A vort of the רבי on this week's פרשה, פרשת וישב, and also on Chanukah. We know that the פרשה of the week that any יום דפגרא, any special day falls out, has a connection. So there must be a connection between Chanukah and פרשת וישב. And the רבי explains as it follows. In פרשת וישב, we find the story of מכירת יוסף, the brothers sold Yosef. First, they put him into a pit, and the פסוק says, הבור רק אין בו מים. The בור, the pit was empty, had no water. And the Midrash says, what this hints to is, water represents Torah. It says אין מים אלא תורה, water represents Torah. So what made the שבטים come to this point of selling Yosef is because מים אין בו, it had no water, they were missing in the ענין of water which represents Torah, which means they were missing in the ענין of Torah, and because of that, they came to make this mistake of selling Yosef.

But the רבי asks, first of all, how could you say on the שבטים that they didn't learn Torah? They they knew Torah, especially that in the מפרשים, it gives a reason על פי תורה why they felt that they had a right to kill him. מפרשים ask, how did they even think of killing Yosef? So they explain that they felt that he was trying to kill them, whichever way, different מפרשים explain it in a different way, but since they felt that he's trying to kill them, there is a din for self-defense, you could kill that person first, הבא להורגך השכם להורגו, someone wants to kill you, you kill him first. So they made a חשבון על פי תורה, they thought על פי תורה they have a right to do it. So what does the Midrash mean that because they were lacking Torah, that's why they came to make this mistake, they were lacking the mayim, which mayim represents Torah?

And the רבי explains as it follows. We know that the Torah is compared to different things: it's compared to water, it's compared to bread, it's compared to wine, it's compared to honey, it's compared to milk, it's compared to many, many things. And what do we mean by that? So the רבי explains what it means is, there are a lot of aspects in Torah, and each one of these משלים, of these things represent and are מרומז, hint to a different aspect in Torah. What does the inyan of water represent? It represents, as the Gemara says, מה מים, just like water, יורדים ממקום גבוה למקום נמוך, water always comes down to the lowest spot, so too when you learn Torah, you have to feel yourself low, you have to have humility, you have to be batel, you have to be an anav. So מים represents the bitul a Yid has to have to Hashem when you study Torah. And that's what it means here. Not that the שבטים were missing the knowledge of the Torah, they knew it, but they were missing, in comparison to their high level, they were missing the bitul, the higher bitul that they could have had to Hashem. Obviously, they had a lot of bitul to Hashem, we're talking about the שבטים, but compared to their level, they were lacking some of that bitul, and therefore they came to sell Yosef. Which means that when the Midrash says that because they had no מים, מים אין בו, which means they had no אין מים אלא תורה, they were missing Torah, means the מים of Torah. They were missing the bitul that you're supposed to have to when you learn Torah in their level, they were lacking the level of bitul they could have had, and that's why they came to sell Yosef.

And the Rebbe says this is connected to Chanukah, because by Chanukah, we all know that what the Greeks tried to do, as it says in על הנסים, להשכיחם תורתך, they wanted to make the Yidden forget your Torah, which means not that they wanted Yidden to stop learning. Torah is a very smart subject, and the Greeks at that time were very intellectual. They appreciated seichel, and the Torah is כי היא חכמתכם ובינתכם לעיני העמים. Even the goyim realized Torah is very smart. But what they wanted is that they should learn Torah because it's very smart, it's a very deep subject, but not because the kedushah of Hashem and not because it's Hashem's Torah. להשכיחם, to make you forget not Torah, the Torah, Toratecha, that it's your Torah, Hashem's Torah. Which means they wanted Yidden should learn Torah, but not with any bitul to Hashem. And when the Chashmonaim came out victorious, that means that this philosophy was restored, this idea was restored that when you learn Torah, you have to learn it with the proper bitul. And this is the connection between what it says in the parashah to Chanukah. The parashah tells us the importance of having the bitul to Hashem and the fact that their bitul wasn't as it was supposed to be by the shevatim, that's what brought to מכירת יוסף. It's connected to Chanukah, which also tells us the importance of learning Torah with the proper bitul to Hashem. And that's the lesson that we take from this parashah and from the story of Chanukah, that when we learn Torah, we should not only learn Torah as a chokhmah, but we have to learn Torah because this is Torat Hashem, this is the Eibershter's Torah, this is the kedushah of Torah we have to keep in mind, we have to have the proper bitul. And then when we learn with the proper bitul, the Eibershter helps that we don't make any mistakes and we pasken things right, and we connect ourselves to Hashem in the proper way. And that's what the one of the connections that says why Chanukah has to do with the coming of Mashiach, the light of Mashiach, because when Mashiach will come, this bitul to Hashem will be so obvious. And Chanukah tells us that even now, it's very important to have that bitul to Hashem.