The King's Revenge: Blessing for the Final Generations

1“And this is what their father spoke to them, and he blessed them; each man according to his blessing he blessed them.”¹ Why does the verse use the word dibber, “spoke,” for Yaakov's blessing? It is a harsh expression, and for a blessing the soft amirah, “saying,” would surely fit better.

2The Gemara says: “Yaakov wished to reveal to his sons the end of days, and the Shechinah departed from him. He said, ‘Perhaps, Heaven forbid, there is someone unfit among my offspring, as with Avraham, from whom Yishmael came out, and my father Yitzchak, from whom Esav came out.’ His sons said to him, ‘Hear, Yisrael, Hashem is our God, Hashem is One’: just as there is only One in your heart, so there is only One in our heart.”² But this is puzzling. Did Yaakov Avinu not recognize that his sons were the tribes of God and perfect tzaddikim? Even about the sale of Yosef, the sefer Parashas Derachim, by R' Yehudah Rosanes, explains that the brothers judged Yosef according to Torah law, and that they acted for the sake of Heaven.³ If so, what doubt did Yaakov have that perhaps there was someone unfit among his offspring?

3aWe can, however, explain this through a well-known parable that we heard many times from my holy father and teacher, zt"l, in the name of the Baal Shem Tov, zt"l. It was told on the verse “Kel nekamos Hashem, God of vengeance, Hashem.”⁴ The question raised was this: “vengeance” belongs to the realm of judgment, so why does it stand beside the Name Kel, which stands for the attribute of mercy? It was explained with a parable. A king once set out to visit all the provinces of his kingdom, to see what each province lacked and to provide it with everything it needed. Of course, everywhere the king came they paid him great honor, until he happened to come to a remote village whose people were not used to royal manners. The village boys were playing with stones, as they always did. Even when they saw the king's chariot and his entourage, in their limited understanding they carried on as usual and kept throwing stones, until one stone struck an image of the king. At once a great uproar broke out among the king's ministers, and they sentenced the boy who had thrown the stone to death.

3bBut the king was wise. He understood that the boy had erred because he did not know what a king is, or how precious and exalted a king is. So he ordered that the boy not be put to death; he would punish him himself, in another way. He took the boy with him to the royal palace and gave him every good thing. The boy saw the king's splendor, and so he set his heart to understand more and more of the king's greatness and majesty. And the more he understood, the greater his anguish grew: how had he dared to rebel against the king's honor by throwing that stone? In the end he came and fell at the king's feet, weeping and pleading with the king to forgive him.

3cThe meaning of the parable is clear. The King is the King of the world, the Holy One, blessed be He, Who sent our souls down from the upper world. The soul was hewn from a source beneath the Throne of Glory, but because of material concerns we forget that we are children of kings, and we do things against the King's will. So Hashem bestows on us an abundance of blessing and success. As a result we come to think and reflect within ourselves: “We have sinned and rebelled so much against the honor of this merciful King, Who gives us such abundant blessing!” And from this we return in complete teshuvah. This is the meaning of “God of vengeance”: what is the vengeance of the King of kings? It is the attribute of Kel, of mercy: He bestows on us an abundance of blessing. Through this we are aroused and remember that we are children of kings, and we repent out of love. Those are my holy father's words, in the name of the Baal Shem Tov.

4This explains our verse. As is well known, the deeds of the fathers are a sign for the children,⁵ and everything Yaakov Avinu did was a prayer and request for the generations to come. So “Yaakov wished to reveal to his sons the end of days, and the Shechinah departed from him” means this. When Yaakov blessed the tribes, he meant to act through this for the generations to come, and he foresaw and looked out over all the generations until the end of days. He saw that there would be times when, Heaven forbid, Bnei Yisrael would not be prepared and fit to receive the blessings, especially in the difficult times before the coming of Moshiach. That is what the verse hints at with dibber, a harsh expression. Yaakov Avinu therefore asked Hashem that even when the attribute of judgment rests upon them, the realm of harsh words, even then the Holy One, blessed be He, should bless you⁶ in the way of “God of vengeance, Hashem,” as in the parable of the king. That is, His judgment should take the form of bestowing blessings on Klal Yisrael, and through this it would be privileged to draw close to Him out of ease and peace of mind.

5This also lets us understand why Yaakov Avinu said that perhaps there was someone unfit among them. He did not mean the tribes themselves, but the generations that would come after them in the days of “the footsteps of Moshiach,” the era just before the redemption.⁷ And, as we see to our sorrow, this fear that “perhaps there is someone unfit” has come true. That is why Yaakov Avinu prayed that at least Bnei Yisrael would accept the yoke of the kingship of Heaven, and through this earn the redemption. This is the meaning of the sons' answer, “Hear, Yisrael”: we accept upon ourselves and upon our generations the yoke of the kingship of Heaven.

6May the Holy One, blessed be He, help us to reach those who are far away, so that they draw close to Him. There is much to do and accomplish here in our generation, as we plainly see. But the main thing is to improve our own deeds, and this in itself influences them: for example, by being careful about love and brotherhood, and by being careful not to talk during prayer. In this way we show our brothers how much we honor the “little sanctuaries,”⁸ our shuls and houses of study, and through this they will accept upon themselves the yoke of the kingship of Heaven. And so we will be privileged to see the redemption. Amen, may it be His will.