Last night, for the first time, I had a taste of American Thanksgiving. Being Canadian-born, and having spent two thirds of my life in Israel, I have very little feeling for the American Thanksgiving. No, sorry, I shouldn’t have said that, I have NO feeling at all for the American thanksgiving, other than the fact that I’m thankful I’m Canadian.
I’m also very thankful that at least one of my prime ministers is a man of principles, and stands by his word. Go Stephen Harper, my new superhero.
Whenever I officially think of giving thanks, the first thing that comes to mind is this book I read a long time ago, but stayed in my head, called the Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom. Corrie was a Christian Dutch woman, who was sent to Ravensbruck Concentration Camp with her sister for hiding Jews in her home in a small town in Holland. After the war, she wrote a book about her experiences, and was honored by Yad VaShem as a righteous gentile.
In her book, she describes her time in the camps. She and her sister would lead prayer groups with the other prisoners, where they would give thanks for whatever they could. One day, her sister, leading the group, gave thanks for the friends they had made, for being together with her sister, and then thanked G-d for the fleas they were infested with. The fleas, of course, were a source of typhus and other diseases. Corrie protested this inclusion. “How can you thank G-d for fleas!!” she asked. But her sister insisted, “Yes, we must thank G-d for everything He gives us.”
Later on, Corrie discovered that the reason they were able to carry on with their prayer meetings was that the German guards didn’t want to come near them because the place was infested with fleas.
In this week’s Parsha VaYeshev, we read the story of how the 10 sons of Yaakov decide to sell their brother Yosef and he is taken as a slave to Egypt.
It’s written “And they (the 10 sons) sat down to eat bread, (after throwing Yosef in a deep pit with the thought of leaving him there to die) and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and behold, a company of Yishme'alim came from Gilad with their camels carrying aromatic gum, balm, and ladanum, going to carry it down to Egypt".
It is to this caravan of Yishmaelim that the brothers sell Yosef instead of leaving him in the pit.
Now, we know that the Torah never wastes words. It doesn’t believe in descriptions to make more interesting reading. There is a reason that the Torah tells us what the camels that are going to take Yosef to Egypt are carrying. They are carrying aromatic gum, balm, and ladanum. (I looked up what ladanum is in the dictionary – in case anyone was wondering. It’s the juice extracted from certain rose plants and used to make perfume.)
We know that Yosef’s sale to the Yishmaelim is the first part of a divine plan. We know that he goes to Egypt so that he can eventually attain a position in which he is able to save his family from famine. We know that G-d wants the sons of Yaakov to come to Egypt. G-d’s plan is for Bnei Yisrael to become slaves, leave Egypt as a nation, and receive His Torah and be brought to the Land as a nation. We know this, but Yosef doesn’t.
So the Torah tells us that the caravans were full of aromatic gum, balm, and perfume. This is a hint to Yosef that he is not alone in his troubles. The caravans could have been full of chickens, or fertilizer, or old boots. But they were full of perfume, making his dark journey into slavery just a little easier, a little brighter. It’s a message to Yosef, and to us, that G‑d is with us even when we don’t understand or see the good, there is always some good to be thankful for. Sometimes, we need to look for the good and recognize it, even in the toughest situations.
And sometimes, like Yosef, or like the Pilgrims in 16whatever, we have to go through some difficult times to be able to really appreciate the good in life.
It’s something to keep in mind.
Like my (Canadian-born) friend Bracha said last night at our Thanksgiving soiree, just like every day should be Mother’s Day, every day should be Thanksgiving.
Wishing all my American friends happy Thanksgiving, and all my non-American friends happy giving thanks!
