Musar for Bava Kamma 183:20

Another awesome thing which befell Judah: Our sags of blessed memory have said (Sotah 7b): "All those years that Israel was in the desert, the bones of Judah were 'rolling around' in his casket, until Moses arose and implored mercy for him. He said… (Devarim 33:7): 'Hear, O L-rd, the voice of Judah' — at which his limbs reunited. But he was not yet brought to the Heavenly synod, at which Moses said (Ibid.): 'and to his people shall You bring him.' But he could not engage in halachic converse with the sages there, at which Moses said (Ibid.): 'Let his hands do battle for him', etc." All this befell him because he had said (Bereshith 43:9): "If I do not bring him [Benjamin] to you and present him to you [alive], I shall have sinned against you all the days." __ But he did bring him! But, "the curse of a sage is fulfilled even if the condition [(in this instance, bringing him back)] is fulfilled" (Makkoth 11b). And we have already said that whatever issues from a man's mouth is by Divine providence, so that the L-rd's will was being enacted here. It seems to me that the explanation is as follows: It is known that they [the brothers] placed a ban on anyone who would reveal this [(the sale of Joseph)] to our father Jacob, and they included the Shechinah in this ban, wherefore the Holy Spirit [of prophecy] was removed from our father Jacob (until the end [of the episode], where it is written (Ibid. 45:27): "And the spirit of Jacob their father revived," which Onkelos translates: "And the Holy Spirit [again] reposed upon him.") And because of this ban it was decreed upon him [Judah] that holiness depart from him entirely, (as any man who is excommunicated), wherefore Judah was constrained to accept excommunication upon himself, as it is written: "And I shall have sinned against my father all of the days."

וה' פקד את שרה . Our sages in Baba Kama 92 learn from the sequence of these verses that if someone prays for his fellow-man although he himself is also in need of the favor he asks G–d for someone else, then his own problem will be dealt with by G–d first. Rashi points out that this is proved by the word פקד, instead of .ויפקוד

We have to ask ourselves why these men were described as חטאים, whereas the Torah does not refer thus to the sons of Aaron. The answer is that they made common cause with Korach. Had they pursued their noble intentions without swelling the ranks of Korach and Datan and Aviram, they would not have been described as חוטאים, sinners at all. The Baal Haturim already alludes to this by quoting the number 250 as being the letters in the first word of Proverbs 13,9, ונר רשעים ידעך, that "the lamp of the wicked will be extinguished."