Miryam's Space

~Diego Baez Excerpt from poem “inheritance”

When my child came into this world she didn’t rock mine or turn it upside down but flipped it inside out, it felt not like a burning fire but like a new chamber opening in my heart. A fourth dimension….

It is unimaginably painful for me to think about losing a child, let alone two! Jacob faces such a loss. In this week’s parashah, Vayigash, Judah almost inexplicably approaches the grand Vizier of Egypt, ie Joseph in disguise, and admits all the secret sordid story of selling their brother into slavery. Told that Benjamin would be enslaved (after finding the planted silver goblet in his sack) Judah says “take me instead” explaining that his father’s heart would be broken. Joseph is so moved, he commands all his staff to leave, cries, and unmasks: “I am Joseph your Brother, does my father live? R’ Shai Held points out that by dismissing his staff, he is vulnerable, it’s 11 against one. Rashi’s (French Medieval commentator) comment, is that he could not bear to shame his brothers by exposing their misdeeds at the expense of his very life! Why would Judah do this, after the brutality of his former life? The humanizing of Judah had everything to do with the birth and loss of his two sons. His admission of a hidden act with Tamar, taking responsibility sets the stage for his stepping forward to Joseph. Tamar, showing incredible courage, when Judah commands her to be burned for being a prostitute, refuses to shame Judah (In a nutshell: she is pregnant with Judah’s child, she tricked him into fathering when he abandoned her to being a “chained woman”/ aguna, after his sons, her husbands, died) Instead she coolly shows the cord, staff and seal of Judah, and explains “this is the father” Judah pronounces, “she is right” He is able to have EMPATHY “em- pathos” to be with someone in their suffering, and make it impossible to break his father’s heart again. To really love is to risk loss. Perhaps that’s why Jacob cried when he kissed Rachel. It is why Joseph cried, for all he had lost, and was his to regain. The ultimate cord of connection, the umbilical cord, never really completely d i s a p p e a r s. To study fully, check out the sources on my Sefaria page . Writ large, this bringing of parents and children aligned in empathy could change the world! “A world of Peace, war will cease, I can see you are me in disguise, gonna wipe the tears from your eyes…”~Ira Scott Levin