This lengthy article has been divided across 5 blogs or 5 parts. This is the final part.
Joseph and Judah
Chapter 39 provides a “re-introduction” to the Joseph narratives, indicated by 37:26 and 39:1. The final paragraph of chapter 39, verses 20 to 23, renders an appropriate bridge to chapters 40 and 41. This reference to something in the past pointing forward to necessary new information is a common narrative technique. These chapters (39–41) describe Joseph’s ascension in the court of Pharaoh, creating a necessary interval of time in the story of Jacob’s family—just as the Judah/Tamar narrative had done.
Later, during a severe famine, Joseph’s brothers begin traveling home after their second journey to Egypt for food, and Joseph’s cup is found in Benjamin’s sack. The brothers are forced to return to Egypt. Notably, Judah is now the spokesman for the brothers to the Egyptian ruler. They know they cannot clear their name, for the cup was discovered in their possession. Judah admits their guilt, but not the charge of thievery, for it wasn’t true. His remarks suggest he is taking the situation to be a repercussion of their evil crime against their long-lost brother—the mistaken accusation a recompense. With no human explanation for the cup in Benjamin’s food sack, Judah declares that God must have “‘uncovered your servants’ guilt’” (44:16, NIV). His language underscores the long-held guilt of the brothers (“‘we . . . we ourselves’”), distinguishing them from Benjamin (“‘and the one’”).
After the Egyptian ruler declares judgment (Gen 44:17), Judah “came near to him and said: ‘O my lord, please let your servant speak a word in my lord’s hearing’” (vs. 18, NKJV). He poignantly describes Benjamin as “‘a young son born to him [Jacob] in his old age’” (vs. 20, NIV), then details the sorrow of their father: His favorite son is dead, and Benjamin is the sole survivor of their mother. Judah emphasizes this by saying: “‘and his father loves him’” (vs. 20).
His empathy for his father reveals noteworthy moral growth in Judah’s character, mentioning both the feeble age of Jacob and the specialness of Benjamin. But rather than resenting the affection that Jacob has for Benjamin, as Judah had earlier resented Joseph, Judah now appeals to it as a reason for mercy. Pleading for his father’s life, Judah urgently discloses how the imprisonment of Benjamin would result in the old man’s death (Gen. 44:18–32).
Even more, Judah dramatically offers himself as a substitute in place of Benjamin (Gen. 44:33, 34). He desperately pleads that he cannot return without Benjamin and see his father suffer. Once before, Judah saw how the news of Joseph’s supposed death broke his father’s heart (37:34, 35). Now Judah would rather be subjected to slavery for the rest of his life than cause his father’s dying grief.
This is astounding. Judah places his life on the line for the sake of his elderly father, referring to him 14 times in his speech—two times in his closing comments alone (Gen. 44:34). The contrast between Judah’s earlier cruel treatment of his brother Joseph and how he acts now in this circumstance could not be more striking, his moral reformation obvious. And Judah’s intercessory supplication caused the Egyptian lord to weep (45:1, 2).
Judah’s plea (Gen. 44:18–34) is part of the longest dialogue in the Joseph-Judah cycle—in fact, the longest dialogue in the Book of Genesis. Judah will also remain the principal spokesman for the brothers from this point onward (vs. 3). For example, when Jacob later returns to Egypt with his sons, he sends Judah ahead to meet Joseph and notify him of their imminent arrival in Goshen.
Summary
The brothers selling Joseph into slavery and then pretending to their father Jacob that he had been killed indicates that the catastrophic pattern of breakdown in family relationships that began with the sin of Adam and Eve (Genesis 3) continued—even in the “chosen people.”
Divine grace is a theme of extravagance in Genesis—God’s providential care of His people abounds in spite of their many sinful actions. In this narrative sequence, the sons of Jacob are granted grace in spite of their earlier motives of murder and vengeance. Time and again, the sinfulness of the patriarchs put them and their seed—and God’s purposes—in peril. Even natural disasters such as famine threatened ruin. However, through all of this, there is one constant: God remains faithful to His promise—obvious also in the Joseph/Judah cycle. Even Joseph recognized that all that happened was used by God to “‘preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance’” (Gen. 45:7, NIV) as noted above. After their father’s death, Joseph again graciously reassured his brothers: “‘You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives’” (50:20, NIV).
Joseph’s role as savior from starvation typifies the salvation of the nations that the Abrahamic promises foretold (12:3). The Reformer John Calvin saw this: “When [Joseph] reflects that their wickedness had been overruled by the wonderful and unwonted goodness of God, forgetting the injury received, he kindly embraces the men whose dishonor God had covered with his grace.”10
Jacob’s descendants sojourning in Egypt, though in forced slavery (as Joseph had), advanced the blessing God forecast for the nations. The narrator of Genesis never lets readers forget that the adoption of Israel was for the purpose of blessing and salvation to “the world” (41:57)—part of the Abrahamic promises in Genesis 12 that “‘all peoples on earth will be blessed through you’” (vs. 3, NIV).
None of the patriarchs totally fulfilled this promise of blessing to the whole world. Abraham did save his nephew from capture and mediated for Lot’s life when Sodom and Gomorrah were going to be destroyed. Isaac was involved in Abraham’s ultimate test (Genesis 22). However, his wife Rebekah dominates the Genesis record of their immediate family. Abraham’s family had major ups and downs.
Joseph did become a blessing to many. Not only did he save God’s chosen people from famine but other nations as well, for “all countries came to Joseph in Egypt to buy grain, because the famine was severe in all lands” (Gen. 41:57). Joseph’s earlier dreams can also be seen as pointing forward to Jesus, the anti-typical Joseph who will be worshiped by the saved of the earth. Joseph’s forgiveness of his cruel brothers also foreshadows Messianic forgiveness—for instead of taking revenge for the massive debt of sin the world cost Him, Jesus offers forgiveness to anyone who comes to Him for salvation.
In Genesis 37:31, the narrative records that Joseph’s brothers dipped his coat in the blood of a goat. In the Book of Revelation, a concluding picture of the victorious Rider on the white horse describes him wearing a robe “dipped in blood” (Rev. 19:13). The only other mention of a robe dipped in blood in the entire canon is that of Joseph’s robe in Genesis.
More and more commentators are recognizing that the text of the Book of Revelation is a major, complex composite of echoes, allusions, references, and quotations from the Old and New Testaments all woven together in a new textual “tapestry”—revealing, underscoring, tying together, summarizing, and expounding canonic content. And in Revelation 5, as noted earlier, a name of the “‘Lamb as though it had been slain’” (vs. 6) is “‘the Lion of the tribe of Judah’” (vs. 5).
If taken seriously, the risen Lord’s instruction on Resurrection Sunday, to begin with Moses for comprehending the glorious nature of the Messiah’s mission, details in the Genesis narratives can be seen to unfold and undergird His life and mission:
• The suffering Joseph can be seen as a type of the Messiah’s suffering and death as the Savior of humankind;
• Judah, of the Davidic kingdom, points forward to Jesus’ everlasting kingdom that will be fully instituted as His second coming, when the “‘Lion of the tribe of Judah’” will reign in full glory—until then interceding for the salvation of His earthly family: “Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:25).
The great marvel is that the “‘Lion of the tribe of Judah’” could and would use the lives of His flawed human children to typify His great salvific work—plus inspire the inclusion of the notably strikingly minimal details in the biblical narratives to reflect this.
Jo Ann Davidson, PhD, is Professor of Systematic Theology at the Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary at Andrews University in Berrien Springs, Michigan, U.S.A.
NOTES AND REFERENCES
1. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references in this article are quoted from the New King James Version of the Bible.
2. Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, The New Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew-English Lexicon (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 1979), 31.
3. John H. Sailhamer, The Pentateuch as Narrative: A Biblical-Theological Commentary (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1992), 37.
4. Ibid., 35.
5. Ibid.
6. B. J. van der Merwe, “Joseph as Successor of Jacob.” Studia Biblical Et Semitica, Theodoro Christiano Vriezen, ed. (Wageningen, Netherlands: H. Veenman En Zonen N.V., 1966), 221–232.
7. C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, The Pentateuch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1872), 1:406.
8. Gordon Wenham, Genesis: Word Biblical Commentary, David Allen Hubbard et al., eds. (Nashville, Tenn.: Thomas Nelson, 1982), 2:486.
9. Thomas Whitelaw, Genesis and Exodus: The Pulpit Commentary (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1977), 1:634, 635.
10. John Calvin, Genesis, The Crossway Classic Commentaries, Allister McGrath and J. J. Packer, eds. (Nottingham, England: Crossway Books, 2001), 25:339–342.
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