Vayigash 5786 - Who could refrain that had a heart to love? Can tears dissolve the hardness of our hearts?

ByRabbi Anita Josefa Barzman MD Founder, micro-mishkan.net

A Palestinian man carries the body of his 4-month-old brother, Ahmed Al-Nader, who was killed the previous day along with other family members in an Israeli shelling of a school-turned-shelter in the al-Tuffah neighborhood of Gaza City, Palestine on December 20, 2025. (Photo by Omar al-Qattaa/AFP via Getty Images)
https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-school-shelter-massacre

https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/ap-top-news/2023/10/18/hundreds-mourn-as-israeli-family-of-5-that-was-slain-together-is-laid-to-rest

Although other species of animals express grief and loss, it is widely accepted that humans are the only animals who shed actual tears.

Much ink has been spilled on the function of tears. Emotional / "psychic" tears are a universal phenomenon; and there is a fascinating body of scientific literature (much of it recent) exploring the purpose and function of tears and crying. Some recent scientific work in this area explores the possible function of tears as mitigators of aggression, as well as activators of empathy.

When we are heard-hearted we are more likely to act aggressively, and to lack empathy, toward others.

Parashat Vayigash: "and he approached": the climax of the narrative of Joseph and his brothers, with the very dramatic scene, filled with pathos, in which Judah approaches Joseph to beg for the release of their younger brother Benjamin, offering himself in Benjamin's place.

There are many tears in this parsha: Joseph is filled with them, at first attempting to conceal his tears, then finally - after revealing himself to his brothers - very intimately crying "onto" them. Notably, of the 116 occurrences of the verb "to cry" / "to weep" in Tanakh, the very small number of these occurences that say "he cried upon" / "he cried onto" (four times) are all here in a focused section of Parashat Vayigash.

בראשית מ״ה:י״ד-ט״ו

(יד) וַיִּפֹּ֛ל עַל־צַוְּארֵ֥י בִנְיָֽמִן־אָחִ֖יו וַיֵּ֑בְךְּ וּבִ֨נְיָמִ֔ן בָּכָ֖ה עַל־צַוָּארָֽיו׃ (טו) וַיְנַשֵּׁ֥ק לְכׇל־אֶחָ֖יו וַיֵּ֣בְךְּ עֲלֵהֶ֑ם וְאַ֣חֲרֵי כֵ֔ן דִּבְּר֥וּ אֶחָ֖יו אִתּֽוֹ׃

Genesis 45:14-15

(14) With that he embraced his brother Benjamin around the neck and wept, and Benjamin wept on his neck.(15) He kissed all his brothers and wept upon them; only then were his brothers able to talk to him.

בראשית מ״ו:כ״ט

(כט) וַיֶּאְסֹ֤ר יוֹסֵף֙ מֶרְכַּבְתּ֔וֹ וַיַּ֛עַל לִקְרַֽאת־יִשְׂרָאֵ֥ל אָבִ֖יו גֹּ֑שְׁנָה וַיֵּרָ֣א אֵלָ֗יו וַיִּפֹּל֙ עַל־צַוָּארָ֔יו וַיֵּ֥בְךְּ עַל־צַוָּארָ֖יו עֽוֹד׃

Genesis 46:29

(29) Joseph ordered his chariot and went to Goshen to meet his father Israel; he presented himself to him and, embracing him around the neck, he wept on his neck a good while.

בראשית נ׳:א׳

(א) וַיִּפֹּ֥ל יוֹסֵ֖ף עַל־פְּנֵ֣י אָבִ֑יו וַיֵּ֥בְךְּ עָלָ֖יו וַיִּשַּׁק־לֽוֹ׃

Genesis 50:1

(1) Joseph flung himself upon his father’s face and wept over [onto] him and kissed him.

Other mentions of weeping or crying in Tanakh are "so-and-so wept", "they wept" - without this element of physical proximity and intimacy. Of all of the occurrences of weeping in Tanakh, the only other one that includes this sort of intimate physical proximity is in the story of David and Jonathan in I Samuel:

שמואל א כ׳:מ״א

(מא) הַנַּ֘עַר֮ בָּא֒ וְדָוִ֗ד קָ֚ם מֵאֵ֣צֶל הַנֶּ֔גֶב וַיִּפֹּ֨ל לְאַפָּ֥יו אַ֛רְצָה וַיִּשְׁתַּ֖חוּ שָׁלֹ֣שׁ פְּעָמִ֑ים וַֽיִּשְּׁק֣וּ ׀ אִ֣ישׁ אֶת־רֵעֵ֗הוּ וַיִּבְכּוּ֙ אִ֣ישׁ אֶת־רֵעֵ֔הוּ עַד־דָּוִ֖ד הִגְדִּֽיל׃

I Samuel 20:41

(41) When the boy [Jonathan] got there, David emerged from his concealment at the Negeb. He flung himself face down on the ground and bowed low three times. They each kissed his friend and wept together; David wept the longer.

If I embrace you, and my tears fall onto you, there is a significant chance that my tears will affect you, will change you, will transform you, will dissolve your hard-heartedness.

ברכות נ״ט א:ד׳

בְּשָׁעָה שֶׁהַקָּדוֹשׁ בָּרוּךְ הוּא זוֹכֵר אֶת בָּנָיו שֶׁשְּׁרוּיִים בְּצַעַר בֵּין אוּמּוֹת הָעוֹלָם מוֹרִיד שְׁתֵּי דְמָעוֹת לַיָּם הַגָּדוֹל, וְקוֹלוֹ נִשְׁמָע מִסּוֹף הָעוֹלָם וְעַד סוֹפוֹ, וְהַיְינוּ גּוּהָא.

Berakhot 59a:4

...when the Holy One, Blessed be He, remembers His children who are suffering among the nations of the world, He sheds two tears into the great sea. The sound of their reverberation is heard from one end of the earth to the other. And that is an earthquake.

"God cries over our misfortune, our suffering, our lack of reaching out, our failure to form deeper connections with the Divine, and therefore with each other.We are created with the same capacity to weep. Our tears are the means by which we can break down barriers of heartlessness; by which we can feel empathy; through which we can connect with each other – in times of sadness and times of joy....The capacity to cry, to shed tears, breaks through our coldhearted tendencies. It tells God we are ready to reach beyond our personal barriers, to connect with our friend, our neighbor, our fellow human. It tells God we are searching for divine connection. Tears are a challenge to our egos, to our separation from others. When we cannot or will not cry, God weeps."
Rabbii Jack Romberg
https://thejewishobserver.com/2016/10/05/tears

There is a beautiful passage toward the end of Shakespeare's final play, The Tempest, in which we find a teaching by the "airy spirit" Ariel to her human master Prospero about the fundamental humanity of empathy. Prospero is preoccupied with the strategies and power maneuvers he has enacted to wreak revenge on those who have harmed him. Ariel finds a way to bring an awareness to Prospero of the actual human cost to the objects of his aggression:

Prospero: Now does my project gather to a head:
My charms crack not; my spirits obey; and time
Goes upright with his carriage. How's the day?
Ariel. On the sixth hour; at which time, my lord,
You said our work should cease.
Prospero. I did say so,When first I raised the tempest.
Say, my spirit, How fares the king and's followers?
Ariel. Confined together
In the same fashion as you gave in charge
Just as you left them; all prisoners, sir,
In the line-grove which weather-fends your cell;
They cannot budge till your release. The king,
His brother and yours, abide all three distracted
And the remainder mourning over them
Brimful of sorrow and dismay; but chiefly
Him that you term'd, sir, 'The good old lord Gonzalo;'
His tears run down his beard, like winter's drops
From eaves of reeds. Your charm so strongly works 'em
That if you now beheld them, your affections
Would become tender.
Prospero. Dost thou think so, spirit?
Ariel. Mine would, sir, were I human.
Prospero. And mine shall.
Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling
Of their afflictions, and shall not myself,
One of their kind, that relish all as sharply,
Passion as they, be kindlier moved than thou art?
The Tempest, Act V Scene i

"Mine would sir, were I human"... in other words: Ariel can imagine being compassionate, if she were human.

What a powerful moment. The embodied human, caught up in his grievances, his need for revenge, is led by spirit to a place of compassion.

From last week's Haftarah:

We humans are arguably hardwired to respond to one another's tears. How can it be that we harden our hearts toward others' tears?

Hardening of the heart... of course this brings to mind descriptions of Pharaoh in the Book of Exodus, which we will come to very soon in our annual Torah cycle; there are twelve occurrences of this expression in the first four parshiot in The Bookk of Exodus; here are the first two.

From Parashat Shemot:

שמות ד׳:כ״א

(כא) וַיֹּ֣אמֶר יהוה אֶל־מֹשֶׁה֒ בְּלֶכְתְּךָ֙ לָשׁ֣וּב מִצְרַ֔יְמָה רְאֵ֗ה כׇּל־הַמֹּֽפְתִים֙ אֲשֶׁר־שַׂ֣מְתִּי בְיָדֶ֔ךָ וַעֲשִׂיתָ֖ם לִפְנֵ֣י פַרְעֹ֑ה וַאֲנִי֙ אֲחַזֵּ֣ק אֶת־לִבּ֔וֹ וְלֹ֥א יְשַׁלַּ֖ח אֶת־הָעָֽם׃

Exodus 4:21

(21) And יהוה said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the marvels that I have put within your power. I, however, will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go.

from Parashat Va'era:

שמות ז׳:י״ג

(יג) וַיֶּֽחֱזַק֙ לֵ֣ב פַּרְעֹ֔ה וְלֹ֥א שָׁמַ֖ע אֲלֵהֶ֑ם כַּאֲשֶׁ֖ר דִּבֶּ֥ר יהוה׃ {ס}

Exodus 7:13

(13) Yet Pharaoh’s heart stiffened and he did not heed them, as יהוה had said.

It seems that the hardening of Pharaoh's heart is a necessary narrative element, to move forward the origin story of yeztiat Mitzrayim - the bringing forth of the people from oppression.

I suggest that collective and personal hard-heartedness, today, oppresses us into a state of cruel disregard for the suffering of others. May we allow ourselves to be bathed in the tears of others, as Joseph and his brothers do in this week's parsha. May our hard hearts be dissolved into hearts of love and compassion.

תהילים ל״ד:י״ט

(יט) קָר֣וֹב יהוה לְנִשְׁבְּרֵי־לֵ֑ב וְֽאֶת־דַּכְּאֵי־ר֥וּחַ יוֹשִֽׁיעַ׃

Psalms 34:19

(19)ק GOD is close to the brokenhearted; those crushed in spirit are delivered.

(a microscopic photograph of a tear, from a book called The Topography of Tears):

The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown:
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway;
It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice.

The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene I

According to the Torah we are created in God’s image, and the Talmud teaches this includes the capacity to cry. Two times the Talmud speaks of God weeping. In Chagigah 5a, “Our Rabbis taught: Over three the Holy One, blessed be He, weeps every day: over him who is able to occupy himself with [the study of] the Torah and does not; and over him who is unable to occupy himself with [the study of] the Torah and does; and over a leader who domineers over the community.” God cries because of us. If we fail to connect with God through studying Torah even though we have the capability, God cries – I would imagine tears of sadness. If we succeed in connecting through Torah, overcoming obstacles in order to do so, God cries – I would imagine tears of happiness. If we are the victims of a narcissistic, domineering leader, who cares not for our welfare, God cries. Further (Berachot 59a), God cries over our suffering and lets 2 tears fall into the ocean, creating a rumbling sound heard the world over. God cries over our misfortune, our suffering, our lack of reaching out, our failure to form deeper connections with the Divine, and therefore with each other.We are created with the same capacity to weep. Our tears are the means by which we can break down barriers of heartlessness; by which we can feel empathy; through which we can connect with each other – in times of sadness and times of joy. Tears open our path to God even more than our prayers. We teach that our High Holidays are the time that the Gates of Prayer are open, that God hears our prayers for teshuvah. As the end of Yom Kippur approaches those gates begin to close. But the gates of weeping do not close (Berachot 32b). The capacity to cry, to shed tears, breaks through our coldhearted tendencies. It tells God we are ready to reach beyond our personal barriers, to connect with our friend, our neighbor, our fellow human. It tells God we are searching for divine connection. Tears are a challenge to our egos, to our separation from others. When we cannot or will not cry, God weeps.
https://thejewishobserver.com/2016/10/05/tears/#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20Torah%20we,Talmud%20speaks%20of%20God%20weeping.