Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 42:17-20

17 And he put them all together into ward three days.

18 And Joseph said unto them the third day, This do, and live; for I fear God:

19 If ye be true men, let one of your brethren be bound in the house of your prison: go ye, carry corn for the famine of your houses:

20 But bring your youngest brother unto me; so shall your words be verified, and ye shall not die. And they did so.

Yesterday I wondered whether Joseph’s brothers had the option to just leave Egypt without any grain, but today’s verses suggest not! They are all put into prison as Joseph finalizes his plans for them.

What must they have thought during those three days of imprisonment? I would imagine it was a frightening ordeal with an uncertain future. So far as we know, they had never been subjected to a confinement such as this. I imagine that if I were in their shoes, I might have a strong sense of being treated unfairly. After all, they were innocent of what they had been accused of, so they were being imprisoned unjustly.

Except it wasn’t quite that simple, was it? They were innocent of the crime Joseph had accused them of, that of being spies, but they were deserving of imprisonment for other reasons. They had betrayed their brother and sent him to be unjustly imprisoned, and so, according to the balance of justice, they deserved to be imprisoned also. And as we will see in tomorrow’s verses, this sense of karmic retribution was not lost upon them at all.

What a relief it must have been for the brothers when Joseph came and lessened his earlier demands. He tells them that he fears God, which presumably is meant to assure him that he is a man of his word, and that if they follow his instructions, they can trust him to keep his end of a bargain. Then, instead of requiring all but one of them to stay in prison while the other is sent to retrieve Benjamin, he reverses the ratio. Only one brother must stay imprisoned, and all the others are free to go retrieve the missing brother. Not only this, but he will even send them home with the grain that they came to buy in the first place.

Given the alternatives mentioned before, it is an offer they can’t afford to refuse.

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.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 42:7-9

7 And Joseph saw his brethren, and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and spake roughly unto them; and he said unto them, Whence come ye? And they said, From the land of Canaan to buy food.

8 And Joseph knew his brethren, but they knew not him.

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.

The fulfillment of his visions is not lost on Joseph, and he reflects on them, according to verse 9. He has been greatly blessed during this last decade by God, and now here is the culmination of his reward for having trusted in the Lord. Joseph remained faithful, even when things went against him for so very, very long, and God has not forgotten His long ago promises.

One thing of note is that Joseph recognizes his brethren, but they do not recognize him. Obviously, it would be easier to recognize a group of ten men, than a single one in isolation, and presumably Joseph has been made to look very different, likely adopting Egyptian standards of dress and grooming. But I also think the lack of recognition in Joseph’s brothers goes to show what a very different man he has become. He has grown, matured, and become powerful. Joseph has gone through a metamorphosis, such that he is a new creature in God.

But Joseph’s brothers? It’s been at least twenty years since he saw them, and they are still recognizable as the same beings that they were before. As we will see, they have matured to some degree from what they were before, but generally they are much the same.

The hope of each of us should be that we are transformed, turned into a more wonderful person, even to the point of being unrecognizable from our past self. Honestly, it would be tragic to instead remain as the same person that we always were, never growing and never evolving. To be purified is divine and to remain stagnant is base.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 42:6

6 And Joseph was the governor over the land, and he it was that sold to all the people of the land: and Joseph’s brethren came, and bowed down themselves before him with their faces to the earth.

I imagine that Joseph needed to set up some sort of delegation, distributing the work of storing and selling the grain to a whole army of workers. But evidently he didn’t delegate his way out of the process entirely. He was still integral to the operation, apparently being responsible for negotiating the sales with foreign customers.

And here, at last, we find the fulfillment of Joseph’s prophecy from many years ago. We know he was seventeen when he had his dreams, thirty when he was taken out of prison by Pharaoh, that seven years of bounty had already passed, and some amount of time in famine before Jacob’s sons came to buy grain. Thus, over twenty years had passed since Joseph first related his dreams to his brothers, which showed that they would come and bow to him.

Which goes to show that the Lord’s timing is on a far different timescale from our own. There is no sense of “too long” since the promise was given, no expiration, no distance of time or status that render His word invalid. The sequence of events that had transpired to bring this prophecy to pass were impossible to anticipate, there was no “lucky guessing” on Joseph’s part to prophesy of it. This development could only have been foretold by an omniscient being who had already seen all that would be.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 42:1-5

1 Now when Jacob saw that there was corn in Egypt, Jacob said unto his sons, Why do ye look one upon another?

2 And he said, Behold, I have heard that there is corn in Egypt: get you down thither, and buy for us from thence; that we may live, and not die.

3 And Joseph’s ten brethren went down to buy corn in Egypt.

4 But Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, Jacob sent not with his brethren; for he said, Lest peradventure mischief befall him.

5 And the sons of Israel came to buy corn among those that came: for the famine was in the land of Canaan.

I could not find any clear answer on whether “why do ye look upon one another” was a common idiom of the time. It does seems to have a distinct meaning within this story, though, similar to our modern expression of “don’t look at me,” spoken when we don’t have a solution to the problem at hand.

Whatever tactic they had employed thus far to make it through this famine, it hadn’t worked, and if they continued to rely on their own power or resources, they and their families would starve and die. Thus, as Jacob suggests, they have to admit their own uselessness and go to where real hope resides.

Unbeknownst to them, this means humbling themselves and coming to Joseph, their younger brother, as helpless souls in need. They are about to fulfill the prophecy they once said could never be, and they aren’t even aware of it.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 37:32-35

32 And they sent the coat of many colours, and they brought it to their father; and said, This have we found: know now whether it be thy son’s coat or no.

33 And he knew it, and said, It is my son’s coat; an evil beast hath devoured him; Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces.

34 And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.

35 And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and he said, For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him.

Joseph’s brothers wrenched his coat off his body, tore it to pieces, dipped it in blood, and then had the audacity to ask Jacob whether it was Joseph’s, as if they didn’t already know! It is interesting that the question they phrase their question as “whether it be thy son’s coat.” Could they not even bring themselves to say, “our brother’s coat?” The strange verbiage makes them sound as if they were strangers to Jacob, but then, I suppose in this moment they truly are. They are lying and pretending, presenting a face to him that is far removed from reality.

But this is not all. They then continued to lie through their teeth when they rose up to comfort their father. The very men that deprived this man of his son would then pretend to be sympathetic for his loss! Jacob thankfully rejected their overtures, even if he did not fathom what sort of vipers he had all about him.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 37:29-31

29 And Reuben returned unto the pit; and, behold, Joseph was not in the pit; and he rent his clothes.

30 And he returned unto his brethren, and said, The child is not; and I, whither shall I go?

31 And they took Joseph’s coat, and killed a kid of the goats, and dipped the coat in the blood;

Reuben’s language to his brothers is very interesting here. It is as if he thinks he is giving them new news. “The child is not!” Does this mean they did not tell him what they had done with Joseph? Was he left to assume that some unknown mischief had taken his brother? Did he never know that his brother had been sent away to Egypt until they met him years later?

I also find interesting his other statement “and I, whither shall I go?” Joseph was the one who had been sold, but Reuben feels lost in this moment as well. As the eldest of all the brethren he might have felt a special responsibility for all of the others, even Joseph. Now that he had failed in that responsibility he had a sense of having misplaced his own self.

And yet, Reuben wasn’t ready to come clean to his father. Rather than tell the man what they had done, Reuben went along with concocting a falsehood about some wild beast killing Joseph. All the brothers had some humbling to go through before they would be ready to own their wrongs.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 37:25-28

25 And they sat down to eat bread: and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and, behold, a company of Ishmeelites came from Gilead with their camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt.

26 And Judah said unto his brethren, What profit is it if we slay our brother, and conceal his blood?

27 Come, and let us sell him to the Ishmeelites, and let not our hand be upon him; for he is our brother and our flesh. And his brethren were content.

28 Then there passed by Midianites merchantmen; and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmeelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they brought Joseph into Egypt.

Now it is Judah who changes the plan for Joseph, suggesting that they sell him into slavery rather than leave him to die. The thought occurs to me that, like Reuben, he might have been doing this as a way to save Joseph from his brothers. Unlike with Reuben, we don’t have a verse specifically telling us what his intent is, but it does seem a possibility.

If Judah really was trying to help Joseph, then it is interesting that Joseph’s loss was a combined coincidence of two brothers trying to save him without realizing that that’s what the other one was trying to do as well. If that is the case, it only goes to show that Joseph being sold into Egypt was inevitable, an event that God had dictated to happen, for reasons He only understood at this time.

But if, on the other hand, Judah’s motivation really was “what profit is it if we slay our brother,” then this is a horrible thing. This would mean he was deciding which way we wanted to ruin his younger brother’s life on the basis of what was most beneficial to him personally. And even if this wasn’t Judah’s actual motivation, all of his brothers still agreed to its logic!

Though, then again, who knows? Maybe they agreed to it because they were coming to realize that they didn’t really want to kill their brother and here was an opportunity to somewhat spare him. Wouldn’t it be a fascinating thing if none of the brothers were okay with what was happening, but none of them spoke plainly because they thought they were the only one that felt this way?

Either way, the outcome was the same. Joseph was sold to Egypt because that was where God needed Joseph to go. And he was sold for twenty pieces of silver, which is another parallel to the story of Jesus, who was sold for thirty.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 37:22-24

22 And Reuben said unto them, Shed no blood, but cast him into this pit that is in the wilderness, and lay no hand upon him; that he might rid him out of their hands, to deliver him to his father again. 

23 And it came to pass, when Joseph was come unto his brethren, that they stript Joseph out of his coat, his coat of many colours that was on him; 

24 And they took him, and cast him into a pit: and the pit was empty, there was no water in it.

Reuben sought to save Joseph, but he had to account for the other brothers’ wrath. Perhaps if he stood entirely on the side of Joseph they would have killed him as well, so instead he suggested that they throw him into a pit in the middle of the wilderness. The idea was that Joseph would still die, there wasn’t even any water for him to drink, but it would spare them from directly staining their hands with his blood.

But as verse 22 reveals, this was all a ruse. Rueben’s actual intention was to come back to the pit after the others had left and get Joseph out of it. Perhaps then he would have urged Joseph to venture out on his own, or maybe he was hoping the others would have calmed down enough to bring the boy back home. In either case, though, this plan of Reuben’s was not to be.

Todays verses again parallel the story of the Savior. Both Joseph and Jesus were betrayed by their brethren and consigned to death. Both of them had a sympathetic ear in Pilate and Reuben, who each tried to save the condemned man but failed. Also, the tearing of Joseph’s cloak seems symbolic to me of when Jesus’s body was torn by the whip before being raised on the cross.

Thus, in many ways Joseph was alone in this suffering, but at the same time he also had a Savior who would endure the same manner of afflictions, and who would therefore know how to speak comfort to his soul. And though that Savior wouldn’t pass through those afflictions until many years later, I believe that in the celestial perspective all of time is laid out as one, and an experience of the future can be called upon to empathize with what has happened in the past.