Yosef and the Evil Eye
בֵּן פֹּרָת יוֹסֵף, בֵּן פֹּרָת עֲלֵי עָיִן
A son with charm is Yosef, a son with charm to the eye (49:22)
New in Town
The Rabbis in a number of places refer to the concept of “the evil eye,” whereby one may damage someone else by looking at them in a negative or begrudging way.
In one place, the Gemara[1] goes so far as to say that out of every hundred people, ninety-nine of them die from the evil eye, and only one of them from natural causes!
The Gemara[2] further states that if one enters a new town and is afraid of the evil eye, he should say the following: “I am descended from Yosef, over whom the evil eye had no power.” The basis for this idea is an exposition of the words “עלי עין” in our verse, which are expounded to read “עולי עין – who rises above the [evil] eye.”
· How is it possible to damage someone purely by looking at him?
· If looking at someone is indeed a damaging force, how then do we understand that doing so was not able to affect Yosef?
Ayin Hara – Vision and Self-Vision
Although there are no doubt many levels on which to understand this concept, Rav Kook[3] explains one aspect of it which is very down-to-earth and very relevant.
Should we ask, “Is it possible for someone to damage me by looking at me?” The answer will be, “Yes, if it damages the way you look at yourself.”
It is well-known that a person’s effectiveness is significantly impacted by his self-image. If he has a positive self-image and feels he is a fundamentally worthy person, he will go about things in an effective and energetic way. If, however, he feels that he has no worth, his vision will be diminished and his actions will be deflated. If someone’s self-image is significantly — or entirely — dependent on what other people think of him, then when they look at him with “the evil eye,” i.e., critically and negatively, he will then come to look at himself that way. Such a person is then prone to all manner of failures that accompany negative self-image. Looked at in this way, it is very easy to see how the Gemara can say that so many people are affected adversely by the evil eye.
A person who enters a new town may be fearful of “the evil eye.” Not knowing anyone and with no standing in this particular place, he may be lacking in confidence, and therefore more inclined to conform with the way things are done in this new locale, in order to establish himself.
Such a person is potentially at risk of compromising correct behavior in favor of what will draw a more positive reaction from his new neighbors. Hence, he needs to take action. He needs to invoke the image of the one who represents immunity from the evil eye; he needs to claim his descent from Yosef.
Politically Incorrect
The individual who represents immunity from the evil eye is Yosef. How was he able to achieve this? A quality which stands out about Yosef is his determination to do the right thing regardless of the reaction it will provoke from those around him. Initially, this gets him into trouble as he insists on telling his brothers the dreams he has had where they all bow down to him. Later on, his resistance to Potiphar’s wife is a classic example of this trait. She is the only other person present in that situation, the only one he could ingratiate himself with, and she is pressuring him daily. As the lady of the house, she wields great authority over him, and this alone should have influenced Yosef to seek to curry favor with her. Yet, for every day over the course of a year, he makes himself more and more unpopular with her, as he states simply, “How can I perpetrate this great evil, I will thus have sinned before God!”[4] Once he has made up his mind not to sin before Hashem, her entreaties do not move him, come what may.
Twelve years later, when he is taken out of jail to see if he can interpret Pharaoh’s dreams, we see this trait express itself in a rather extreme form. Pharaoh greets Yosef and says, “I have dreamt a dream, and there is no one to interpret it, and I have heard about you that you are able to hear a dream and interpret it.”[5] This itself is quite remarkable; Pharaoh is bestowing a compliment on an insignificant slave who has spent the last dozen years rotting in jail. Yosef will certainly wish to respond to this kind word in an appropriate and appreciative manner. What do we read next?
“Yosef said, it is not me; God will respond with Pharaoh’s welfare.”[6] Yosef rebuffs Pharaoh’s compliment, and corrects his mistake!
The more we appreciate the precariousness of Yosef’s situation, the more we realize that he is practically committing suicide with this corrective remark. No one speaks to Pharaoh that way! What will Pharaoh think of him now? How will he react to being corrected and having his compliment thrown back in his face? However, Yosef is not guided by what will gain the best response from Pharaoh, only by what is the true presentation of the source of his abilities.[7]
Now we understand why Yosef represents immunity from the evil eye. His sense of whether or not he is doing the right thing does not come from his surroundings. It is generated from an internal sense of right and wrong. He is fully prepared to act in contrast to his environment if he feels it is the right thing to do. Hence, the negative vision of those around him does not lead to negative self-vision.
Although we naturally like to be looked upon favorably by others – and there is no reason why we should not strive to attain this – ultimately our sense of self worth cannot be dependent upon what others think is right, but rather on what actually is correct. The more we achieve this, the morel we can claim descent from Yosef in the most meaningful sense of the word.
חזק חזק ונתחזק
[1] Bava Metzia 107b.
[2] Berachos 55b.
[3] Commentary Ein Aya to Berachos, ibid.
[4] Bereishis 39:9.
[5] Ibid., 41:15.
[6] Ibid., verse 16.
[7] It is interesting to note from the nuances of the text the change in atmosphere from before Yosef’s words to after them. Pharaoh’s opening sentence is introduced with the words “ויאמר פרעה — Pharaoh said” (Bereishis 41:15). The word אמר always has a warm and easygoing connotation (See Rashi to Bamidbar 12:1), and this represents Pharaoh’s initial attempt to be friendly. After Yosef has rebuffed his compliment, and Pharaoh proceeds to describe his dream, the opening words are “וידבר פרעה — Pharaoh said” (41:17). The term דיבור typically has a harsh connotation (Rashi to Bamidbar, ibid.). What we are witnessing in the shift between these two terms is a drop in room temperature of about twenty degrees, brought about by Yosef’s politically disastrous correction of Pharaoh’s views. For his part, Yosef will not have it any other way.