Divrei Torah on the weekly portions

Bereishit: Mikketz

But he's got more than me!

"And he (Yosef) sent them (the brothers) portions from his table, giving Binyamin 5 times as much as the rest. They drank with him and became intoxicated." (Bereishit 43:34) .

Gemara Shabbat 139a states that from the time the brothers sold Yosef (22 years earlier), both Yosef and his brothers vowed to abstain from wine. The Midrash interprets the above verse that now "they drank with him", implying that previously they did not drink wine because of their vow.

We know that at this stage "Yosef recognized his brothers, but they did not recognize him" (Bereishit 42:8) so we can understand why Yosef's vow had expired and he could drink wine with his brothers. However, since the brothers did not yet recognise Yosef, why did they break their vow here?

Maharsha answers that they interrupted their vow and drank wine here because they were very afraid of the ruling power (i.e. Yosef).

Rabbi Elyakim Getzil from Dvinsk inquires why the brothers were so afraid of the ruling power that they interrupted their vow. After all, they had not been commanded to drink wine, it was merely offered to them. If they did not want to drink it, couldn't they simply have said they weren't thirsty or they were on medication?

He answers based on a Gemara in Eruvin 65a that "when wine is imbibed, one's inner secrets come out!" The brothers thought that if they would decline the invitation to drink wine, then Yosef would further accuse them of being spies, reasoning that the brothers had secrets to hide and that is why they did not want to drink. Accordingly, the brothers felt they had to drink wine here, despite their vow.

Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch Ferber ("The Soho Rov") provides a beautiful alternative explanation. The brothers had abstained from wine as a punishment for their sin of selling Yosef. They had been jealous of the extra favours (Bereishit 37:3-4) Yaakov had shown Yosef, which had caused them to sell him as a slave.

They had sincerely regretted their action and had confessed and repented for what they had done (Bereishit 42:21) . However, Rambam identifies (in Hilchot Teshuvah 2:1) that a true penitent is someone who finds himself in the same circumstances as before, with the same ability to sin again, yet he does not repeat the sin.

Therefore, even after repenting they had not drunk any wine because they were not sure if they had truly eradicated their sin from their hearts. While they were sitting around Yosef's table, they noticed that Yosef gave Binyamin a portion 5 times larger than their own portions. Yet they did not feel at all jealous. Thus they now had ample proof that they had indeed rectified their earlier sin of jealousy of Yosef. They therefore allowed themselves once again to drink wine.