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Why did Pinchas lead the war against Midian to avenge the sale of Yosef when Ishmaelites were also involved? The shiur explains that Midianites served as merchants who saw Yosef's value for immoral purposes, not regular slavery. This debasing parallels their current sin with Bnei Yisrael, making this the proper time for revenge.
The shiur addresses a perplexing question from Rashi (רש"י) regarding why Pinchas ben Elazar led the war against Midian to avenge the sale of Yosef, when the Torah (תורה) seemingly attributes Yosef's sale to the Ishmaelites. Rabbi Zweig develops an innovative understanding of the complex transaction that led to Yosef's enslavement. The fundamental question centers on the economic logic of Yosef's sale. If the brothers could have sold directly to the Ishmaelites, and the Ishmaelites could have sold directly to Potiphar in Egypt, why were there so many intermediary transactions? What profit margin could the Midianites possibly have extracted from this chain of sales?
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Parshas Matos
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