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Why Is There a Stalk?
Seven ears of corn came up on one stalk (kaneh)
Why does it matter that there was a single stalk in Pharaoh’s dream? What can we possibly learn from the use of this seemingly-irrelevant word?
Might it be connected to something else that has seven things coming from a single kaneh: the Menorah?
And thou shalt make a candlestick of pure gold: of beaten work shall the candlestick be made: its shaft (kaneh)
Isn’t it curious that a central identifier of Egypt (grain) is offered using the same language as a central identifier of Israel (menorah)?
Might there be a lesson in it? For example, might we suggest that Egypt and Israel are mirror images of each other? Egypt’s kaneh is physical, and material, while Israel’s kaneh represents light and knowledge and spirituality?
Where is kaneh first found in the Torah? Is it the words of Malchi-Tzedek, who identifies G-d as koneh shamayim va’aretz, “stalk of heaven and earth.”
If Malchi-tzedek is correct, do Egypt and Israel reflect the duality that G-d has created in our world – physicality and spirituality, ruchniyus and gashmiyus?
Might this help explain why Egypt and Israel are often contrasted in the text of the Torah? That each embodies their respective quintessential qualities of physicality versus spirituality, grain versus light, power versus influence, etc.?
What might be the meaning of the number “seven” in both cases? Are there similar parallels for heaven and earth being identified with the number “seven”?
Could The Dreams Offer A Bigger Picture?
Is it possible that the dreams of Pharaoh contain more than one message? Might, for example, the seven “alien” cows or emaciated ears of grain represent the invasion of the seventy members of Jacob’s family? And that what happens to the cows and grain is also a prophecy for what will happen to Egypt as a result of the immigration of Israel?
East Wind
The Torah only refers to the East Wind, קָדִ֤ים, a total of five times. The first three are the dreams of Pharaoh:
But close behind them sprouted seven ears, thin and scorched by the east wind. (Gen. 41:6)
And in the retelling to Joseph:
but right behind them sprouted seven ears, shriveled, thin, and scorched by the east wind. (Gen: 41:23)
Joseph says:
The seven empty ears blasted with the east wind shall be seven years of famine.
The “east wind” is only mentioned again in the Exodus process:
So Moses held out his rod over the land of Egypt, and the LORD drove an east wind over the land all that day and all night; and when morning came, the east wind had brought the locusts. (Ex. 10:13)
and
Then Moses held out his arm over the sea and the LORD drove back the sea with a strong east wind all that night, and turned the sea into dry ground. (Ex. 14:21)
Had Pharoah’s dream of the East Wind been a foreshadowing for what would happen to Egypt during the Exodus? The locusts consuming the grain of Egypt, and the east wind destroying Pharaoh and his army?
Garments or Clothes?
When Joseph is first retrieved from prison to report to Pharaoh, they give him new garments: simla.
But when Pharoah promoted Joseph to Vizier, Joseph is given begadim. What is the difference between the two? Does the Torah offer an explanation?
Here are the simla cases:
Noah’s sons cover him with a simla; Jacob rips his simla in mourning Joseph; Joseph is given simla to see Pharoah; we are told to take the simla of the Egyptians when we leave; “[G-d] upholds the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and befriends the stranger, providing him with food and simla”; But here is the evidence of my daughter’s virginity!” And they shall spread out the simla before the elders of the town; the clothing of the defeated captive woman whom a soldier chooses to marry is called a simla.
What do they all have in common? Does it seem that a simla is merely a functional garment, not a symbol of status or aspiration? Is a beged/begadim different?
Here are the begadim cases:
Rivka receives begadim as an engagement gift; Rivka then uses beged to turn Jacob into Esau for a blessing; Jacob, after seeing the angels on the ladder, bargains with G-d for clothing, begadim; Reuven, the first-born, tears his beged when he finds Joseph missing from the pit; Tamar removes her begadim before seeing Yehudah, only to put them on again afterward!; Joseph gets begadim when he is promoted; Joshua and Caleb rip their begadim when they fail to convince the people; people can get tzaraas in their begadim, men wear tzitzis on their begadim, and the priests wear begadim when they serve in the mikdash.
Could a beged always denote an identity? An aspiration or understanding of what one is or seeks to be? So tearing a beged (as Reuven, Kalev and Yehoshua do) is recognizing a breach in one’s own status, a recognition of failure in one’s primary task or self-identity?
Similarly, might tzaraas appearing in a beged instead of a simla denote a threat to a person’s self-perception?
Might this explain why, for example, the captive woman is described as wearing a simla, because she does not aspire to remain in that low state? And why we take simla (not begadim) from the Egyptians: we want their possessions, but we do not aspire to become like them?
Might the begadim of the priests – and the tzitzis we wear on our begadim – echo the begadim Jacob sought from G-d – clothing that connects man and G-d?
Does this answer the original question? Joseph was given fresh garments, simla, when he was still a prisoner – but he received begadim when he was promoted, because his status and aspirations changed?
Kindly go back and review the cases above: is this right?
Beyond this: is the Torah telling us that the way we dress is more than a functional simla, but is instead about begadim, about seeking an identity that has a meaning and purpose? And that this identity might be tied to the begadim of Rivka and Jacob and priests, begadim that denote relationship and connection to each other and G-d?