"All his sons and daughters sought to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted, saying, “No, I will go down mourning to my son in Sheol.” Thus his father bewailed him" (Bereishis 37: 35).
On this pasuk, Rashi writes, "Literally, it means a grave - 'I will bury myself in mourning, and I will not be comforted all my days.' And its midrashic interpretation is Gehenom; this sign was given to me by the Almighty, that if none of my sons die in my lifetime, I am assured that I will not see Gehenom."
Before I start, I would HIGHLY recommend that everybody go to https://www.jle.org.uk/pages/podcast, the home for History for the Curious. It contains, so far, three years worth of Jewish history lessons, which are delivered in such an amazing way, you'll end up being addicted to it as much as I have. Their latest one is about Chanukkah and the West and the ICC, and I believe it sums up the current world situation as it stands. Plus, it takes the point of this week's Dvar Torah and builds on it in ways that I cannot possibly hope to do.
Each of the nation's "founding fathers" were known for specific attributes. Yaakov is known for emes, truthfulness. His job is to work against his brother, Eisav, who's known for quite the opposite. But what exactly is the Torah's definition of "truth"? In today's world, people like to say, "There is no truth" or "it's MY truth." Some of the more militant amongst the social elite say, "my truth IS the truth and you cannot possibly say anything against it."
The Torah looks at truth simply as the reality that Hashem has a will in the world. Truth is simply what Hashem says it is. An excellent example of this is regarding when the Jewish month begins (this example is taken from said podcast). We all know that that Jewish month begins with the New Moon. However, the question is: when is that? According to science, we know through calculations that the new moon occurs every 29.53 days (give or take). That means Rosh Chodesh is every 29.53 days, no? No. The Torah says differently. Our new month begins with witnesses who have seen the moon shortly after it became new. If the witnesses showed up at the time it's possible to see the moon, then the month begins then. If not, it begins the day after. For the Jewish nation, while we do take the calculation of 29.53 days into consideration, it's not what actually triggers the new month. Rather, the Torah says, witnesses do that.
So, we have truth according to science and truth according to the Torah. And the will of Hashem, the ultimate reality, is to follow the Torah.
We see this in play comparing Yaakov and Elisha ben Avuyah, the famous teacher of Rebbe Meir.
When Elisha ben Avuyah saw that he had no portion in the World to Come, he simply left the way of the Torah. If I'm not going to get anything in the end, then there's no point in continuing on this path.
To contrast this, we have Yaakov. He knew that part of his purpose was to bring twelve tribes of the Jewish nation into existence. When he learned that one of those twelve was "killed," he knew that his mission was a failure. While he fell depressed over this, he still, nonetheless, continued to serve Hashem with all of his strength, because Hashem's will is the ultimate reality, and it is his job to fulfill it.
THAT is truth.
In today's world, there is no truth. We need not look far to see ample proof of this. Yet, for the Jew, there is still truth, the reality that Hashem runs the world and has a mission for us to fulfill. This is the truth of the Jew, and it is our job to hang on to that, even in the darkest of times, and even when it goes against everything that the world is telling us.
With that, I wish you all a good Shabbos.