{"id":40474,"date":"2018-09-18T10:00:08","date_gmt":"2018-09-18T07:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=40474"},"modified":"2022-04-12T22:52:12","modified_gmt":"2022-04-12T19:52:12","slug":"why-does-judah-become-the-leader","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/why-does-judah-become-the-leader\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Does Judah Become The Leader?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":50634,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[552,568,402,594],"acf":{"old_id":"40474","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":36775,"related_cahpter":"49","type_929":"2","show_author_image":true,"old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"As the rivalry between Judah and Joseph suggests, disunity is all too often the norm of Jewish history","content":"<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">49:8- \u201cYou, O Judah, your brothers shall praise; Your hand shall be on the nape of your foes; Your father\u2019s sons shall bow low to you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Joseph\u2019s flaws are considerable. To incur his father\u2019s favor, he tattle-tales on his brothers (Gen. 37:2). He shares his dreams of aggrandizement. Last, he brings his father untold grief, failing to inform him that he yet lives. As Thomas Mann speculates in his epic, Joseph and his Brothers, Joseph resented being the \u201cfavored son\u201d whom his father had thereby endangered.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Judah, too, is a flawed character, the architect of the sale of Joseph. Unlike Joseph, Judah is unable to restrain his sexual passions. After impregnating Tamar, Judah insists upon a cover-up.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Yet Judah matures. His Hebrew name \u201cYehudah\u201d connotes \u201cacknowledgment\u201d \u2013 both of errors and as leader by his brothers (Gen. 49:8). Judah\u2019s speech compels Joseph to confront three truths:<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">First, as Robert Alter notes, Judah underscores the family context in which Jacob favored two of his sons. In Judah\u2019s words, Jacob had told the brothers, \u201cYou know that my wife bore me two sons.\u201d The remainder held no such status.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Second, Judah\u2019s speech stresses his responsibility for Benjamin. He offers to remain as Joseph\u2019s slave and will not permit his father to die by yet another loss of a favored son.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Third, Judah appeals to Joseph saying he cannot return without Benjamin \u201clest I see the evil that will befall my father\u201d. When he returned previously without Joseph and saw his father\u2019s grief, he ought to have confessed but lacked the statesmanship to make that personal sacrifice. Now he is a changed man \u2013 one determined to maintain the family.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">It is these tropes that \u201covercome\u201d Joseph. He can only embrace his brothers and urge them to reunite with him. This rebuilding of family is prerequisite for building peoplehood underscored in Exodus.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Several implications lie embedded within this narrative. First, leadership requires the capacity to admit mistakes \u2013 as demonstrated by Judah. Second, as Joseph\u2019s experience indicates, the leadership of the \u201ccourt Jew\u201d is only transitory \u2013 temporarily useful but no safeguard for Jewish security. Last, as the rivalry between Judah and Joseph suggests, Jewish disunity is all too often the norm of Jewish history, and efforts to create unity aberrational. Parallels to contemporary Jewish life are by no means difficult to identify.<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":54934,"id":54934,"title":"jud1-leadership","filename":"jud1-leadership.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud1-leadership.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/transitions\/jud1-leadership\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"jud1-leadership","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":54932,"date":"2019-05-05 10:16:43","modified":"2022-11-27 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Does Judah Become The Leader?","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"As the rivalry between Judah and Joseph suggests, disunity is all too often the norm of Jewish history","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":{"ID":54934,"id":54934,"title":"jud1-leadership","filename":"jud1-leadership.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud1-leadership.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/transitions\/jud1-leadership\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"jud1-leadership","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":54932,"date":"2019-05-05 10:16:43","modified":"2022-11-27 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