07 Jan VAYECHI: YOU ARE NOT ALONE WHY DOES BEREISHIT END ON SUCH A LOW NOTE?

Culminating Words
Thus are the
culminating words of
the first—and in many
ways the
foundational—book
of the Torah, Sefer
Bereishit:

“Yosef died at the age of one hundred and ten
years; they embalmed him and he was placed
in a coffin in Egypt.”
This ending is disturbing. Could have
Bereishit not concluded on a more inspiring
note, just like the four following books of
Moshe?
Even the fifth and final sefer, Devarim, which
concludes with Moshe’s passing, culminates
with a eulogy so rarely moving that it leaves
one with an unforgettable impression of
Moshe.
Indeed, for thousands of years the classical
Jewish sages, authors and rabbis have paid
special attention to concluding their written
volumes and verbal speeches on a positive
note. Even if the subject matter was one of
melancholic nature, they desired that at least
the punch line, the “last inning,” as it were,
should invigorate readers and listeners with a

message of hope and promise.
Yet, Sefer Bereishit chooses to conclude its
first installment with a gloomy and despairing
punch line: Yosef’s death and burial.
That incredible human being who in the best
and worst of times displayed enormous
dignity and richness of spirit, that tremendous
visionary and leader who rescued a world
from famine, is now gone. If that is not
enough, Bereishit informs us that Yosef is
embalmed and placed in a coffin in Egypt.
There his remains would be stored for
hundreds of years until the Jews leave Egypt
and bury his bones in the city of Shechem.
While Yosef’s father, Yaakov, labored hard
for assurances that his body would not remain
among the morally depraved—and what
would turn out to be genocidal—Egyptian
people but would be brought back to the
sacred soil of Chevron, Yosef’s worn and
sacred body must remain etched in Egyptian
earth for centuries.
Even if the Torah felt compelled to culminate
Bereishit with Yosef’s death, it could have
ended with the second-to-the-last verse of
Bereishit: “Yosef told his brothers: ‘I am
about to die, but G-d will indeed remember
you and bring you up out of this land to the
land that He swore to Avraham, to Yitzchak,

and to Yaakov… You will bring my bones up
out of here.” At least that would have ended
the sefer with a promise for future redemption.
What indeed are the final words of the book?
“Yosef died… and he was placed in a coffin in
Egypt!”
“Be Strong! Be Strong!”
The question about the ending of Bereishit
increases upon considering the Jewish custom
that when the reader of the Torah concludes
each of the sefarim of the Chamisha Chumshei
Torah, the entire congregation thunders out
loud: Chazak! Chazak! Venischazak! “Be
strong! Be strong! Let us be strengthened!”
This will occur this Shabbat morning in
synagogues the world over. When the reader
of the Torah concludes with the verse—
“Yosef died at the age of one hundred and ten
years; they embalmed him and he was placed
in a coffin in Egypt”—Jews will sing out:
Chazak! Chazak! Venischazak! “Be strong!
Be strong! Let us be strengthened!”
But how can one glean strength, never mind
triple strength, from this despairing end?
The Pain of Loneliness
Yet it may be that it is precisely this ending
that grants us a deeply comforting message.
Unfortunately, we cannot live life without
pain. Every life comes with challenges. The
very genesis of existence is rooted in a void
and a vacuum—the concealment of the
Divine infinite presence to allow for an
egocentric universe. This means that life,
whichever way you twist it, is a confrontation
with a void, and thus a painful experience.
What a person must know is not how to get
rid of his or her pain—that may not always
be possible—but rather how to discover that
they are empowered to deal with the pain
and that they are not alone in it.
The Presence of Yosef
“Yosef died at the age of one hundred and
ten years; they embalmed him and he was
placed in a coffin in Egypt.” In these very
uninspiring words, one may sense profound
inspiration.
The Jewish people are about to become
enslaved and subjugated to a tyrannical
government that will attempt to destroy
them one by one, physically and mentally
(as recorded at the beginning of Shemot).
This new Egyptian genocide program will
drown children, subject all Jewish men to
slave labor and crush a new nation.
What will give Bnei Yisroel the resolve they
will desperately need? What will preserve a
broken and devastated people from falling
into the abyss? The knowledge that one day
they would be liberated? Certainly. The
knowledge that evil will not reign forever?
Absolutely. Indeed, this is what Yosef told
the Jewish people before his passing,
recorded in the second-to-the-last verse of
Bereishit: “Yosef told his brothers: ‘I am

about to die, but G-d will indeed remember
you and bring you up out of this land to the
land that He swore to Avraham, to Yitzchak,
and to Yaakov… You will bring my bones up
out of here.”
But, then, when Bereishit seeks to choose its
final words, it provides us with a message that
perhaps served as the greatest source of
strength for an orphaned and broken Jewish
family. “Yosef died at the age of one hundred
and ten years; they embalmed him and he was
placed in a coffin in Egypt.” Yosef’s sacred
body is not taken back to the Holy Land to be
interred among the spiritual giants of human
history: Avraham and Sarah; Yitzchak and
Rivkah; his father Yaakov, or his mother
Rachel. Yosef’s spiritual and physical
presence does not “escape” to the heavenly
paradise of a land saturated with holiness.
Rather, Yosef remains in the grit and gravel of
depraved Egypt, he remains etched deeply in
the earthiness of Egypt, together with his
beloved people.
This is based on the ancient Jewish idea that
has its roots in the Tanach itself: The burial
place of a virtuous and saintly human being
contains profound holiness and spiritual
energy and constitutes a place conducive for
prayer to G-d. Since the soul and the body
retain a relationship even after they depart
from each other, the space where the physical
body of a holy man is interred is a space
conducive for spiritual growth, meditation,
reflection, and inspiration.
“He was placed in a coffin in Egypt”—that is
the culmination of Bereishit. The Jew may be
entrenched in Egypt and all that it represents,
but Yosef is right there with him, in the midst
of his condition, giving him strength,
blessings, and fortitude.
The same is true in our own lives as well. In
each generation G-d plants such “Yosef’s” in
our midst, the Tzaddikim and Rebbes, who
are there with the Jewish people in their pain
and agony. Sometimes, even after their
passing, if we open our hearts, we can feel the
touch of their soul, the richness of their spirits,
the faith of their lives. We may be stuck in the
quagmire of “Egyptian” dung, yet “Yosef” is
present with us. Thus, even in the midst of a
dark and horrific exile, we can hold each
other’s hands and thunder aloud: Chazak!
Chazak! Venischazak! “Be strong! Be strong!
Let us be strengthened!”