- 1) The Torah doesn’t waste an unnecessary word or relate any extraneous details, telling only what is necessary for all generations to know. Why was it necessary to record (41:45) that Pharaoh changed Yosef’s name to Tzafnas Paneiach?
- 2) To force his brothers to return with Binyomin, Yosef put one of them in jail and said he would only be freed if they returned with their younger brother (42:19-20). If Yosef’s desire was to be reunited with Binyomin, why was it necessary to incarcerate one of his brothers when he knew the famine would continue for several more years and he could have simply informed them that they could not buy more grain unless they returned with their younger brother?
- 3) Shortly after Yosef’s brothers departed, he instructed his son Menashe to catch up to them, accuse them of pilfering his goblet, and search their possessions to find the perpetrator (44:4). However, rather than admonishing them for the grave crime of stealing from the viceroy, Yosef told Menashe to simply ask why they repaid his kindness with evil. Why did Yosef emphasize this aspect of the alleged transgression rather than the primary sin of theft?
- 4) How old was Yosef when he was put in jail?
- 5) Yosef accuses his brothers of being ‘meraglim’ – ‘spies.’ What parallels can you find between the brothers of Yosef and the meraglim that Moshe sent?
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