This week, we follow the fortunes of Yosef (Joseph). Sold into slavery by his brothers (their justification for doing so is a subject for a different piece), he ends up in Egypt, serving General Potifar, one of Pharaoh’s chief officials. After refusing to have forbidden relations with Potifar’s wife, Yosef is thrown into Prison.
It is there that he becomes famous for an unusual talent, one that would bring him from being a lowly criminal to become the viceroy of Egypt.
Here’s how it happened.
One day, Yosef encountered the king’s former butler, in for letting a fly get into the king’s goblet, and he seemed a bit glum. When Yosef asked what was bothering him, the butler told him about a very perplexing dream the night before. In it, he saw a grapevine with three bare tendrils. Suddenly, the Tendrils quickly sprouted fat juicy grapes. Immediately, he plucked some of the grapes, pressed them into wine, pressed the wine into Pharaoh’s cup (which he happened to be holding), and placed the cup in Pharaoh’s hands
Upon hearing this dream, Yosef interprets it seamlessly. The three tendrils represented the remaining three days the butler would have to spend in jail. After that, he would be pardoned by Pharaoh and reinstated to his former position, serving Pharaoh as if nothing had ever happened.
I would imagine that the butler and the other inmates were probably a bit sceptical. Some of them perhaps felt that the long years in prison had affected Yosef’s mental health. But lo and behold, to the amazement of all, Yosef’s prediction came true, and the butler was let off the hook.
Word of the young prodigy dream interpreter spread through the jail. The baker, who was serving time for dropping a pebble into the bread (even back then, world leaders were unpredictable- some things never change!) tried his luck and ran his dream by Yosef. In his case, the dream saw him balancing three baskets on his head. The top one held an assortment of baked goods, which were consumed hastily by some rather impudent birds. Perhaps he regretted asking. Yosef explained that the three baskets represented the three days he had left before he would be executed. Again, Yosef was right on target, and the poor met his Creator three days later.
The question that begs to be asked is: How did Yosef know who would live and who would die?
Of course, the simple explanation is that Joseph used Prophetic vision. But I recently heard an amazing insight in the name of Dayan* Chanoch Ehrentreau, head of the London Beth Din and one of North West London’s most senior Rabbinic authorities.
The dream of the butler involved ACTION on the butler’s behalf. It was the butler who pressed the grapes and made the wine. Yosef saw that he was a doer. The baker, by contrast, was completely passive. He simply stood there, without even waving his hands to shoo away the birds!
It’s a principle that so many great people have shown throughout history. We all have dreams. But only those of us who are proactive and do something about our dreams are helped by Hashem to make them reality.
Let’s keep dreaming big dreams. But let’s DO something with them when we wake up!
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*(A Dayan is a Rabbi who serves as a judge in a Jewish court of law)
Growing with the Parshah 