Rabbi Ed Bernstein

“The Little Rascals” get into mischief, and so do the sons of Jacob in this week’s Torah portion.

In Parashat Vayeshev, we meet Joseph, the spoiled brat and favorite son of Jacob. He torments his eleven brothers with his dreams in which he predicts his dominance over them. They can’t take it any more. In a puzzling act of parenting, Jacob sends Joseph out one day to find his brothers and inquire after their welfare. They plot to kill him but relent when Judah sells him into slavery instead. Joseph goes down to Egypt and eventually achieves a position of immense power. One can only imagine what living in a house of twelve sons must have been like on a day-to-day basis. The mischief of the “Little Rascals,” may offer some clue into the brothers’ lives when they were young boys.