The following is a brief summary of some of thoughts said over by R' Frand on the parsha this evening. I have attempted to reproduce these vorts to the best of my ability. Any perceived inconsistency is the result of my efforts to transcribe the shiur and should not be attributed to R' Frand.
R' Frand observed that although it was already Cheshvan, it was close enough to Yom Kippur to say a vort about the Yonah story. As we read every year on Yom Kippur at Mincha, Yonah was reluctant to go to Ninveh (which R' Frand said is the current day city of Mosul in Iraq) and tell them to do Teshuva because he knew that they would in fact repent. We read in the story that not only did the people do Teshuva, even the animals fasted and wore sackcloth.
But why was this city able to accomplish this task? R' Frand quoted the Tchortkov (Sp?) Rebbi who quotes Rashi in this week's parsha on the pesukim in Bereishis 10:8-11 which states that Ashur left his lands and built many cities, including Ninveh. Rashi explains that Ashur saw that his children could have been influenced by Nimrod, and for that reason he left "civilization" and built his own city. The Rebbi then states that a city with this in its seeds would be able to achieve the Teshuva which Yonah was concerned would reflect badly on the Jews of his time.
R' Frand closed the vort by quoting a Sefer called L'Meromeim which quotes a Piskei Tosfos in Megillah which explains that the reason why our Ksav is Ashuris is because Ashur was not influenced by Nimrod. From this we see that if someone takes an action, it can have a positive result for millenia.
R' Frand said a second vort from the Medrash Tanchuma on Parshas Vayeshev. The Medrash observes that every time in Tanach and that the word "Hayah" is used in connection with a person, it means that he lived in three worlds. In the opening pasuk of Parshas Noach (Bereishis 6:9) the Torah states נֹ֗חַ אִ֥ישׁ צַדִּ֛יק תָּמִ֥ים הָיָ֖ה. The Medrash observes that Noach lived in the world before the flood, during the flood and then during the rebuilding of the world.
Similarly, by Moshe we are told in Shemos 3:1 that וּמשֶׁ֗ה הָיָ֥ה רֹעֶ֛ה. We know that Moshe saw the Jews in Egypt before the Shibud, during the Shibud and when they were travelling as free men in the desert.
Other examples include Mordechai who we are introduced to in Esther 2:3 - אִ֣ישׁ יְהוּדִ֔י הָיָ֖ה. Mordechai saw the Jews before Haman's decree, during the time that they were threatened and after the Jews were saved.
R' Frand observed that each of these people (as well as Iyov and Yosef who also had the word Hayah connected with them) all saw times when they were good and then bad and then during the rebuild afterwards. He hypothesized that perhaps what made each of them great was that they were able to put the difficult times in the past - they were Hayah and move on with doing great things.
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