The Midrash states that Yaakov refused to be comforted for the death of Yosef because he believed that Yosef was still alive.
On what basis did Yaakov continue to hope that Yosef was still alive? Surely he had recognized Yosef’s blood-stained coat. He said explicitly, “A wild beast has devoured him. Yosef has been torn to pieces.” Do these words not mean that he had accepted that Yosef was dead?
The late David Daube made a suggestion that I find convincing. The words the sons say to Yaakov – haker na, literally, “identify please” – have a quasi-legal connotation. Daube relates this passage to another, Exodus 22:10-13, with which it has close linguistic parallels. The issue discussed is the extent of responsibility borne by a guardian (shomer). If an animal is lost through negligence, the guardian is at fault and must make good the loss. If there is no negligence, merely force majeure, an unavoidable, unforeseeable accident, the guardian is exempt from blame. One such case is where the loss has been caused by a wild animal. The wording in the law – tarof yitaref, “torn to pieces” – exactly parallels Yaakov’s judgment in the case of Yosef: tarof toraf Yosef, “Yosef has been torn to pieces.”
An elder brother carried a similar responsibility for the fate of a younger brother placed in his charge, as, for example, when the two were alone together. That is the significance of Cain’s denial when confronted by G-d as to the fate of Abel: “Am I my brother’s guardian [shomer]?” (Bereishis 4:9)
We now understand a series of nuances in the encounter between Yaakov and his sons upon their return without Yosef. Normally, they would be held responsible for their younger brother’s disappearance. To avoid this, as in the case of later biblical law, they “bring the remains as evidence.” If those remains show signs of an attack by a wild animal, they must – by virtue of the law then operative – be held innocent. Their request to Yaakov, haker na, must be construed as a legal request, meaning, “Examine the evidence.” Yaakov has no alternative but to do so, and by virtue of what he has seen, acquit them.
A judge, however, may be forced to acquit someone accused of a crime because the evidence is insufficient to justify a conviction, while still retaining lingering private doubts. So Yaakov was forced to find his sons innocent, without necessarily trusting what they said. In fact, Yaakov did not believe it, and his refusal to be comforted shows that he was unconvinced. He continued to hope that Yosef was still alive. That hope was eventually justified: Yosef was still alive, and father and son were ultimately reunited.
The refusal to be comforted sounded more than once in Jewish history. The prophet Jeremiah was sure that Jews would return to Israel because they refused to be comforted – meaning, they refused to give up hope (Jeremiah 31:15-17). So it was during the Babylonian exile, as articulated in one of the most paradigmatic expressions of the refusal to be comforted: “By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept, as we remembered Zion...”
Jews are the people who refused to be comforted because they never gave up hope. All the evidence of Jewish history may seem to signify irretrievable loss, a decree of history that cannot be overturned, a fate that must be accepted. Jews never believed the evidence because they had something else to set against it – a faith, a trust, an unbreakable hope that proved stronger than historical inevitability. It is not too much to say that Jewish survival was sustained in that hope. And that hope came from a simple – or perhaps not so simple – phrase in the life of Yaakov. He refused to be comforted. And so – while we live in a world still scarred by violence, poverty, and injustice – must we.
RABBI SHLOMO KATZ
RABBI JONATHAN SACKS Z”L
