Shabbat Parashat Mikeitz - 5783

Shabbat Parashat Mikeitz - 5783

Rabbi Hal Miller

And he had him ride in his second chariot and they proclaimed before him

"Avrech" and he appointed him over all the land of Egypt. [Bereishit 41:43]

The obvious question here is, what is "Avrech"? The word as such does not

appear in dictionaries. There appears to be two lines of response from the

various commentators.

Radak, Ibn Ezra, and Seforno equate the word to bereich, meaning to bend the

knee. Rav Hirsch translates our verse as a command to the people on the

street to bend the knee in deference to Yosef.

Most others base their understandings on the Gemora [Bava Batra 4a], discussing

Herod, "'You are not a reicha or the son of a reicha, Herod the slave who made

himself free.' What is reicha? King. As it is written, 'I am today a tender and anointed

king.' (Shmuel II 3:39)" after which it cites our verse. Rashi, based on Onkelos, writes

"this one is a patron of the king. In Aramaic, rech means king." Rav Soloveitchik

also calls him the king's patron.

But there are some differences too. Taking a lead from the quote from Shmuel II,

Bereishit Rabbah [90:4] says, "Avrech means father (av) in wisdom though tender

(rach) in years" which Rashi explains "refers to Yosef for he is a father in wisdom

yet tender in years." The most common translation of avreich is "father to the king"

supported by a verse in next week's portion [45:8] "He has set me as father to

Pharaoh".

Rashbam critiques the Radak, et al., position of bereich, saying that word should be

read bar reicha, son of the king, thus here avreich means father of the king. Since

he knows that Pharaoh is not Yosef's son, he translates it instead like Rashi,

Onkelos and Rav Soloveitchik, "official of the king", "provider for the king" or

"patron to the king". In any event, a title of honor.