Vayigash: In Search of Serach

This week we read of the members of Jacob''s family who went down to Egypt. There were 53 grandsons listed, but only a single granddaughter – Serach, the daughter of Asher. The commentators wonder, what was so exceptional about this girl that her name was recorded? The Midrash spills forth with stories portraying an image of a unique and endearing Biblical heroine. Serach stands as a trusted, beloved sage of the people. She possessed an uncommon gift of healing through poetry and music. Somewhat as Orpheus is to Greek myth, so is Serach to the Biblical myth – the archetypal poet and bard.

The Midrash on this week''s parsha tells of the brothers'' concern that their father Jacob would die from shock upon hearing the astounding news that his son Joseph was alive and well in Egypt. Their solution – to appoint Serach to the task of sharing the news with him. In one version Serach masterfully waits until Jacob is praying and then relays the news to him through the poetic form of three rhyming lines.1 In another rendering she sings the news to him gently and wondrously with a harp.

Both versions reveal a girl with psychological insight into just how to approach Jacob with the potentially lethal news. Serach intuits how to tend to Jacob''s emotional wounds with song. Even though she was sharing a truth with him, sometimes the sharing of truth with someone can be even more shattering than a lie. Where the bald facts could have killed Jacob, Serach''s simple almost child-like rhyme and song healed him, opening him to hope and possibility after decades of despair.

So what is it about song and rhyme which is able to impart such promise and soothe such wounds? Voltaire is famous for saying, “Anything too stupid to be spoken in words is sung.” And this might be true enough if one were to survey song lyrics for their intellectual content. But God forbid the purpose of music would be deliver intellectual points. No, the great gift of song rests in its stirring of sentiment, its arousal of spirit, its curative catharsis of emotions. Serach, with her ample emotional intelligence and creativity knew how to utilize song, rhyme & poetry for their subtle therapeutic properties.

May all of our artistic endeavors likewise access healing and inspiration, offering hope and the possibility of betterment in the face of any despair. The poem below is a prayer and request to Serach to instruct us in how to do just that.

Serach, teach us please

your therapy of harmony 

- that exquisite technique

that you work with your speech

Reveal to us, ancient sister

your mesmeric tincture

of lyric and meter

And mix us well a word elixir

to soothe the wounds of 

injured listeners

Just the way 

you sung your way 

and stood in the way 

of the heart-halting parade

of gold-laden wagons 

sent to stun an old man 

too fast from his depression

For even one''s despair can be 

a precious thing

to those who cling to their misery 

as if it were a love letter

to the ones they''ve lost

But you with your harp

loosened that knot

on the yarn of a lie 

that had so long bound

Jacob''s beguiled mind

- as you applied 

the cautious remedy

of a child''s rhyme2

Plucked hope back 

into a ruptured heart 

and strummed him 

through the sting and stun 

of loss

Suddenly reversed 

through your verse

- with the touch of a song

For is not the crowning goal 

of creative endeavor

to heal the bereaved

and herald in a better reality?

So teach us more-loudly your 

chemistry of composition

to make what''s written

glisten from the page

to release vast repositories of pain

To make space for 

the joyful reception of miracles

of salvation and spiritual accumulation 

like wagons laden with bread

and corn, and a child reborn

in the midst of a famine

And a lie overturned

and a family re-fashioned

So teach us Serach 

your eternal talent

of healing hearts with harps 

and the ancient art 

of rhyme

And let it start 

with these faltering lines

- a prayer 

for the gentle unraveling

of our long-held 

lies

*

1MidrashHaGadolon Gen. 45:26: 

"ויגדו לו לאמר ''עוד יוסף חי''" (בר'' מה:כו) רבנן אמרו אם אנו אומרים לו תחלה יוסף קים שמא תפרח נשמתו. מה עשו? אמרו לשרח בת אשר, "אמרי לאבינו יעקב שיוסף קים והוא במצרים. מה עשתה? המתינה לא עד שהוא עומד בתפלה ואמרה בלשון תימה:יוסף במצרים/ יולדו לו על ברכים/ מנשה ואפרים. פג לבו כשהוא עומד בתפלה. כיון שהשלים ראה העגלות, מיד "ותחי רוח יעקב אבינו" (שם). [מדרש הגדול על בר'' מה:כו]

[The brothers said:]If we tell him right away, "Joseph is alive!" perhaps he will have a stroke [lit., his soul will fly away]. What did they do? They said to Serah, daughter of Asher, "Tell our father Jacob that Joseph is alive, and he is in Egypt." What did she do? She waited till he was standing in prayer, and then said in a tone of wonder, "Joseph is in Egypt/ There have been born on his knees/ Menasseh and Ephraim" [three rhyming lines: Yosef be-mizrayim / Yuldu lo al birkayim / Menasheh ve-Ephrayim]. His heart failed, while he was standing in prayer. When he finished his prayer, he saw the wagons: immediately the spirit of Jacob came back to life.(Translated by Avivah Zornberg in Genesis, the Beginning of Desire, p.281).