ספר בראשית

‎Genesis 50,19. “Joseph said to them: ‘do not fear‎‏ ‏for ‎I am in place of G’d.’” According to Onkelos the meaning of ‎this line is: “since G’d when He performs an act that appears to us ‎as evil, although He knows that it will turn out for our benefit, I, ‎if I were to be instead of G’d, I would have to perform a similar act ‎against you. Since it is not within man’s power to foresee how his ‎actions will turn out in the end, I am obviously not entitled to do ‎something that begins by being harmful.”‎ Looking at the plain meaning of the text it is difficult to ‎understand Onkelos.‎Perhaps we have to fall back on the principle that every ‎human being, as part of his character, (virtues) must endeavour ‎to maintain close relations with his Creator. This involves a ‎degree of awe and reverence for the Creator to be present in his ‎mind at all times. It also presumes that he is imbued with a ‎degree of love for his Creator, as he contemplates the greatness of ‎G’d. He is obligated to do this if for no other reason than G’d has ‎performed so many more deeds of loving kindness for the Jewish ‎people than He has performed for any other nation. The same is ‎true for other attributes of G’d that have been of benefit to us on ‎numerous occasions. The sum total of such a relationship ‎between us, the creature, and the Creator, makes this an ‎עולם ‏האמת‎, a world in which truth is predominant. Once we appreciate ‎this we can understand the Talmud in Megillah 18 in which ‎the rhetorical question is posed of how we know that G’d had ‎referred to Yaakov by the title ‎א-ל‎, a name used for referring to ‎Him on many occasions? ‎The foregoing will also help us understand what the Talmud ‎meant when it described G’d as having built and destroyed worlds ‎on a regular basis before He commenced with the construction of ‎the universe described in Bereshit. The Talmud in Baba ‎Batra 75 tells us that just as G’d has been building worlds, so ‎the righteous, in a future, refined world, will also “build worlds;” ‎not only that but they will be given titles used by G’d to describe ‎Himself. The ministering angels when meeting up with these ‎righteous will address them as “your holiness.” Although such ‎statements first strike us as bordering on blasphemy, when we ‎consider that these “righteous people” have already acquired ‎many of G’d’s own attributes, it is not difficult to understand the ‎Talmudic references to the future better state of the world at all.‎If man has not attained the level of perfection described in ‎the last few lines, then instead of being accorded titles that he can ‎share with G’d, he remains below that spiritual level; this is why ‎Joseph asks his brothers if they have such a low opinion of him ‎that he is ‎תחת אלוקים‎, “beneath the level of minimal perfection” ‎described in the Talmud, so that he would be capable of dealing ‎on a basis of revenge with them.‎If man has not attained the level of perfection described in ‎the last few lines, then instead of being accorded titles that he can ‎share with G’d, he remains below that spiritual level; this is why ‎Joseph asks his brothers if they have such a low opinion of him ‎that he is ‎תחת אלוקים‎, “beneath the level of minimal perfection” ‎described in the Talmud, so that he would be capable of dealing on ‎a basis of revenge with them.‎