d’var torah
Chanukah and Joseph
Inspire Us
By Rabbi Linda Holtzman
T Parshat Miketz
he story of Joseph is a story of
dreams: first Joseph revealing
his own dreams that antago-
nize his brothers, then Joseph finding
the meaning in the dreams of those
with whom he is imprisoned, and
finally, in this week’s Torah por-
tion, Joseph interpreting Pharaoh’s
dreams and finding himself second
in command of all ancient Egypt.

Dreams in the Torah have power as
do all the dreams in our own lives.

Miketz falls during Chanukah, so
dreams are especially important to
us right now. We need dreams to give
us the impetus to move ahead, to gain
vision, to process all that happens in
our lives and our world.

This is the time of year that is cold
and dark. The days are the shortest
of the year. Many of us go out in the
darkness in the morning and come
home from work after the sun has
set. Having so little light and so much
dark time should give us extra time to
dream, but it isn’t always enough. To
learn to use this dark time well, we
need to pay attention to Joseph and
to what helped him look into dreams
so deeply and clearly.

First, Joseph pays attention. He
learns as a boy to notice what is going
on with others. His own brothers
teach him how dangerous it can be to
not pay attention. And when Joseph
grows up, he is primed to notice
everything in life. There are many
writers who see Joseph as a queer
man: He loves bright, multicolored
coats; he isn’t interested in sleeping
with his employer’s wife; he is treated
like an outsider. Joseph learns to pay
careful attention to everything to
help him negotiate the challenging,
unaccepting world.

As we read the story of Joseph, we
can all use his inspiration. We can
give ourselves ample time to dream
and to hold onto our dreams. We can
all try to pay closer attention to what
the world is bringing us. And we can
all use this time to shine a light on
what is truly happening in our lives
and our world. It is not a coincidence
that the story of the dreamer, Joseph,
and the holiday, Chanukah, fall at the
same time every year.

It is nothing short of a miracle
that Joseph, an imprisoned, young,
possibly queer outsider, a young man
from another land, can use dreams to
catapult himself to such a position of
power. When Joseph can reach inside
and find a way to access the power of
dreams, to shine light on the truth,
there is no end to what can happen.

It is a miracle.

When we give ourselves the time to
focus on our dreams, when we shine
a light on ourselves and our world,
there is no end to what can happen.

There can be new miracles. It was
up to Joseph to persevere, even from
deep within a prison, and to find the
light he needed to change the fate of
an entire people, an entire country. It
is up to each of us to give ourselves
the time to step back at this cold,
dark time and to shine a light on all
that we need to see to change our own
people, our own country.

When we shine our lights in the
world, miracles happen. Then we see
injustice and we work to fight against
it. Then we see how people are mis-
treated because of their race or reli-
gion or sexual identity or gender and
we work to fight against that mis-
treatment. Then we stay open to all
that desperately needs to be changed
and healed in this broken world and
we don’t shy away from the work that
needs to be done.

It is not easy to let ourselves use
these short days with so little light
effectively, but the conf luence of
the Joseph story and the miracle of
Chanukah remind us that we can
cause miracles. We all have dreams:
dreams of a better world, of a com-
munity where everyone is treated
with loving kindness and respect,
dreams of a world where antisemi-
tism and Islamophobia and racism
and homophobia and transphobia
vanish. We can use the inspiration
of Chanukah and of Joseph to do
our part to bring about the mira-
cle of this new world. My hope is
that this Chanukah will be the one
that inspires us to create a health-
ier, kinder and more just community
and country. Wishing all of us a
Chanukah of great miracles! JE
life at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical
College and the rabbi of the Tikkun Olam
Chavurah. She is a commissioner on the
Mayor’s Commission on Faith Based and
Interfaith Aff airs and is involved with
the Anti-Gun Violence initiative of Live
Free/POWER. Th e Board of Rabbis of
Greater Philadelphia is proud to provide
diverse perspectives on Torah commen-
tary for the Jewish Exponent. Th e opin-
ions expressed in this column are the
author’s own and do not refl ect the view
of the Board of Rabbis.

Linda Holtzman is the director of student
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