There is a beautiful thought from last week’s Parasha about Ahavat Yisrael that I would like to share.
Long lost brothers Yosef and Binyamin reunited after not seeing each other for over 20 years. They hugged, kissed and cried. It says Yosef cried on Binyamin’s shoulder, and Binyamin cried on Yosef’s shoulder. Rashi explains that Yosef was crying for the two Betei HaMikdash in Binyamin’s area that would be destroyed, and Binyamin cried on Yosef’s shoulder for the Mishkan in Shiloh that would be destroyed.
Rav Eliyahu Svei asks the obvious question-They hadn’t seen each other for over 20 years and this is what they are crying over?
Cry that you haven’t seen each other for 22 years. Why bring in the Bet HaMikdash- that wouldn’t be for another few thousand years!
It says “The problem in its time.” So why cry for something that didn’t happen yet?
The answer that he gives is that the brothers, when meeting after all those years, were hoping that they had fixed the sin. Yehuda had cosigned for Binyamin, and the brothers were united. Their grievances were behind them, and they were hopefully on the track of Ahavat Yisrael.
They wanted to see whether they had really achieved that, so they looked into the future with Ruach Hakodesh and saw that no, they had not yet fixed the sin. The Bet HaMikdash would eventually be destroyed, because the brotherly love would not be to its fullest.
But even so, says Rav Betzalel Pinhasi, from Yeshivat Birkat Ephraim in Bnei B’rak, look at what happened: Yosef cried over Binyamin’s Bet HaMikdash, and Binyamin cried about Yosef’s Mishkan that was destroyed.
Each one didn’t cry for his own loss, he cried for the other one’s loss.
There’s a story like that, of two great Hasidic rebbis who had lost their dynasties in the Holocaust. One said to the other, “I can’t cry for my own Bet HaMikdash, for my lost congregation. On that, I have to say Gam Zu L’Tova and I have to accept it. But I can cry over your Bet HaMikdash, over your lost dynasty and your congregation that was lost.”
Each one hugged the other, and cried over the other one’s losses.
That is an expression of Ahavat Yisrael.
As an elderly man, Rabbi Meir Chodesh, the Mashgiach of Yeshivat Chevron was in the hospital, surrounded by his family. A resident once came in to draw his blood and the Rabbi asked his family to leave.
Once the resident did his job, the family came back in and asked the Rabbi why they hadn’t been permitted to stay during the procedure. The Rabbi replied that it was hard to find veins on an old man. Even a professional would have difficulty with this, and since this was a resident, he would probably need to poke a few times and maybe miss the vein. So why add the pressure of the family watching him mess up? Why embarrass him more? Therefore, the Rabbi decided to send everybody out, so that the resident shouldn’t have to go through that embarrassment and pressure.
Instead of insisting on a real doctor, he chose to not embarrass the resident. He cared more about the resident’s embarrassment than his own personal pain.