Walking in Torah: Yosef's Way and Yaakov's Way

1“So he sent his brothers away, and they went; and he said to them, ‘Al tirgezu baderech.’”¹ Rashi explains: “Do not occupy yourselves with a point of halachah.” Chazal themselves found this puzzling.² How could Yosef HaTzaddik tell his brothers not to engage in Torah? The Torah says, “when you walk on the way,”³ and Chazal say in the same passage, “Two Torah scholars who walk on the way with no words of Torah between them deserve to be burned.” Their answer is that the duty to speak Torah on the way refers to reviewing by heart, while Yosef's warning refers to in-depth study. Yet, in the words of the verse, “there are still words to say on God's behalf.”⁴ Two further points need a closer look. First, why is this law, “Al tirgezu baderech,” which Rashi reads as “do not engage in halachah,” stated here of all places, in Yosef HaTzaddik's command to his brothers before they went down to Egypt? Second, why did he tell them not to engage in halachah in particular, and not in the other parts of the Torah?

2Let us first look at another verse, a little further on: “And he sent Yehudah ahead of him to Yosef, lehoros before him in Goshen.”⁵ Rashi brings a Midrash Aggadah: “Lehoros before him: to set up for him a house of study from which teaching, hora'ah, would go forth.” But what need was there to set up a house of study in advance, before Bnei Yisrael came to Egypt? Would it not have been better to wait until they had first got to know the place and knew where it was fitting to establish a place of Torah? Why was Yaakov Avinu so particular to send someone to establish a house of study even before he came to Egypt?

3The Torah goes on: “And Yosef harnessed his chariot and went up to meet Yisrael his father in Goshen … and he fell on his neck and wept …”⁶ Rashi comments: “But Yaakov did not fall on Yosef's neck and did not kiss him. Our Rabbis said that he was reciting the Shema.” The holy sefarim ask why Yosef himself did not recite the Shema like his father. The question is raised by the Maharal in his Gur Aryeh and by the Maor VaShemesh; see also the Sifsei Tzaddik, and the Sfas Emes in the name of the Chiddushei HaRim.⁷

4We can explain this as follows. We know that there are two levels in learning Torah. The first is the simple way: a person sits and engages in Torah. But there is a loftier way, in which a person is bound to the Torah not only while he is learning. Even when he is not actually learning, he cleaves to the Creator all day long. All his deeds, his movements and his feelings are only for the sake of Hashem, and every step he takes is bound up with the Torah. This is how the holy Rebbe of Vorka, zt"l, explained a teaching of Chazal: “Whoever studies halachos every day is assured that he is destined for the World to Come … Do not read halichos, ‘ways,’ but halachos, ‘laws.’”⁸ If a person goes about and conducts himself all day according to the Torah and for the sake of Hashem, then he is always cleaving to the Torah. That is the meaning of “Whoever studies halachos every day”: everything he does the whole day long is itself halachos, for all his deeds are the Torah of Hashem.

5We find something similar in the halachic authorities, such as the Beis Yosef, about the blessing over Torah study.⁹ They asked about a person who is busy with his livelihood all day and is free to learn only toward evening. Why does he not have to say the blessing over the Torah again, when his business affairs have come between the morning blessing and his learning? They answered that if he conducts himself according to the Torah while he earns his living, then all day long he is like one learning Torah. Following our approach, we may go even further. If a Jew cleaves to the Creator all day, and all his deeds are only for the sake of Hashem, then he is cleaving to the Torah. For this is the very purpose of the Torah, to cleave to Hashem, since the whole Torah is full of the Names of the Holy One, blessed be He.¹⁰ So such a Jew is assured that he is destined for the World to Come, as it says, “The ways of the world are his”:¹¹ do not read halichos, “ways,” but halachos, “laws.” All his deeds and his ways are themselves halachos, as the holy Rebbe of Vorka explained.

6We can now see why Yosef did not recite the Shema. The Torah says of Yosef that “Hashem was with him,” and Rashi explains that the Name of Heaven was constantly on his lips.¹² Yosef, in other words, lived on the level of “do not read halichos but halachos”: he cleaved to Hashem at all times, and everything he did was halachah. That is what it means that “the Name of Heaven was constantly on his lips.” He was therefore exempt from reciting the Shema, since he was considered to be cleaving to the Torah at all times. Chazal say something similar in the Gemara about R' Shimon bar Yochai and his colleagues,¹³ [that they were exempt from prayer because their Torah was their occupation. So too, before the giving of the Torah, even though the Avos were stringent with themselves and kept the entire Torah, Yosef was exempt from reciting the Shema, since he stood on such a level that he cleaved to the Torah constantly. On a similar theme, see also the sefarim Maamarei Admur HaZaken HaKetzarim and Torah Or.¹⁴]

7Yaakov Avinu was surely on this level too, all the more so than Yosef, which means that he too was exempt from the Shema. Yet he did recite the Shema, because he wanted to lay down the path for the generations to come. The path of “do not read halichos but halachos,” whose essence is deveikus, cleaving to the Creator at all times, is the way of tzaddikim. In the lowly generations, though, it is impossible to hold on to this path, and one must follow the simple way of actually engaging in Torah and mitzvos. Yaakov's reciting the Shema, then, was meant to lay down the simple path for Israel in the lowly generations.

8This is also the meaning of “Al tirgezu baderech,” which Chazal read as “Do not occupy yourselves with a point of halachah.” The holy tribes too were on this level: the Name of Heaven was constantly on their lips. Their whole way of life was in the spirit of “do not read halichos, ‘ways,’ but halachos, ‘laws.’” But on this journey they were preparing to go down into the exile of Egypt, and they needed to open the way for the generations to come. So Yosef HaTzaddik told them, “Do not occupy yourselves with a point of halachah.” In other words, their deveikus in the Torah should not take that form, a constant deveikus with the Creator in everything they did, as was their custom. For the generations to come they had to set out the simple path of actually engaging in Torah and practical mitzvos. This answers both our questions: why Yosef spoke specifically of “a point of halachah,” and why he said it just before they went down to Egypt.

9This also answers our question about why Yaakov Avinu sent Yehudah to set up a house of study for him even before he came to Egypt. Yaakov set his mind on laying down for the generations to come the way to endure in exile, not only while they were on the road but also while they lived in Egypt. So he commanded then that a place of Torah be prepared for them. In this he showed the generations that in the land of Egypt, “the nakedness of the land,”¹⁵ only by actually engaging in Torah can they succeed in the way of Hashem and go up “on the highway that goes up to Beis El.”¹⁶ That is why, as soon as they came to Egypt, they had to sit and engage in Torah in the first of the two ways, by actually learning.

10May Hashem grant that we be privileged to sit in peace over Torah and actual service of Hashem, and to bring near the appointed time of the redemption. Amen, may it be His will.