We usually consider little actions to be of little importance. Even things we utter by the way, we do not think of them as having any big consequences. It is as if crucial outgrowths could only come from important and programmed deeds. Moreover, drastic changes in history come only from famous people, who are experienced and well known in the field which is being transformed. At least, this is the widespread opinion.
Our parashah shows us a different reality, a more frequent one that happens every day, a reality more like ours. We may think it is a fortuitous reality. But it is not.
Yaakov had sent Yosef to search for his brothers, who went to pasture their father’s flock at Shechem. Yosef did not find them. He wandered seeking them, but it was of no avail.
Up till now, this is a simple story of something that could also happen to us. We set an appointment at a certain place but we cannot find each other. What do we do? We wait, we search, and after a while we decide to go back. We couldn’t meet this time, so we’ll do it later on.
But in the parashah Yosef finds a man, an anonymous man, whose task is to ask him “what are you looking for?” meaning “have you lost something? Have you get lost? May I help you?” A simply deed of everyday life. A generous one, but simple all the same. Something done by an unknown person. A deed that is not intended to cause any significant revolution. “They went to Dothan”, this is all the contribution of this anonymous man.
Is it?
Wasn’t this man interested in Yosef and hadn’t he offered him this simple information, Yosef would neither have been sold, nor would he have arrived to Egypt, nor would he have become Vizier. He would not have brought his father and siblings into Egypt and would not have become slaves in a strange land. We would have then never been liberated, would not have received the Torah at Mount Sinai, we would have never entered the Promised Land and the slavery we suffered would have never become the example and the basis for foundational mitzvoth of the Jewish civilization such as Shabbath, loving the stranger, respecting the rights of the slaves and paying them a compensation for slavery time, judicial justice, justice for the vulnerable, social justice and support for the needy.
It was only because one little thing by an anonymous man that our history developed as it developed.
God had said to Abraham that his descendants would be enslaved in a strange land and that He would redeem them. But He did not state neither the place, nor the time, nor how things would develop. He did not even say who exactly would be those involved and how they may respond to the developments. All this was in man’s hand.
And that anonymous man, with his so little deed, changed our whole history.
We all are that anonymous man. We should never belittle the importance of what each one of us may do. We should neither forget the power of our words – power either to build or to destroy.
