In Parshas Vayeishev, we begin the end of Sefer Bereishis.  The last four parshios - Vayeishev, Miketz, Vayigash and Vayechi - relay to us, in great and fascinating details, the life and times of Yosef ha’Tzaddik and his brothers, and Yaakov Avinu’s final years.  The details are many; the passions are high; the emotions are great; the events are surprising, powerful, evocative, and compelling.  There is so much to be learned from Yosef, his brothers, and the family of Yaakov.

In Vayeishev, we learn of:

*Yaakov’s special love for Yosef, the kesones pasim he gifts Yosef, Yosef’s dreams of field/sheaves and heavens/sun, moon and stars, the brothers hatred and jealousy, the abduction, and ultimately, the sale, of Yosef (Bereishis 37); 

*Yehuda and Tamar, the birth of their twins, Peretz and Zerach, and the founding of the dynasty of malchus beis Dovid through the efforts of heroic Tamar, and the humble courage of Yehuda who fathers her twins (Ch.38);

*Yosef in the house of Potiphar, the chief executioner in Egypt, the attempted seduction of Yosef by Eishes Potiphar, Yosef’s tremendous spiritual strength to resist her advances, the first blood libel in history when she frames Yosef and accuses him of trying to seduce her, and Potiphar’s throwing Yosef into jail as punishment(Ch.39);

*Yosef in jail, where he meets the butler and baker, whose dreams he interprets.  The baker - who is jailed for serving Pharaoh bread with a pebble in it - dreams of baskets atop his head filled with bread, and the birds eating from the bread.  Yosef correctly predicts that he will be killed.  The butler - jailed for serving Pharaoh a glass of wine with a fly in it - dreams of squeezing grapes into Pharaoh’s cup and serving Pharaoh wine.  Yosef correctly predicts that he will be restored to his post as royal butler for Pharaoh.  Yosef asks the butler to remember, and not forget him, when he is released from jail.  The parsha ends by telling us that the butler forgot Yosef and did not remember him (Ch.40).

Towards the beginning of the parsha, when Yosef dreams of rulership - with the brothers sheaves bowing down to his sheaf in the field, and the sun, moon and eleven stars of the heavens bowing down to him - he relays the first dream to his brothers, and the second dream, to his brothers and his father.  The Torah tells us that after he relayed the second dream, the reaction of the family is: וַיְקַנְאוּ-בוֹ אֶחָיו; וְאָבִיו, שָׁמַר אֶת-הַדָּבָר - and his brothers were jealous of him and his father guarded the matter (37:11).  

What does it mean that his father was שָׁמַר אֶת-הַדָּבָר, ‘guarded’ the matter?  Rashi (ibid.) explains that it means that Yaakov was מַמְתִּין וּמְצַפֶּה מָתַי יָבֹא, waiting and anticipating for the time when the dream would come true.  Hence, to be שָׁמַר means to wait and anticipate.

Interestingly, in a totally unrelated passage in Torah, we are told about the importance of Shabbos to our nation.  The pasuk tells us: וְשָׁמְרוּ בְנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל, אֶת-הַשַּׁבָּת, לַעֲשׂוֹת אֶת-הַשַּׁבָּת לְדֹרֹתָם, בְּרִית עוֹלָם - and the Children of Israel guarded the Shabbos, to do the Shabbos for generations, an eternal covenant (Shemos 31:16). 

In his lengthy and beautiful commentary to this pasuk, the Ohr Ha’Chaim ha’kadosh presents ten different interpretations of what to be ‘shomer Shabbos’ means.  Amongst his many explanations, the Ohr Ha’Chaim teaches that to be a Jew who is shomer Shabbos is to be a Jew who waits and anticipates - all week long - for Shabbos to come.  The Ohr Ha’Chaim learns this from our pasuk, regarding Yaakov who was שָׁמַר אֶת-הַדָּבָר.  He teaches that Shabbos should not be viewed as a tircha (a burden) because we are prevented from doing work.  Rather, צריכין לשמוח בו בשלימות הרצון וחפץ בדבר ותמיד יהיה ממתין ומצפה מתי יבא - one is required to rejoice in Shabbos with a complete desire and will, and to always wait and long for Shabbos, for the day that she will arrive once again.

Just as Yaakov waited and longed for the fulfillment of Yosef’s dreams, so too, we must wait and long all week for Shabbos.  As the saying goes, “It’s not that the Jews keep Shabbos, but it is Shabbos that keeps the Jews.”  But we learn from here that it is not only on Shabbos that we must enjoy, benefit, and delight in her presence.  We must have a “Shabbos mind” all week long, and know that no matter where we are, or what busyness we are involved in, soon, in a few days, Shabbos will be here to spiritually redeem us once again!  

Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt’l, the Rav, teaches, “Allow me, please, to make a ‘private confession’ concerning a matter that has caused me much loss of sleep.  I am not so very old, yet I remember a time when ninety percent of world Jewry were observant and the secularists were a small minority at the fringes of the camp.  I still remember - it was not so long ago - when Jews were still close to G-d and lived in an atmosphere pervaded with holiness.  But, today, what do we see?  The profane and the secular are in control wherever we turn.  Even in those neighborhoods made up predominantly of religious Jews one can no longer talk of the ‘sanctity of the Sabbath day.’  True, there are Jews in America who observe the Sabbath...  But, is it not for the Sabbath that my heart aches, it is for the forgotten ‘eve of the Sabbath.’  There are Sabbath-observing Jews in America, but there are not ‘eve-of-the-Sabbath’ Jews who go out to greet the Sabbath with beating hearts and pulsating souls.  There are many who observe the precepts with their hands, with their feet and/or with their mouths - but there are few, indeed, who truly know the meaning of service of the heart!” (Soloveitchik on Repentance, p.88).

May we lovingly await and anticipate our weekly Shabbos, which brings us tremendous spiritual gains each and every week, so that even during our mundane weekdays, our minds and hearts are always longing for Shabbos.  And in the merit of our shemiras Shabbos, may we very soon - in our day and our time - merit the ultimate redemption, יום שכלו שבת ומנוחה לחיי עולמים.

בברכת בשורות טובות ושבת שלום