Jacob Warns His Sons Against the Evil Eye

(Genesis 42:1-3) "And Jacob saw that there was grain in Egypt." (Psalms 146:5) "Happy is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the LORD his God." "And Jacob saw that there was breaking [shever, grain]"; there is also "hope" [sever, reading shever as sever]: this is the plenty; "there is breaking," this is the famine. "There is breaking," (Genesis 39:1) "And Joseph was brought down to Egypt"; "there is hope," (Genesis 42:6) "And Joseph was the ruler." "There is breaking," "and they shall enslave them and afflict them"; "there is hope," (Genesis 15:14) "and afterward they shall come out with great wealth." "And Jacob said to his sons, why do you show yourselves?" He said to them: do not go out with provisions already in your hands, and do not all enter through one gate. Do not go out with provisions in your hands, on account of resentment; and do not all enter through one gate, on account of the eye. Our Rabbis taught: one who goes from a place where they do not fast to a place where they fast must fast with them; if he forgot and ate and drank, let him not show himself before them and let him not display himself in comfort, as it is said, "And Jacob said to his sons, why do you show yourselves?"—do not show yourselves before the children of Esau and the children of Ishmael as though you were sated. Jacob said to his sons: I beg of you, keep yourselves hidden, for nothing is harder than the evil eye. The first tablets, because they were given amid loud proclamation, were shattered; but the latter tablets, of which it is said "and no man shall come up with you," endured. And even Jerusalem was destroyed on account of the eye, (Lamentations 2:15) "Is this the city that men called the perfection of beauty?"