Seven-year-old Peach’s new favorite CD is the Cap’n’s recording of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.” From my perspective, it’s not the most brilliant or textured collaboration of Lloyd-Webber and Rice, but it has some clever lyrics and does some great stuff musically (like have Reuben tell Jacob about Joseph’s “death” in a country-western song, and have Pharaoh’s song about his dreams be in the style of Elvis who, the Cap’n reminded me, was nicknamed “The King”).
Peach helped me clean the kitchen on Friday and we listened to the soundtrack twice through. I asked her a few questions about the story to get the facts straight (she could answer them all), and at the end, I observed how devastating it must have been for Jacob to think his son was dead for years, and only be reunited with him shortly before his own death. Peach agreed that that may have been the case but said, “But the brothers saved the Jewish people when they sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites.” How? I asked. “Well, the Ishmaelites took Joseph down to Egypt and sold him into slavery. Later on, he told Pharaoh what his dreams meant, and told Pharaoh to save up food for seven years. That saved everyone from starving, including Joseph’s family when they went to Egypt because there was no food in Canaan. If Joseph had stayed home with his family, no one would have told Pharaoh to save up food, and everyone would have died.” From the mouths of babes (and Torah-educated babes, no less) . . .
Now I’ve just got to ask her why the Jews had to be slaves in Egypt.
Shimshonit 
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