<b>And he called his son Joseph (Gen. 47:29).</b> Why did he not summon Reuben or Judah? After all, Reuben was the firstborn, while Judah was a king. He ignored them and called Joseph instead. He did so to teach us that one must pay homage to the person who is in power at the moment; moreover, Joseph had the power to fulfill his desires. <i>And he said to him: “If now I have found favor in thy sight … bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt</i> (Gen. 47:29). It was for your sake that I descended to Egypt, and it was because of you that I said: <i>Now let me die</i>. Even the soul of a man who dies on shipboard joins his fathers, and so when <i>I sleep with my fathers, carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burying-place</i> (ibid., v. 30).” They cherished their burial place. <i>The grave that I have digged</i> (ibid. 50:5). <i>And deal kindly and truly with me</i> (ibid. 47:29). Is there false kindness that he should say to him <i>kindly and truly</i>? The proverb says: When your friend’s son dies, share his sorrow; but when your friend dies, cast off your sorrow.<sup class="footnote-marker">7</sup><i class="footnote">A cynical proverb. Console him on the death of his son, for he will console you if your son dies. However, if he dies, cast off your sorrow, for his son will not be concerned about you or your sympathy.</i> He said to him, in other words: “If you are kind to me after my death, that will be true kindness. <i>Bury me not in Egypt</i>, for it will eventually be smitten with vermin, and they will swarm over me.” Hence it says: <i>Bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt</i>.
Another explanation as to why Jacob did not want to buried in Egypt. He was afraid that the Egyptians might use him as an object of idolatrous worship. Just as punishment is exacted from the worshipper of an idol, so is it exacted from the (idol) which is worshipped, as it is written: <i>And against all the gods of Egypt will I execute judgment</i> (Exod. 12:12). Similarly, you find that after Daniel interpreted Nebuchadnezzar’s dream: <i>Then the king Nebuchadnezzar fell upon his face, and worshipped Daniel, and commanded that they should offer an offering and sweet odors unto him</i> (Dan. 2:46). Daniel would not allow it. And why not? For just as the idolaters would be punished, so too would he be. You find this illustrated in what is written about Hiram, king of Tyre. After he proclaimed himself a god: <i>Because thy heart is lifted up, and thou hast said: I am a god</i> (Ezek. 28:2). The Holy One, blessed be He, said to him: <i>Art thou wiser than Daniel</i>? (ibid., v. 3). When Nebuchadnezzar decreed that offerings should be brought to him, he (Daniel) would not permit it, yet you call yourself a god. And so it is written there: <i>I have cast thee to the ground, I have laid thee before kings, that they may gaze upon thee</i> (ibid., v. 17).
Another explanation is that Jacob said: “Perhaps the Egyptians will be redeemed through me.” They are compared to asses, as it is said: <i>Whose flesh is the flesh of asses</i> (ibid. 33:20), and I am likened to a sheep, as is said: <i>Israel is a scattered sheep</i> (Jer. 50:17). And it is written elsewhere that <i>The firstling of an ass thou shalt redeem with a sheep</i> (Exod. 34:20). Hence, (<i>Bury me not in Egypt</i>) lest the Egyptians be redeemed through me. Therefore <i>Bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt</i>.
Why were the patriarchs anxious to be buried in the land of Israel? R. Eliezer said: There is a reason for this. R. Hanina said: There is a reason for this; and R. Joshua the son of Levi said: There is a reason for this. What did they mean by “There is a reason for this”? It is written: <i>I shall walk before the Lord in the land of the living</i> (Ps. 116:9). However, our sages said in the name of R. Helbo that there were two reasons why the patriarchs longed to be buried in the land of Israel: The dead in the land of Israel would be the first to be resurrected in the Messianic age, and they would be the first to enjoy the years brought by the Messiah.
R. Hanina said: Whoever dies outside of the land of Israel and is buried there experiences two deaths, as it is written: <i>And thou, Pashhur, and all that dwell in thy house shall go into captivity; and thou shalt come to Babylon, and there thou shalt die, and there thou shalt be buried</i> (Jer. 20:6). Hence he experienced two deaths.<sup class="footnote-marker">8</sup><i class="footnote">They suffer both the pain of death and the pain of interment outside the Holy Land.</i> That is why Jacob said to Joseph: <i>Bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt</i>. R. Simon argued: If that is so, do not the righteous who are buried outside the land of Israel suffer because of that? What does the Holy One, blessed be He, do? He constructs subterranean passages through which they revolve until they reach the land of Israel. When they reach the land, the Holy One, blessed be He, instills within them the breath of life and they rise, as it is said: <i>Behold, I have opened your graves, and I caused you to come up out of your graves, O My people. And I will bring you into the land of Israel</i> (Ezek. 37:12), and after that is written: <i>I will put My spirit in you, and you will live</i> (ibid., v. 14). R. Simeon the son of Lakish said: The following verse teaches explicitly that when the righteous reach the land of Israel, the Holy One, blessed be He, instills the breath of life in them: <i>He that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein</i> (Isa. 42:5).
Rabbi (Judah the Prince) and R. Eliezer, while strolling outside the gates of Tiberias, saw a coffin being borne for burial in the land of Israel. Rabbi said to R. Eliezer: How does this one, who died outside the land, benefit from being brought into the land of Israel for burial? I apply to him the verse: <i>Ye made My heritage an abomination</i> (Jer. 2:7). During your lifetime you did not go up to the land, <i>But when ye entered ye defiled My land</i> (ibid.). R. Eliezer replied: Since he is now to be buried in the land of Israel, the Holy One, blessed be He, will forgive him, as it is said: <i>The land maketh atonement for His people</i> (Deut. 32:43).
When R. Yohanan was about to leave this world, he said to those who were to arrange his funeral: Bury me in colorful garments that are neither wholly white nor black, so that if I should stand among the righteous I shall not be humiliated, and if I stand among the wicked I shall not be embarrassed. When R. Josiah was about to depart from this world, he told those standing at his side: Summon my disciples. He said to them: Bury me in white garments, for I am not ashamed to stand before my Maker for any act that I have committed. It is told that when our holy Rabbi was about to depart from this world, he left three instructions. He told them: Do not move my widow from my home, do not permit eulogies to be recited in the cities of the land of Israel, and do not permit a stranger to bear my coffin. Permit only the ones who attended me in my lifetime to attend to me when I die. During his lifetime, he resided for seventeen years in Sepphoris. He applied to himself the verse <i>And Jacob lived in Egypt seventeen years</i>, and “(I,) Judah, lived in Sepphoris seventeen years.”
Our saintly Rabbi suffered from a toothache for thirteen years, and during that time no woman in the land of Israel died in childbirth or had a miscarriage.<sup class="footnote-marker">9</sup><i class="footnote">Because his suffering warded off death and miscarriages in Israel.</i> At the end of the thirteenth year, Rabbi became angry with R. Hiyya the elder. Elijah, of blessed memory, visited our Rabbi in the guise of R. Hiyya and touched his aching tooth. He was cured immediately. The following day, when R. Hiyya visited him, he asked: “How is your tooth?” He answered: “From the moment you touched it yesterday, it was cured.” Then R. Hiyya cried out: “Woe unto you, O pregnant woman in the land of Israel, woe unto you O pregnant woman in the land of Israel.” When R. Hiyya told him: “I did not touch your tooth,” our Rabbi realized that it was Elijah, of blessed memory, who had done so. From that moment on he began to pay homage to R. Hiyya.
<i>But when I sleep with my fathers</i> (Gen. 47:30). Jacob said to Joseph: “If you will do as I have asked, well and good, but if not, my soul shall depart at once.” “I shall do it,” he answered. “Swear unto me,” said Jacob. And he swore unto him. And Israel bowed down before the Shekhinah that hovered over him. What is written after he passed away? <i>His sons did unto him as he commanded them</i> (ibid. 50:12). The Holy One, blessed be He, said: Death does not permit man to rejoice in this world, but in the world-to-come <i>He will swallow up death forever</i> (Isa. 25:8). When He does swallow up death, then <i>I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in My people; and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor the voice of crying</i> (Isa. 65:19).