By Susan Feldman, Adat Yeshua, Overland Park, Kansas

As we read through the Torah again and again, I try each year to take a special angle in viewing it. The angle for this portion is choosing LIFE by living Torah. Allowing the scenes in the portion to grab me and make me think about my life choices, Joseph becomes the main model, but the rest of the family has much to teach as well.

In this week’s portion, we go through the agony of difficult family situations, and ultimate sibling rivalry. Maybe you have lived through a few as well. It all started because of favorites. Joseph was his father Jacob's favorite. He showed him favor in a special way, by giving him a special coat. Apparently it was different from most other coats in style and color. It represented the father's love to his son. It raises the question – why was he favored? And what other ways can you think of that this favor may have been shown?

Do you have a favorite child in your family? If so, how do you treat him or her? Is it recognizable to others? And how do the others respond to it? Or are you the kind of person who doesn’t show favoritism? What are the markers of your behavior?

Think back into your own life. Were you the favorite child in your family? Or was your brother, or maybe your sister? Did you like that they were the favored child? Now, I do recognize that some of you may be an only child, and so this paradigm may not work for you. But favoritism happens everywhere, in school, on the job, at the grocery store. How do we react when someone is favored over us? Do we behave like the brothers, and want to throw that person into a pit?

One of the reasons Joseph was disliked by his brethren was due to his dreams. Let’s take a different look into the family picture here; I see a large encampment, with lots of chores to take care of. I see all the "boys" busy about their work, but Joseph is sitting looking into space, daydreaming. And as a brother it makes me mad! And then, his dreams show him in charge of me. I get madder.Who does he think he is anyway? Then something ugly starts growing in my heart, and I want to not have him around at all, and I don’t want to be around him. Let's leave him at home and take our business elsewhere.Yet, even over there he follows us! Yipes!! We can’t get rid of the creep!

This reminds me so much of what I hear from people on their jobs. A boss, or coworker they can barely tolerate because the person thinks he is hot stuff just happens to be favored, and he happens to be very good at what he does, but he bugs the life out of others.  What are we going to do about it?

Joseph was thrown into the pit, and then sold. What is your pit? And who do you blame for putting you there?

As a child, I remember when I was feeling disconsolate, my mom taught me a silly ditty to help get me out of it. "Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I’m going to go sit and eat worms!" I didn’t want to eat worms, but I had put myself in a pit! In our daily lives as believers, many times we do feel as though we are alone, and sometimes left down in a hole. But that is not where we are left.God is faithful to us, just as he was faithful to Joseph. He brings us up out of the pitand sets our feet on a ROCK!

As we travel on in the Torah, we find that Joseph has a few more ups and downs to live through. But ultimately, he is used to bring redemption to the known world of his time by providing the necessary food for them. When we stay in a pit, we limit ourselves from being used in a greater way. When we get out of the pit, we can then use that experience to our benefit in the future. Knowing it may happen again, but we will not stay there long. Every incident that we go through is a stepping stone, not just for us, but for others. And as we keep walking with our God, he will use every one of those for his redemptive purposes.

Be strong, and be courageous!   Be a modern day Joseph!  Keep on dreaming!