EXTRA · Parashas Vayeishev · Passuk 37:20 · not a Torah Temimah citation on this passuk
Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; and we can say, ‘A savage beast devoured him.’ We shall see what comes of his dreams!”
Classical source (EXTRA side-ring): Bereshis Rabbah 84:16.
Sefaria — Bereishis Rabbah 84:16
English: “And they cast him into the pit” — R’ Akiva said: there were two pits there, one filled with stones and one filled with snakes and scorpions. Rav Aḥa said: “It had no water” teaches that it had no water, but it did have snakes and scorpions.
Derash on the verse (Bereshis Rabbah) — not a formal named middah of the 13. The pit imagery is expanded into a concrete danger, and Rav Aḥa also reads the absence of water as a Torah/water allusion.
The midrash underscores the physical danger of the pit and, in Rav Aḥa’s interpretation, the significance of the Torah/water metaphor.