“What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover his blood?”
(Bereishis 37:26)
The Tosefta (Brachos ch. 4) asks “Why was Yehudah deserving of royalty? Because he saved his brother from death.”
This is difficult to understand. If the brothers including Yehudah judged Yosef to be deserving of the death penalty then why is Yehudah now retracting his verdict? The answer lies in Yehudah’s question “What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover his blood?” Rashi explains “If we hide his death.” Even though the verdict was correct by hiding his death we are insinuating that we cannot take responsibility for it and that fact alone invalidates the verdict altogether.
As a result of this display of responsibility that Yehudah demonstrated he was deemed worthy of becoming royalty. (Rabbi Chaim Shmuelevitz essay 15 5731)
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