Posted on by Abe Austin

Creating Our Own Monsters

People play a dangerous game when they insist on casting entire demographics as villains. I have seen several examples in society of everyday people that wish to “just get along” being accused of actually being the enemy. Ironically, those that take the route of disingenuous accusation tend to summon the very evil that they fabricated. They are crushed by their own myth.

Different cultures will call certain races inherently evil. Sexes are encouraged to see their interaction as inherently adversarial. Members of a caste are despised simply for being of that caste. In all of these examples, the accused are told that their lack of personal transgression does not absolve them, they are covered in sin or blood no matter what they do, fundamentally evil since the day they were born. We are told that some groups are just against other groups, always have been and always will be, and that’s all there is to it.

Division in the West is growing rapidly, and we are becoming a more race- and gender- and class-obsessed people. In earlier times we were been more willing to look past what another person is to see who another person is. I’ve recognized in myself how when speaking with others I tend to wonder what they are wondering about me, whereas before I would just speak as though we were one and the same.

Ideally we would be able to reject the false accusations out of hand. We would refuse to adopt propositions about ourselves or others that we do not believe in. We would continue to live good and wholesome lives, treating all as equals, letting the inaccurate labels just slide off our backs. But the more society pushes certain demographics to hate other demographics, the more the hated are going to accept that the haters are their true enemy. And when enough people accept these opposing side, horrible things will follow.

We may have to grapple with terrible monsters then, but it will be monsters entirely of our own devising.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 42:14-16

14 And Joseph said unto them, That is it that I spake unto you, saying, Ye are spies:

15 Hereby ye shall be proved: By the life of Pharaoh ye shall not go forth hence, except your youngest brother come hither.

16 Send one of you, and let him fetch your brother, and ye shall be kept in prison, that your words may be proved, whether there be any truth in you: or else by the life of Pharaoh surely ye are spies.

Joseph repeats his accusation that they are spies. He suggests that their story is clearly false, and that he cannot believe it unless they bring the one brother out of eleven that is absent. In other words, “if you expect me to believe that all ten of you are brothers in one family, then bring along another member of your kin to confirm it.”

The account from earlier in Joseph’s life seem to suggest that Benjamin was born before Joseph was sold into Egypt, so this was presumably not a ploy to meet the lad for the first time. Several have speculated that Joseph’s chief concern might have been instead to ascertain that Benjamin was well taken care of. After all, he had very personal reasons to distrust the sons of Leah, Bilhah, and Zilpah, and the way they behaved towards the sons of Rachel.

The solution that Joseph suggests is extreme. Keep all of the brothers in imprisonment, except for one, who will be permitted to go and retrieve the youngest brother, Benjamin. Only if the storied son is revealed will all the others be allowed to go free.

What isn’t clear is whether Joseph is giving the brothers any alternative. If they didn’t agree to this exchange, would they have been free to leave, just without any of the grain they needed? Or were they locked into the situation now, whether they liked it or not?

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 42:9-13

9 And Joseph remembered the dreams which he dreamed of them, and said unto them, Ye are spies; to see the nakedness of the land ye are come.

10 And they said unto him, Nay, my lord, but to buy food are thy servants come.

11 We are all one man’s sons; we are true men, thy servants are no spies.

12 And he said unto them, Nay, but to see the nakedness of the land ye are come.

13 And they said, Thy servants are twelve brethren, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan; and, behold, the youngest is this day with our father, and one is not.

It seems a sudden and strange accusation to call this group of men traitors. Obviously, Joseph knows that his brothers have a sneaky and destructive streak, not only because of how they treated him, but because of their tricking and slaughtering the men in the city of Shalem. But it seems doubtful to me that he genuinely expects his brothers to be here for anything other than buying the grain as they have claimed. More likely it seems to me that he was casting around for a reason to keep them engaged with him for a while longer. To what end, perhaps even he does not yet know, only that he will keep them in play until he can decide what to do with them.

The response of Joseph’s brothers, doubling down on their heritage makes me wonder if they felt the appearance of ten men together was what Joseph had found suspicious. Did they think he saw this was an excessive emissary to buy grain, and so they needed to explain why so many of them were here together?

Unfortunately we don’t have any explicit insights into either party’s inner thoughts in this exchange. Regardless, in the brothers’ haste to explain themselves, they let slip some crucial information that Joseph will be able to use in his charade. One of their brothers is absent, and one of their brothers “is not.” Now he can turn the focus of the conversation to the matter of missing brothers and prove where their hearts are on the matter.