Someone went to Meron for Shabbos. He arrived three hours before sunset and found that the apartment he rented was far from suitable. It wasn't cleaned properly, nor orderly. He looked for another place to be for Shabbos but couldn’t find one, so he settled on what he had but decided that he wouldn’t pay the rent. "He cheated me," he said, "and doesn't deserve to be paid."
After Shabbos, his older daughter said, "Please, father. Forgive him and pay him. And in the merit of your avoiding a machlokes, may Hashem help me find my shidduch." The father agreed to do as his daughter requested. She had been waiting for many years for her shidduch, and shortly after this episode, she got engaged.
Then Yosef said, מכרתם אשר אחיכם, "Even when you sold me, my feelings of brotherhood with you never left me." Tzaddikim say that the Or HaChaim wouldn't have written this explanation if he, himself, wasn't on this level. And it is an incredibly high level. Yosef suffered immensely from being sold to Mitzrayim. He was in jail for twelve years, he suffered from aishes Potiphar, and more. But throughout all these times, Yosef said that his feeling of love to his brothers remained firm. Even when they sold him, he wasn't angry at them, and that is an incredibly high level.
We can't expect to have this perfection, but at least we should aim at being somewhat like Yosef. As Chazal say, יגיעו מתי לומר אדם חייב אבותי למעשי מעשי, a person should say, "When will my deeds reach the deeds of my forefathers." The word יגיעו means to reach, but it also means to touch. The Imrei Emes says that we must at least touch and have a drop of similarity to the deeds of our forefathers. We should seek to be like Yosef HaTzaddik.
It is wrong to argue and fight, especially with family. Hard feelings toward family shouldn’t be expressed, no matter what the others did to us. The Shlah HaKadosh writes, "See how much a person must forgive because they sinned to him, and he cried on their shoulders."
The Psikta writes that Yosef was cautious to never be alone with Yaakov, because he sought to avoid Yaakov asking him how he ended up in Mitzrayim, and he would have to tell him about how the brothers sold him. Also, the Ramban writes that Yosef never told Yaakov about his being sold. This is how cautious they were about harming others in their family. Yosef didn't want his brothers to be embarrassed and harmed, and he protected his brothers from shame.
The Shem MiShmuel zt'l mentions that had Yosef come frequently to his father, Yaakov, how much Torah he would have learned! How many secrets of the Torah would have been discussed! But Yosef forfeited this opportunity, for his brother's sake, for he was cautious that they shouldn't suffer any shame.
Yaakov Avinu said (44:28) טרף טרף אך , The Chasam Sofer zt'l explains that טרף means parnassah (see Tehillim 111:5, ליראיו נתן טרף). The expression ָףטֹר ָרֹףט ַ ךְא means that the parnassah was lost, due to the machlokes. This is as the Shlah HaKodosh teaches, "One machlokes pushes away one hundred parnasos."
One of the tzaddikim of the Gerer dynasty was Reb Moshe Betzalel. There was once poverty in his home, and he said that the first step towards fixing this problem was to avoid machlokes and disputes, because "one dispute pushes away one hundred parnasos."
Yosef told his brothers (45:24) בדרך תרגזו אל, and Reb Chatzkel Kozmirer zt'l explains, "Don't argue over the derech, the correct path in which to serve Hashem." The yetzer hara finds many ways to increase machlokes among Yidden, and one of the yetzer hara's tactics is to cause people to fight and argue over the correct path in serving Hashem. Yosef warned his brothers that they shouldn't fall into that trap.
The Ahavas Yisrael of Vizhnitz zt'l said, "Hashem shows each tzaddik that his path is the correct path to serve Hashem. Hashem shows this to the tzaddik to strengthen him in his way. However, the tzaddik doesn't realize that just as Hashem revealed this to him, Hashem reveals the same to other tzaddikim. Hashem tells them that their path in avodas Hashem is the correct way.
It states (Yeshayah 66:22) החדשים השמים כאשר כי ,עושה אני אשר החדשה והארץ, that in the future, Hashem will create a new heaven and a new earth. We understand that we need a new earth because the earth became contaminated by our aveiros, but why do we need a new heaven?
The Chasam Sofer said that this is because people make machlokes שמים לשם, and they claim that they are fighting for Hashem's honor, but really, it would be better if they would have avoided the machlokes. Therefore, we need החדשים שמים, a new heaven. The old shamayim was used for machlokes.
