What about Josephs brother Levi? He and his wife gave birth to Jocheved during the years of famine. Why didnt they abstain, like Joseph and Osnat?
Netziv writes that the situations of Joseph and Levi were somewhat different. Joseph lived in Egypt, where the famine was total. Levi, however, lived in Canaan, where the famine could not have been total. (Only in Egypt had a leader stored up grain, as Joseph did; everyone in Canaan would have died had the famine there been total.) In Canaan, people, including Josephs family, were slightly protected against the famines worst effects; there was no obligation to diminish ones personal pleasure thus, Jocheveds birth to parents who lived in Canaan.
Other commentators have a different take. Tosefot, the medieval commentators, say that Joseph and Osnats refraining from intimacy during the famine was a special act of piety, not obedience to an actual prohibition. Joseph lived on a higher plane than Levi.
Taanit continues in a general vein: Whomever separates himself from the troubles of the Jewish community . . . will not see the deliverance of the community. Alternatively: . . . will have no portion in the World to Come; i.e., will die a permanent death.
ANOTHER, much tougher level of solidarity: the scenario above, in which one member of a group is demanded to be put to death.
Again, in this weeks Torah portion, there is a weighty message in a seemingly innocuous phrase.
The background is laid out in Genesis 42:1-19: The famine in Canaan is too much to bear. When grain disappears (and, according to Netziv, only vegetables and grasses remain as food), Jacob urges his sons to go down to Egypt to buy grain. They come before Joseph, who recognizes them, even as they do not recognize him.
Joseph accuses them of spying. They defend themselves, saying that once they were the 12 sons of Jacob, but one is unaccounted for (Joseph) and one was left back in Canaan (Benjamin). Joseph locks up the 10 brothers for three days and then tells them: Leave one brother behind in Egypt, take grain back to Canaan, and bring back the one brother you left there. If you do that, then Ill know youre telling the truth, and you shall not die.
In other words, something very similar to the Holocaust scenario. Joseph tells his 10 brothers: Turn over one member of your group and I wont kill the rest of you. The implication is that if you dont come back with your other brother, I will kill the one brother you leave behind.
Even more, Joseph knows that the grain he has given his brothers will run out; they will have to return for more. By implication, when they return, if they dont bring their other brother, Joseph will kill them all.
Now for the seemingly innocuous phase at the end of the verse in which Joseph threatens them with death:
[Joseph:] Bring your younger brother to me and in this way verify your story, and you shall not die. And thus they did (Gen. 41:20).
Did what?
Interprets Netziv: They began to discuss which one of the brothers to leave behind. Netziv notes that Joseph shortly relieves them of the choice by imprisoning Simeon (Gen. 41:24), but Netziv comments: Clearly, the brothers were guilty of a terrible violation of human solidarity in considering which brother to hand over. On the other hand, the brothers saw that it was their own fault that put them in this position. The next verse:
And one brother said to the next, but we are guilty of having seen the anguish of our brother [Joseph] when he plead with us [not to sell him down to Egypt], and we didnt listen. Thats why this trouble has befallen us (Gen. 41:21).
The lack of human solidarity costs!
Are there limits to human solidarity? At a minimum, we should answer that on the level of special piety, there are none. Pleasure should be diminished during a period of others pain; and even life itself must be sacrificed if life can be preserved only at the price of turning over another person to certain death.
As to whether leaders may accept aid extended during a disaster, permit me to cite an amazing incident. At the beginning of the 20th century, a fire burned down all of the wooden houses in the Jewish shtetl of Brest Litovsk, Lithuania.
There was no home insurance.
No Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
Nor any aid from the US government (if it even heard about the fire in pre-radio days).
The leader of the community, Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik (1853-1918), took it up himself to circulate in the surrounding shtetls in order to raise the funds to rebuild everyones house.
It took a long time.
As he was raising the funds, he slept on a board in the open. Until everyone elses house was rebuilt, he would neither rebuild his own house nor even take shelter. Human solidarity without limit!
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