Rewriting our prophetic story: A message from this week’s haftarah - opinion

In the background of the current conflict looms a deeper crisis that threatens the very fabric of our society. Even before the current war, one in five Israelis was already living below the poverty line. Those numbers have only increased as small business owners have been displaced or mobilized, and with the tourism industry decimated. 

Add to that a growing societal rift, as certain segments of the population shoulder the entire burden of the fighting while others do all in their power to desist, causing more polarization among citizens and political camps.

But this isn’t just a contemporary scene – it’s a rerun of the prophecy of Amos, one of Israel’s earliest prophets, whom we read in this week’s haftarah. Amos decried a society in which the wealthy systematically exploited the poor and internal divisions threatened to tear a community apart. 

Thousands of years later, has nothing changed? 

To reflect on this perennial crisis, let us examine the general purpose of the haftarah and why it was established. Rabbi David Abudraham, a 14th-century Spanish Jewish communal leader and expert on liturgy, in his magnum opus, Sefer Abudraham, writes about the institution of the haftarah: 

“After [completing] and wrapping the Torah scroll, we read the haftarah, [whose message] needs to be connected to the [Torah] portion of the day. And why do we read from the Prophets? Because of the legislation imposed upon the Jewish people forbidding them from reading from the Torah…” (Laws of Shabbat, Shacharit).

Rabbi Yom Tov Lipmann Heller, in his 17th-century Tosafot Yom Tov, a commentary on the Mishna, further develops this idea, suggesting that the particular persecution that prompted the introduction of the haftarah happened during the historical period of the Hanukkah miracle. 

When the Greek emperor, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, prohibited the Torah to be read, the rabbis instituted that sections be recited from the Prophets that focus on a theme similar to the Torah portion:

“The reason for the haftarot… is because Antiochus, king of Greece, legislated that the Torah should not be read in public. What did the Jews do? They chose a section from the Prophets that was thematically similar to the Torah portion of the week. Even though this [antisemitic] legislation has been annulled, the custom [of reading from the Prophets] was not discarded” (Megillah 3:4). 

For this reason, haftarot are intended to leave us hopeful, with each haftarah complete with verses of redemption. It is also why the blessings of the haftarah focus on redemption. Therefore, haftarot, even those with harsh or mournful messages, like the one read on Tisha B’Av, always contain a positive, optimistic note.

The unusual character of this haftarah

IT IS AGAINST this backdrop that we approach the haftarah for Parashat Vayeshev. Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, in a 1980 address, noted the unusual character of this haftarah, which has no encouraging end to contrast with its dreary opening. He writes: “The final words of each haftarah express the idea that no matter how dismal our present situation, Israel can look ahead to a bright future. [...] This haftarah is the one exception” (Divrei Hashkafa, p. 30-34).

Amos, an early prophet, does not mince words in calling out the thievery and corruption that had overtaken the kingdom of Israel, with the wealthy extorting money from the impoverished. 

“The idea expressed here,” Soloveitchik states, “is that the community that acts corruptly is fit for punishment and censure. The opening line of the prophecy, which speaks of ‘the sale of the righteous for money,’ (Amos 2:6) was read by our Sages as a reference to the sale of Joseph, which appears in our parasha” (Pirkei d’Rabi Eliezer, #37). 

Soloveitchik suggests that even when the sages read Amos’s words in reference to Joseph, they didn’t mean to deny the literal meaning of the verse. On the contrary, they were highlighting a crucial idea: that national corruption is not merely a passing phase in our history. 

The forms of contempt for one another and principles of justice, which repeatedly lead to violence between us, have a deeply embedded history, signaling a great need for reflection and change.

As far back as we can trace, even to the brothers who would produce the tribes of Israel, there has been internal strife producing baseless hatred, theft, and corruption, bringing about our own doom and destruction.

This is not a reason to lose hope, and it is surely not a reason to continue with our same comfortable patterns. We must take control and take chances the way the Maccabees did by lighting the tiny amount of oil they found, and as our modern Maccabees do today – willingly sacrificing all on the battlefield and the home front to ensure that the light in our skies isn’t coming from missiles but from the energy of a purposeful society. 

In “those times” it was the right thing to do, no matter how improbable it seemed that the oil would last even one night. And in “our time” it has helped guarantee our immortality as a nation. 

With God’s help, we should all make increased efforts to love our neighbors, serve those in need, and act with humility. Only that will help us begin to heal our rifts.

The writer, a rabbi, is president and rosh yeshiva of Ohr Torah Stone.