December 25, 2025
I have never met anyone who likes being told what to do, who likes when his behavior is critiqued and is told to change. Yet, this is something we all do to others. Spouses are often telling each other what they should and shouldn't do. And of course parents have the responsibility to educate their children so they can learn the right way to live. The problem becomes how we can expect the behavior to change if they – like us! – don't like to be corrected or criticized. If a child's instinct when hearing criticism is to defend himself or herself, then what should a parent do? Perhaps we can learn the answer from an example of effective communication found in the beginning of Parashat Vayigash. The parashah begins with Yehuda's famous plea to Yosef, the vizier of Egypt. Binyamin, the youngest of the brothers was framed as a thief, and when Yosef's royal goblet was found in his bag, Yosef ordered that he remain in Egypt as his slave, while the other brothers return home. Yehuda, however, had made a solemn promise to their father, Yaakov, that he would personally guarantee Binyamin's safe return home. And so Yehuda came before Yosef and made an impassioned speech, begging Yosef to allow him to remain in Binyamin's stead. In this speech, Yehuda reviewed all the events that led to the current crisis, recalling how he and his brothers came to purchase grain, how Yosef demanded that they bring their youngest brother, how their father at first refused, due to his fear that something m