Last week, I mentioned that the biblical character of Jacob / Israel may be considered by our tradition as a Patriarch of Judaism, but aside from smashing Laban’s idols and proclaiming the one G-d concept of his father and grandfather, his routine, day to day interactions with his family leave me with an impression of a G-d fearing yet pompous old man. Full of himself and his “ability” to father 12+ children who, as we read, doted on him, waiting on him hand and foot. Well, this week, in Parasha Miketz, Jacob / Israel is still a grump. When it is finally pointed out to him that the family does not have two kernels of wheat to rub together, maybe the boys should go to Egypt to buy food. It seems that a very smart Egyptian vizer (Joseph) foresaw famine and put away sufficient stores to manage through hard times. Jacob insists on keeping the youngest Benjamin as a hedge on possible demise of his other sons while the boys make the trek to Egypt. Right now, I see Jacob / Israel as a selfish old crank. O.K., let me move on to the real subject of my sermon.

The Etz Chaim Chumash points out a very interesting sentence in the reading this morning. Chapter 43 verse 27 says, “How is your aged father? Is he still in good health?” It is from this seemingly innocuous sentence that our Rabbi’s built the Halacha of Bikur Cholim, the commandment of visiting the sick. After I read the sentence and the explanation at the bottom of the page, the phrase, “Hi. How are you?” took on a whole new meaning for me.

In our daily conversations with our friends and neighbors, we routinely inquire about their good health (or lack of good health) when we first see them. Even the simple “Nice to see you” is a variation of the good health inquiry. Every time we use the salutation “how are you,” we are, in effect, obeying and indeed practicing the commandment of Bikur Cholim. Aside from using the salutation to provoke some conversation, we are basically checking on the physical health of our friends and acquaintances. And if our friends are in good health but tell us of someone else who may be feeling poorly, this becomes a golden opportunity for us to make plans to visit that sick person. “How are you” becomes one way for us to check on the vitality and health of our community.

Which then brings us to: what do we do with the information we receive from our friends as to their well-being? Most of us just blow it off. The phrase “Hi, how are you?” is automatic, just another way to say hello. Some of us, depending on the response we receive from our acquaintance, will feel happy knowing our friends are in good health. Others will be sad to hear of some malady that has befallen one or more of our friends and we begin to make plans to visit our sick friend either by ourselves or with the friend with whom we are speaking. All of this is exercising the commandment of Bikur Cholim, visiting and comforting the sick in the community.

And yet, we all should know there is an extremely fine line between inquiring as to someone’s state of health for the purpose of Bikur Cholim, and asking in order to hear some gossip about someone’s illness or worse, to spread gossip just heard to someone else. This is the aveyra of Loshon Hara, the sin of spreading gossip, which, as we all know, can be more devastating and cause more harm than one’s actual illness.

Intent in our system of Halacha is everything. Why are we to do something or why should we not do something. The intent of Bikur Cholim is to attempt to bring good health back to our sick friend by visiting them and doing what we can to bring them some cheer and happiness. Physicians tell us that a patient’s mental attitude means everything to their improving physically and mentally.

We have a practice of reciting a Mi-Shebayrach prayer for the sick in our community during the Torah reading. Religiously, we are asking for G-d to directly intercede in the recovery process and to bring good health back to our members. In announcing the names, we are giving everyone attending services notice of illness and the names of those people who could stand a visit from us to speed their recovery. It is true that some people who are ill would prefer their English names not be mentioned so we use the Hebrew, never-the-less, if you don’t know who some of these people are, ask after services and we’ll tell you who they are in the hopes that you will make arrangements to pay them a visit and as a result, you will have performed a mitzvah and, heaven knows, we all could use a few more mitzvot in our lives.

Make a plan by yourself or with a friend to begin regular visits to sick friends and community members whether they are at home, hospitalized, or in one of our local nursing homes. You need not stay long – 10 to 15 minutes is perfect. Be careful about bringing food or flowers unless you know for certain the person has no allergies or other food issues.

It’s the regular visit that is most important – for you and for the patient. Just go ahead and do it – the mitzvah will do you both a lot of good.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rubovits