“Korach took.” These are the opening words of our parashah. With these words, the lid to Pandora’s Box was lifted and the seeds of Korach’s uprising sprouted forth to begin bearing their twisted fruit. Korach took something that didn’t belong to him. But what did Korach actually take?
It’s difficult to be around negative people, especially in the middle of difficult circumstances. In this week’s Torah portion, Moses deals with many difficult situations but comes through them with a positive attitude and unyielding faith in God. How did he do it, and what can we learn from this great leader? Let’s explore these concepts together in this week’s 5 Minute Torah.
We are all familiar with what took place in Acts 2. After Yeshua’s resurrection he instructed his disciples to remain in Jerusalem so that they would be filled with the Ruach HaKodesh, the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:4–8). Here’s the account of how it happened:
When it was time for the LORD to deliver the Children of Israel from Egypt, God poured out His judgments on Egypt to demonstrate His power and allow time for the Egyptians to repent. But before any of this took place, the LORD made multiple promises to the Children of Israel for what He was about to do:
When Jacob was one hundred and forty-seven years old, he realized his life on this earth was coming to an end. He called Joseph to him and made him swear that, when Jacob departed from this life, Joseph would not bury his body in Egypt but take it back to Canaan and bury it there. Later, when Joseph understood the severity of his father’s illness, he brought his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, to his father so that he would bless them. Jacob tells Joseph:
In this week’s Torah portion, we learn about the reunion of Joseph and his family. How appropriate for the name of the portion to be called Vayigash, which means, “and he came near.” After a long period of being apart from his family, Joseph was able to come near his family. Not only did Joseph reveal himself to his brothers after the long wait for his plan to succeed, but he was also reunited with his father who had given up hope of Joseph’s survival years beforehand.
Everyone enjoys a good magician. They appear to do what seems completely impossible. Although they can entertain people for hours on end, the craft of a magician is based on illusion and misdirection. They draw our attention to one thing in order to distract us from another. If they want us to watch what one hand is doing, then the other hand is doing the real “magic.” If they point at an object, it’s generally misdirection. But we don’t mind this. In fact, we pay money to be misguided and have our point of view misled.
