L’dor V’dor Nagid Tehilatecha -From Generation to Generation, We Declare Your Glory
In every generation, parents bless their children.
יעקב אבינות, our Patriarch Jacob, taught us what we should fear - and what we should ask for.
When Yaakov blessed Yosef’s sons, the Torah uses an unusual phrase:
וַיְבָרְכֵם בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא, לֵאמֹר, בָּךְ יִבָּרֵךְ יִשְׂרָאֵל לֵאמֹר, יְשִׂמְךָ אֱלֹקִים כְּאֶפְרַיִם וְכִמְנַשֶּׁה (בראשית מ"ח:כ"ו)
So he blessed them that day, saying, “By you shall Yisrael invoke blessings, saying: Hashem make you like Efraim and Menashe."
Chazal note that “on that day" is deliberate. It was not a passing moment; it was defining.
Yaakov was not blessing Ephraim and Menashe individually. He was establishing a pattern - how Jews would bless their children for all generations: “בָּךְ יִבָּרֵךְ יִשְׂרָאֵל". Their names would become the language of blessing spoken over Jewish children forever.
The Targum Yonasan ben Uziel makes this explicit: “היום ההוא" refers to the day a Jewish child enters the covenant - the day of his bris milah. These are not merely words of affection said later, like Friday night or Erev Yom Kippur blessings. This is a blessing of entry, at the very start of Jewish life.
The Targum states:
בָרֵיכִינוּן בְּיוֹמָא הַהוּא לְמֵימַר בָּךְ יוֹסֵף בְּרִי יְבָרְכוּן בֵּית יִשְרָאֵל יַת יְנוּקָא בְּיוֹמָא דִמְהוּלְתָּא לְמֵימָר יְשַׁוִינָךְ יְיָ כְּאֶפְרַיִם וְכִמְנַשֶׁה וּבְמִנְיַן שִׁבְטַיָא יִתְמַנֵי רַבָּא דְאֶפְרַיִם קֳדָם רַבָּא דִמְנַשֶׁה
Translation:
"He blessed them on that day, saying: ‘By you, Yosef my son, the House of Israel will bless their young sons on the day of their circumcision, saying: May Hashem make you like Ephraim and like Menashe.’"
According to the Targum, the words “on that day" are precise. Yaakov was not describing a general blessing or a later custom; he was fixing the wording and meaning of the blessing when a child first enters the covenant.
The moment is striking: the child cannot act, choose, or understand. His entire future is hidden. The blessing is not a description of what he is - it is a charge for what he must become, and an obligation upon those who raise him.
Normally, Jewish tradition teaches yeridas ha’doros - the decline of generations. Each generation is spiritually weaker than the previous. Chazal put it sharply: if prior generations were like angels, we are like people; if they were like people, we are like donkeys (שבת ק"ב ב). Decline is considered natural.
Yet יעקב אבינו, our Patriarch Jacob, makes one clear exception.
He declares אפרים ומנשה Ephraim and Menashe, equal to ראובן ושמעון, Reuven and Shimon. Not below them. Not diminished. Counted as his sons, not grandchildren (בראשית מ"ח:ה). One generation later - yet equal in stature to the prior generation.
They grew up in Egypt, surrounded by immorality, idolatry, and foreign culture. No yeshivah, no Jewish street, no protective environment. And yet, they did not fall. Yaakov himself testifies they stood shoulder to shoulder with the previous generation.
This is why Yaakov establishes them as the model blessing for future generations.
According to Targum Yonasan ben Uziel, this blessing is especially fitting at a bris milah - when a child formally enters Avraham Avinu’s covenant. A new generation begins. The greatest fear is decline: will this child be weaker than his parents? Will he lose what was entrusted?
Over time, this blessing also became customary on Friday night, when parents bless their children. Its meaning has not changed. The child cannot yet be “like Ephraim and Menashe." The words are a call to the parents.
“Each Friday night, when a father places his hands on his child’s head and says ‘יְשִׂמְךָ אֱלֹקִים כְּאֶפְרַיִם וְכִמְנַשֶּׁה,’ he reminds himself: the responsibility is his. The child cannot yet become Ephraim or Menashe - it is the parent who must ensure the chain continues, that traditions are preserved from his parents, his grandparents, and all generations before, so that the golden chain endures."
The great leaders of recent generations already voiced this concern. The Chafetz Chaim (Or Yisrael, Introduction) said: in earlier generations, parents worried if their children would reach Torah greatness. Today, the concern is whether they will remain yirei Shamayim. He lived in one of the most difficult times for Jews - persecution, revolutions, massive drifts to communism, socialism, and other world-changing “isms." We live in far easier times, yet the responsibility is no less.
Our children today have opportunities we never had. Torah learning is everywhere - teachers, sefarim, shiurim, guidance. Tools are abundant. But with opportunity comes responsibility: more paths, but also more challenges.
The blessing is not for honor, fame, or worldly success. It is about the foundation: not to fall below, not to lose what was given, not to break the chain.
May this child not be weaker than the generation before him.
May he not lose what he receives.
May he stand on the same level as his parents - and use the gifts and opportunities wisely.
This is the blessing of אפרים ומנשה.
In a world pulling us in every direction, eroding Torah and mesorah, this blessing speaks sharply to our times. We are not asking for more. We are asking that the chain remain unbroken. That the next generation stand firm. That the torch be held high.
The blessing is not small.
In our times, it is the greatest - and parents bear the heaviest responsibility to see it fulfilled (בראשית מ"ח:כ"ו; שבת ק"ב ב; תרגום יונתן בן עוזיאל).
As we conclude Parshas Vayechi, the parsha of blessings, we say to children and parents alike: חזק, חזק, ונתחזק! Chazak, chazak, venitchazek