This Shabbat we study the Parshah Vayechi, meaning “And he lived” (Genesis 47:28).

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Jacob spends the final 17 years of his life in Egypt, where he dies at the age of 110. Before his passing, he blesses his sons, assigning to each his role in the tribes. He also blesses Joseph’s two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, elevating them to the status of his own sons as progenitors of tribes within the nation of Israel.

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The patriarch desires to reveal the end of days to his children, but is prevented from doing so. Before his passing Joseph conveys to the Children of Israel the testament  from which they will draw their hope and faith in the difficult years to come: “G-d will surely remember you, and bring you up out of this land to the land of which He swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

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Chabad.org

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On the 10th of Tevet of the year 3336 from Creation (425 BCE), the armies of the Babylonian emperor Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to Jerusalem. Thirty months later – on Tammuz 17, 3338 -- the city walls were breached, and on 9 Av of that year, the Holy Temple was destroyed. The Jewish people were exiled to Babylonia for 70 years.

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Tevet 10 is observed as a day of fasting, mourning and repentance, in remembrance of the siege of Jerusalem. We refrain from food and drink from daybreak to nightfall, and add the Selichot and other special supplements to our prayers. (More recently, Tevet 10 was chosen to also serve as a "general kaddish day" for the victims of the Holocaust, many of whose day of martyrdom is unknown.)

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This Friday, Jan 10 we observe the fast from 6:10 a.m. to 5:05 p.m. in Montreal and from 6:01 a.m. to 5:14 p.m. in Ottawa. 

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Out of hope our nation was born, and so there is hope for every person, and for the entire world. Cultivate the soul with hope; teach it to await the break of dawn, for it is soon upon us. Through its ordeals, the earth is softened to absorb the rains of spring. Yet it still must hope—for in the spring there blossoms only those that have longed for it. And so the sages say, “Because they never gave up hope, our parents were redeemed from Egypt.”

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Rabbi Tzvi Freeman

Our nation has yearned for and awaited the Redemption for nearly 2,000 years. The anticipation, however, reached a fevered pitch following the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, of righteous memory's, announcement, in the early 1990s, that the Era of Redemption is upon us, and we must only increase in acts of goodness and kindness in order to be worthy to greet our redeemer. The Rebbe pointed to various global phenomena that are clear indicators that the process of redemption has indeed started and asked that we prepare ourselves for Redemption by beginning to "live with Moshiach,"—living a life that is dominated by the values that will characterize the Messianic Era. One primary way this is accomplished is through studying the Messianic Era. Studying about it makes it a reality in our lives, and allows us to live a life of redemption even in these last moments before we witness the complete and true redemption.

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Chabad.org

There was a fellow whose morning ritual involved reading the daily paper while drinking a glass of cold, freshly squeezed orange juice. One day, as he flipped through the obituary section, he was shocked to see his own name on the list of those who had passed. He assumed that it was someone else who shared his name, but upon closer inspection, all the information was a perfect match. 

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Furiously, he called the newspaper office and demanded to be put through to the editor. He insisted on an apology and a retraction. The editor was rather unsympathetic and categorically refused to issue an apology.

“Sir, the Paper does not make mistakes.”

“But I’m alive! I’m talking to you on the telephone!”

“Sir, the Paper does not make mistakes. We, therefore, cannot issue a correction or an apology. However, if you insist, we can put your name in tomorrow’s Birth Column.”

Just 80 years ago, the Jewish People’s obituary had already been written. We were down and out with a full third of our population decimated and Hitler’s Museum of the Extinct Jewish Race was already being planned.

Thank G-d, we did indeed resurface in the “birth column,” as the survivors emerged from Europe and resettled in Israel and the world over, doing their best to raise the next generation of our nation.

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In Parshat Vayechi, we read about the passing of our patriarch Jacob. Remarkably, Rabbi Yochanan of the Talmud claimed that “our father Jacob never died.” When his colleagues challenged the veracity of his astounding statement, he explained: “Just as his descendants are alive, he is alive.”

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Jacob’s life work continued in perpetuity. He was described as the “select of the forefathers.” Why? Because whereas Abraham fathered Isaac, he also bore Ishmael. And Isaac fathered Jacob, but also Esau. Jacob, however, fathered twelve sons who became the 12 Tribes of Israel, who all remained faithful to his way of life, and through whom Am Yisrael, the Jewish nation, was firmly established.

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Whether it is the individual Jew or the Jewish People, the same rule applies. We have a role to play, a mission to accomplish—each of us in our personal lives and all of us collectively. We cannot opt out. We are only as good as the sum of all our parts. And the very trajectory of history depends on us too. Our actions can change not only our own situation, but the rest of the world too, and can even achieve global redemption. Our “chosenness” is as much a responsibility as it is privilege.

Jacob never died because we continue to carry on what he and our other patriarchs and matriarchs began.

Let us live proud Jewish lives and continue to be living examples of eternal Jewish continuity.

From an article by Rabbi Yossy Goldman

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