Shabbat Parashas Vayeishev - 5781

Shabbat Parashas Vayeishev - 5781

Rabbi Hal Miller

In another three days Pharaoh will count you and will restore you to your post

and you will place Pharaoh's cup in his hand as was the former practice when

you were his cupbearer. [Bereishit [40:13]

Yosef is in prison with the chamberlain of the bakers and the chamberlain of the

cupbearers. They tell him their dreams. Our verse is the beginning of Yosef's

interpretations. What does it mean that "Pharaoh will count you"? In another

verse [40:20], the Torah says, "he counted the chamberlain of the cupbearers

and the chamberlain of the bakers among his servants" so Pharaoh clearly did

what Yosef foretold.

The Hebrew in our verse is, b'od shloshet yamim yisa paroh et rosheicha. The

words we are concerned with here are yisa and rosheicha. Yisa appears in [20]

as does rosh, but both words appear precisely in [40:19], b'od shloshet yamim

yisa paroh et roshecha mei'aleicha.

Onkelos translates the verses as, [13] "At the end of three days, Pharaoh will

remember you" and [19] "At the end of three days, Pharaoh will remove your

head from you" but does not explain how he gets two completely different

versions from identical wording, although the addition in [19] of mei'aleicha,

from you, may be his reasoning. Radak brings down a similar approach.

Rashbam interprets our verse homiletically, but says that [19] is to be

understood literally.

Ramban sees our verse, not as remembering or as removing the head

but, "lift up your head and restore you to your post".

Others translate yisa as counting. Rashi writes, "when he takes stock of his

other servants to attend him at a banquet, he will count you among them."

Rav Soloveitchik takes a similar position on our verse, but falls back to the

"remove your head" for [19].

Rav Hirsch explains yisa as taking up something in the area of thought.

While counting is certainly included in such an approach, in particular the

idiomatic expression to count heads, here he sees Pharaoh thinking about

these two servants along with his other staff, and contemplating what he

wants to do with each. Although imprisoned, these two were still on the roll

as royal servants. Counting the heads, then, doesn't mean removing them,

nor does it mean assigning numbers, rather taking the time to consider

each of these individuals.