Vayechi: When Jacob Bows

The prophecy

Joseph has two prophetic dreams when is seventeen, according to the Torah portion Vayeishev (Genesis 37:1-40:23). After the second dream, he tells his brothers:

“Hey, I dreamed a dream again! And hey! The sun and the moon and eleven stars mishtachavim to me!” And he reported [it] to his father and to his brothers, and his father rebuked him and said to him: “What is this dream that you dreamed? Will we actually come, I and your mother and your brothers, lehishtachot to the ground to you?” And his brothers were jealous of him, and his father observed the matter. (Genesis/Bereishit 37:9-11)

mishtachavim (מִשְׁתַּחֲוִים) = were bowing down, were prostrating themselves. (From the root verb sh–ch–h, שׁחה = bow down deeply in humility, do homage.)

lehishtachot (לְהִשְׁתַּחֲוֺת) = to bow down. (Also from the root sh-ch-h.)

Joseph’s Second Dream, by Owen Jones, 1865

Joseph’s father, Jacob (a.k.a. Israel), is over 100 years old at this time, and so far the Torah has not mentioned him bowing down to anyone except his brother, Esau.

The previous prostration

That happened in the Torah portion Vayishlach (Genesis 32:4-36:43), when the two brothers met again after a twenty-year estrangement. Esau had vowed to kill his brother after Jacob had cheated him out of both his birthright and the blessing he expected from their father. Jacob had fled to his uncle’s house in Charan. When he finally headed home again, after acquiring a large family and his own fortune, he learned that Esau was coming down the road with 400 men to intercept him. Jacob did everything he could think of to prevent disaster: sending his brother generous gifts ahead of time, praying to God, and finally, as Esau came into view with his troop,

He himself went across to face him, vayishtachu to the ground seven times, until he came up to his brother. (Genesis 33:3)

vayishtachu (וַיִּשְׁתַּחוּ) = and he bowed down, and he prostrated himself. (Also from the root sh-ch-h.)

In the Hebrew Bible, prostrations are a way to demonstrate humility and deference to a superior—usually to a king or to God. By bowing down to Esau seven times, Jacob is symbolically renouncing any advantage he tried to get over Esau in his youth, and demonstrating as graphically as possible that he considers Esau his superior. His prostrations are the equivalent of a puppy rolling over and exposing its throat to an older dog.

Inferior to nobody

After Jacob and his family and servants depart from Esau in peace, he does not bow to anyone for over forty years. Why should he? Jacob, jealous of his twin brother’s extra rights as the firstborn, has always been self-conscious about his position in life. After he failed to secure the rights of a firstborn son by fraud, he labored in Charan for twenty years until he had earned them. Now Jacob is a chieftain with twelve sons, many slaves and employees, and a great wealth of livestock. The chieftain of the town of Shekhem treats Jacob as an equal, and when he makes an offer to Jacob he goes out to his camp instead of summoning him to his own residence in town.¹

Jacob does not bow down to God, either. He first encounters God in the dream with angels on a stairway, and when he wakes up he treats God as someone to bargain with, vowing to give God a tithe of his wealth if God protects him and brings him safely back home.² When Jacob worships God, he does so by pouring oil on a stone or burning animal offerings on an altar.³

Jacob and his people settle somewhere near Hebron/Chevron in Canaan.⁴ After Jacob’s older sons come home from the field without their younger brother and show their father Joseph’s bloody tunic, Jacob thinks his favorite son is dead. He mourns Joseph for 22 years. During that time Joseph is actually living in Egypt, where he rises from slave to viceroy. Finally Joseph sends for his father and his whole extended family in last week’s Torah portion, Vayigash (Genesis 4:18-47:27).

And Joseph harnessed his chariot and went up to Goshen to meet Israel [a.k.a. Jacob], his father. And he appeared to him, and he fell on his neck and he wept on his neck a long time. Then Israel said to Joseph: “I can die now, after seeing your face, that you are still alive.” (Genesis 46:29-30)

But the prophetic dream Joseph had when he was seventeen is not fulfilled. Jacob’s brothers have already bowed down to him many times, but his father has not.

Jacob does not bow down to Pharaoh, either, when Joseph presents him at court. He greets the king of Egypt with a blessing, and answers Pharaoh’s inquiry about how old he is by saying he is 130, and his life has been hard and short.⁵ Then Jacob blesses the king again, and leaves.

The prophecy fulfilled

Jacob finally bows down for the second time of his life on his deathbed, in this week’s Torah portion, Vayechi (Genesis 47:28-50:26).

Then the time approached for Israel [a.k.a. Jacob] to die, and he called for his son, for Joseph, and said to him: “If, na, I find favor in your eyes, place, na, your hand under my thigh and do a loyal and faithful deed for me: don’t, na, bury me in Egypt. When I lie down with my forefathers, then bring me up from Egypt and bury me in their burial place!” (Genesis 47:29-30)

na (נָא) = please, pray, I beg you.

Joseph gives his word, but Jacob wants the formal hand gesture of an oath as well.⁶

And he [Israel/Jacob] said: “Swear to me!” And he swore to him. Vayishtachu, Israel, upon head of the bed. (Genesis 47:31)

vayishtachu (וַיֱִשְׁתַּחוּ) = and he bowed. (Also from the root sh-ch-h.)

Many classic commentators wrote that Jacob bowed toward the head of his bed, because the presence of God is at the head of the bed of a sick person (and prepositions are ambiguous). But that interpretation implies he was standing up. The Torah has already told us that Jacob is 147, and his death is approaching. I have been at the beside of four people near death, and I believe even Jacob would be too feeble to stand up during his final days.⁷ Perhaps he is seated on his bed, resting against a cushion, and he manages to bow at the waist.

In that case, he is not bowing toward the head of his bed; he is probably bowing to Joseph. This was the opinion of 12^th-century rabbi Shmuel ben Meir, known as Rashbam, who wrote: “ ‘And Israel bowed low’: To Joseph, from the place where he was at [the top of] the bed.”⁸

Rabbi Bachya ben Asher (1255-1340 C.E.), known as Rabbeinu Bachya, added: “Seeing that Joseph had agreed to honour his father by undertaking to fulfill his wishes, Yaakov in turn prostrated himself before him to show that he respected the position Joseph occupied as effective ruler of the country.”⁸

Jacob spent the first hundred years of his life struggling to be the one on top, the one in charge. But during his final years in Egypt, he accepts that his son Joseph is his superior. He knows he is dependent on Joseph to carry out his final request, so he uses the language of an inferior, using the subservient phrase “if I find favor in your eyes” and repeating he word na. Then he uses the gesture of a humble inferior, coming as close as he can to a prostration.

This is the moment when Jacob fulfills the prophecy of the dream his son Joseph had when he was seventeen.

After that, Jacob lives long enough to do the equivalent of rewriting his will, adopting Joseph’s two sons as his own so they will receive shares of the inheritance equal to those of Joseph’s brothers. Jacob also delivers his own prophecies to all his sons, predicting what will happen to the tribes that descend from them. Finally he orders all twelve of his sons to bury him with his deceased family members in the cave of Machpelah in Canaan.

And Jacob completed commanding his sons, and he drew back his feet in the bed, and he expired, and he was gathered to his people. (Genesis 49:33)

One prostration to Joseph before he died was enough for Jacob.

“Honor your father and your mother,” says the fifth of the Ten Commandments in the book of Exodus. In my post Yitro, Mishpatim, & Va-etchanan: Relative or Relevant? Part 1, I suggest that parents should also honor their children. But should they show humble submission to them, as Jacob did by bowing to Joseph on his deathbed?

Nobody would advise submission to a callow seventeen-year-old. But what about when the child is middle-aged, and the parent’s ability to deal with the world is declining in old age? If the adult child is competent and kind, then it would be better to humbly submit to that child’s arrangements than to insist on complete autonomy. I hope that is what I will do when I am considerably older—though I do not expect to live to age 147!

Genesis 34:6-24.
Genesis 28:20-22.
Jacob’s journey south from Shekhem ends at the home of his father, Isaac, in Hebron/Chevron (Genesis 35:27). After that, the Torah only says Jacob lives “in the land of Canaan”, without specifying the location. His first stop on the way to Egypt is Beir-sheva, which is south of Chevron.
Genesis 28:16-19, 33:19-20, 35:6, 35:13-14, 46:1.
Genesis 47:7-10.
Biblical Hebrew sometimes uses the word for “thigh”, yareich (יָרֵךְ) as a euphemism for the genitals. According to Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, midrash written between 630 and 1030 C.E., Jacob said: “O my son! Swear to me by the covenant of circumcision that thou wilt take me up to the burial-place of my fathers in the land of Canaan to the Cave of Machpelah.” (translation of Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer 39:13 by sefaria.org)
This is the first of Jacob’s three deathbed scenes. In the second, he has to summon his strength (vayitchaek, וַיִּתחַזֵּק) to sit up in bed.
Both quotations are from sefaria.org.

Vayeishev & Vayigash: Is Joseph Ethical?

It is one thing to take an ethical stand when only you and a few other individuals are concerned. It can be harder to perceive and make the most ethical choice when a whole population is affected.

Joseph as ethical examplar

I have written before about Joseph’s iffy behavior as a troubled seventeen-year old and his older brothers’ inflated response: selling him as a slave to a caravan bound for Egypt.¹ I have also written about how twenty years later Joseph saves his brothers’ lives and declines to take revenge, though he could easily enslave them; he merely puts them through a nerve-wracking test.²

Joseph acts even more ethically when he is propositioned by the wife of his Egyptian owner, Potifar. God blesses Joseph with success in everything he does, and Potifar promotes him to steward over his household in the Torah portion Vayeishev (Genesis 37:1-40:23). Potifar’s wife notices how good-looking Joseph is, and asks him to lie down with her.³

And he refused, and he said to his master’s wife: “Hey, with me, my master is not concerned about what is in the house, because everything that is his, he placed in my hand. There are none greater in this house than I am, and he has not withheld anything at all from me except you, since you are his wife. So how could I do this great wickedness, and be guilty before God?” (Genesis/Bereishit 39:8-9)

Joseph Flees Potiphar’s Wife,
by Julius Schnorr von Carlsfeld, 19th century

Joseph feels intuitively that committing adultery with his owner’s wife would be wicked. Potifar did not enslave him, but merely purchased him as a slave. Since then his owner has treated him well and trusted him completely. Joseph believes it would be wrong to cheat him.

He also believes that adultery is wrong according to God. Although the God of Israel does not explicitly prohibit adultery until the Ten Commandments,⁴ God has already punished two kings who unknowingly attempted adultery with Joseph’s great-grandmother Sarah. Furthermore, adultery is a general taboo in the region; both kings were appalled when they discovered what they had almost done.⁵

So when Potifar’s wife approaches him again, Joseph flees.

Several years later, Pharaoh has two significant dreams, and Joseph is called upon to interpret them. He tells Pharaoh that the dreams are God’s warning that Egypt will have seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine. Then he advises Pharaoh to appoint someone make sure grain is stockpiled during the years of plenty. Pharaoh appoints Joseph viceroy in charge of all agriculture in Egypt.⁶

He spends the next seven years commandeering and storing Egypt’s excess grain. The Torah does not say how Joseph acquires the grain; it may be through eminent domain, for the public good. Or he may purchase the grain, as the United States purchases crude oil to stock its Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Either way, Joseph is earning his livelihood as Pharaoh’s agent in an ethical way.

We learn what Joseph does during the seven years of famine in this week’s Torah portion, Vayigash (Genesis 44:18-47:27).

Joseph, Overseer of the Pharaoh’s Granaries,
by Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1874

Joseph as capitalist

During the first year of famine, Joseph sells grain from the government’s reserves for silver, the currency of that time and place, and brings the silver into Pharaoh’s palace. The second year of famine, there is no more silver left in either Egypt or Canaan.

Then all the Egyptians came to Joseph, saying: “Give us bread! Why should we die in front of you? For the silver is all gone.” (Genesis 47:15)

Rather than distributing grain for free, Joseph offers to trade grain for livestock. So that year Pharaoh acquires ownership of all the horses, donkeys, cows, and sheep in Egypt.

In the third year of famine, the Egyptians tell Joseph:

“We cannot hide from my lord that all the silver and the cattle [we] possessed have gone to my lord. Nothing remains before my lord except our bodies and our soil. Why should we die before your eyes, us and our soil? Keneih us and our soil for bread, and we will be slaves to Pharaoh. And give us seed, so we will live and not die, and the soil will not turn into desert.” (Genesis 47:18-29)

keneih (קְנֵה) = Acquire! Buy! (An imperative form of kana, קָנָה = acquired through purchase, ransom, or production.)

By the third year of the famine, the Egyptians are in the position of debt slaves who must sell both their land and themselves just so they can eat. Their poverty is entirely due to the weather, which is an act of God.

How does Joseph respond? First he acquires all the farmland in Egypt for Pharaoh—all except for the land Pharaoh had previously allotted to the priests,⁷ and the land of Goshen where Pharaoh invited Joseph’s extended family to settle.⁸

Vayiken, Joseph, all the soil of Egypt for Pharaoh, since all the Egyptian sold their fields because the famine was too strong for them. And the land became Pharaoh’s. (Genesis 47:20)

vayiken (וַיִּקֶן) = and he acquired. (Another form of kana.)

Since Pharaoh has a monopoly on all the grain remaining in the region, Joseph can sell the grain at any price he likes. If laissez-faire capitalism is ethical, then Joseph’s acquisition of all the farmland is ethical.

Next, in order to make sure that the Egyptian farmers know they no longer own the land they farm, Joseph moves whole communities to different areas. People have the same neighbors as before, but they live in a different place, and farm different plots than their parents and grandparents.

Is this ethical? It could be worse; at least Joseph deports existing communities together, so people have the same friends, neighbors, and social structure in their new location. But they do not have a choice about where to live. In that respect, they have indeed become slaves rather than citizens.

The Hebrew Bible accepts slavery as a necessary evil, but decrees that Israelites may only sell themselves as debt slaves for a term of six years. In the seventh year they must be freed, unless they choose to undergo a ritual committing them to their owner for life. And when owners free their slaves, they must supply them with goods that will give them a start in their new life.⁹

So if Joseph were ethical by later Israelite standards, he would buy the Egyptians as temporary slaves, and set them free after a reasonable number of years.

If he were ethical by modern standards, he would acquire their land, but not their bodies. No doubt they would choose to work for the government as tenant farmers for a while, since it was the only way they could get food. But when times improved, they would be free to choose another form of livelihood.

After Joseph acquires the farmland for Pharaoh and deports whole communities, he takes one more step.

Then Joseph said to the people: “Hey, kaniti you and your soil today for Pharaoh. See, there is seed for you, and you shall sow the soil. And when you harvest, you will give one-fifth to Pharaoh, and four-fifths will be yours to sow the field and to eat, you and everyone in your households and your little ones.” (Genesis 47:24)

kaniti (קָנִיתִי) = I have acquired. (Another form of kana.)

Thus Joseph institutes a system of serfdom, turning the people into permanent tenant farmers. Every year the farmers must give Pharaoh 20% of their harvest. It is not a tax on their income, but rather a split of the profits between the owner of the land and the workers who do the labor.

The farmers gratefully accept this arrangement simply in order to eat. They would rather be alive with no freedom and no belongings, than dead of starvation.

And they said: “He has kept us alive! We found mercy in the eyes of my lord, and we will be slaves to Pharaoh.” (Genesis 47:25)

Mandating a tenant farmer arrangement in perpetuity certainly benefits Pharaoh and his government, which will now receive a steady annual income of grain. Joseph is a successful administrator. But is his arrangement ethical?

Some classic commentators praised Joseph for his moderation. Since Egyptian farmers got to keep four-fifths of their harvest, they did not suffer hardship, according to Radak (13^th-century rabbi David Kimchi) and 16^th-century rabbi Obadiah Sforno. Sforno also noted that all slave-owners were responsible for feeding their slaves, so in the event of another famine Pharaoh would have to provide his tenant farmers with food.

However, the bottom line is that few human beings want to be someone else’s property. We want to make our own decisions about where we live and how we earn a livelihood. Joseph did less harm to the farmers of Egypt than he might have, but his actions were still unethical.

Is he motivated by a desire for revenge due to his own enslavement? Joseph threatens his brothers with slavery, but does not impose it. He knows them, and he overhears them admit to each other that they were guilty of enslaving him.¹⁰ He feels empathy for them, and turns away to weep.

He also feels warmhearted toward Potifar, who promoted him and trusted him. But he does not have any feelings about the farmers of Egypt.

I believe Joseph’s ethics are imperfect because he is human. It is hard to imagine the viewpoint of thousands of people you have never met. Yet someone with power in government must do just that in order to make ethical decisions. Saving lives is good, but it is not the only good.

See my post Vayeishev: Favoritism.
See my posts Mikeitz: A Fair Test, Part 1 and Part 2.
Genesis 39:6-7.
Exodus 20:13.
Genesis 15:11-20, 20:1-7 and 47:27.
Genesis 41:1-46.
Genesis 47:22.
Genesis 47:1-6, 47:11-12.
Exodus 21:2-6, Deuteronomy 15:12-18.
Genesis 42:21-24.

Mikeitz & Vayigash: A Fair Test, Part 2

Did Joseph behave ethically when he deceived his brothers and secretly tested them during their two visits to Egypt?

Last week I posted an essay on Joseph’s first round of testing, when his ten older brothers come to Egypt to buy grain in the first year of famine. When they meet the viceroy of Egypt, they do not recognize their brother Joseph, whom they had thrown into a pit and sold as a slave twenty-one years before.¹ After they mention that their youngest brother is at home in Canaan, Joseph imprisons Simeon as a hostage, sells grain to the rest, and says they must return with their youngest brother. (See my post Mikeitz: A Fair Test, Part 1.) This youngest brother is Benjamin, the only one of Jacob’s sons with the same mother as Joseph.

Joseph’s second round of testing begins in the Torah portion Mikeitz and concludes in this week’s portion, Vayigash. The following essay comes from an earlier draft of my book on moral mistakes in Genesis, which I am now rewriting.

Second Year of Testing

When the brothers arrive in Egypt with Benjamin, Joseph releases Simeon, and invites them all to dine at his palace. He finally sees his baby brother Benjamin, who is now a young man.

And Joseph hurried [out] because rachamav was stirred up toward his brother, and he needed to break into sobs. And he came into the inner room and he sobbed there. Then he washed his face and he left and controlled himself, and he said: “Serve bread!” (Genesis 43:30-31)

rachamav (רַחֲמָיו) = his compassion, his feeling of deep affection. (From the noun rechem, רֶחֶם = womb.)

Is Joseph moved to tears by a sudden feeling of love for his brother? Or is he feeling compassion over Benjamin’s situation? He would remember what it was like to live with a clinging father and ten jealous and dangerous older brothers.

Joseph keeps his brothers on edge by having them seated in order by age. Benjamin is obviously the youngest, but the ten older men, who were all born during a seven-year period that ended with Joseph’s own birth, are now middle-aged. No outsider could have guessed their birth order.

And he had portions passed to them from in front of himself, and Benjamin’s portion was five times bigger than anyone else’s. And they drank and they got drunk with him. (Genesis 43:34)

By giving Benjamin five times as much food as the others, Joseph displays unfair favoritism just as Jacob did when he gave Joseph an expensive tunic. This time the ten older brothers do not react to the favoritism.

Then the final test begins. Once again, Joseph has the silver returned to his brothers’ packs. He also has his steward plant a silver cup in Benjamin’s pack. The eleven brothers load their donkeys and set off early in the morning. Then Joseph orders his steward:

“Get up! Pursue the men, and when you catch up with them you shall say to them: Why did you pay back evil for good? Isn’t this what my lord drinks from and uses himself for divination? You did evil in what you did!” (Genesis 44:4-5)

The hint that the viceroy knows how to do divination, along with the previous day’s seating plan by birth order, might frighten the brothers into believing that the viceroy has magically divined their old crime. The steward overtakes the brothers as they leave the city, and repeats Joseph’s words.

And they said to him: “Why does my lord speak these things? Far be it from your servants to do [anything] like this! Hey, the silver that we found in the mouths of our packs, we brought back to you from the land of Canaan. So how would we have stolen silver or gold from your master’s house? [If] it is found with any of your servants he will die, and also we ourselves will become slaves to my lord.” (Genesis 44:7-9)

Their righteous indignation indicates that the eleven brothers all trust one another to refrain from stealing.

The Cup Found, by James J.J. Tissot, circa 1900

They quickly put their packs on the ground and open them, and the steward conducts a search, dramatically saving Benjamin’s pack for last. When the steward pulls out the silver cup, the brothers tear their garments in mourning. They accompany him back to the viceroy’s house, where they throw themselves on the ground in yet another prostration to the man who controls their fate.

And Joseph said to them: “What is this deed that you have done? Didn’t you know that a man like me does divination?” (Genesis 44:15)

Joseph is still playing his role in the elaborate test he has arranged. Judah answers for all eleven brothers.

And Judah said: “What can we say to my lord? How can we speak, and how can we be vindicated? The God has discovered the crime of your servants. Here we are, slaves to my lord, including us as well as he in whose possession the cup was found.” (Genesis 44:16)

In other words, Judah says the brothers are collectively culpable. He may feel that they are so united that if one of them commits a crime they are all guilty; or he may remember that all of them except Benjamin (and Reuben, who was absent at the time) sold Joseph as a slave, and therefore are just as guilty as the presumed thief of the silver cup.²

The older brothers’ solidarity with Benjamin could be the final piece of evidence Joseph needs for them to pass his test. But a lingering doubt makes him repeat that only Benjamin will stay as a slave in Egypt.

And [Joseph] said: “Far be it from me to do this! The man who is found with the cup in his possession, he will be my slave; and [the rest of] you, go up in peace to your father.” (Genesis 44:17)

Joseph acts ethically by fulfilling his promise to release Simeon when the brothers brought Benjamin to him.

But planting an item in Benjamin’s pack and pretending it was stolen is a more serious kind of deception than hiding his identity as their lost-lost brother. Now Joseph is framing an innocent man for a crime he did not commit.

He probably does not intend the accusation to go any farther. Joseph enjoys creating dramatic effects (the mysterious return of the silver to their sacks,³ the seating order at the feast, the talk of divination). When he ends the test, he is likely to reveal everything, and savor his brothers’ shock and amazement.

Joseph may not realize that framing his little brother for the theft might ruin Benjamin’s reputation with his older brothers. What if, after Joseph reveals his identity, his older brothers thought Benjamin did steal the cup, and Joseph was covering up for him? His desire to amaze his brothers prevents Joseph from choosing the morally better action of protecting his little brother’s reputation.

Nevertheless, he does no long-term harm to any of his brothers. In this week’s Torah portion, Vayigash, Judah appeals to the viceroy’s feelings and offers himself as a slave in place of Benjamin so that he can fulfill his promise to their father, Jacob, to bring him back. If Benjamin did not return, he says, it would kill his father.

“And now, please let your servant remain instead of the young man as my lord’s slave, and let the young man go up with his brothers. For how could I go up to my father [if] the young man were not with me? Then I would see the evil that would come upon my father!” (Genesis 44:33)

At this moral example of unselfish sacrifice, Joseph “could no longer restrain himself”.⁴ He dismisses all his Egyptian servants and reveals his identity to his brothers. He invites his whole extended family to move to Egypt so that he can provide for them during the remaining five years of the famine.

What if Joseph’s older brothers had not passed the test? What if, despite their guilt over mistreating Joseph, they had not volunteered to become the viceroy’s slaves along with Benjamin? What if Judah had not proven that he met his promises, had compassion for his father, and sincerely wanted to sacrifice his own freedom to save his little brother?

Joseph’s plan in that case might have been to keep Benjamin safe in Egypt, and let his older brothers to back to Canaan with another year’s supply of grain, no matter how much their father grieved. He might even have planned to let them all starve after the grain was consumed. As long as he believed his older brothers were a threat to Benjamin, he could not just forgive them and let them live in Egypt, too. Alternatively, Joseph might have planned to imprison them for the rest of their lives, feeding them but denying them freedom of movement.

Whether he chose to lock up his older brothers or send them home, would it be ethical for Joseph to punish men who committed a crime 22 years ago and who, in his opinion, might do so again?

Since his brothers (especially Judah) do pass Joseph’s secret test, he avoids facing this moral question. But I suspect Joseph is so carried away by his own cleverness that he does not consider the long-term ethical consequences of his test.

—

Genesis 37:18-28.
It would be unethical of Judah to speak for his brothers without their prior approval, even by ancient Israelite standards, since he is not the oldest brother or otherwise the head of a household they belong to. However, the ten older brothers had agreed that God was punishing them for their long-ago cruelty to Joseph. They may have discussed it again later and agreed that they deserved to be punished further, perhaps by becoming slaves themselves.
Genesis 42:35, 43:19-23.
Genesis 45:1.

Ki Tavo & Vayigash: Tithes and Taxes

How does a theocracy support itself?

Governments today, both democratic and autocratic, levy taxes to pay for government programs that range from making war to feeding children. But a few thousand years ago in the Ancient Near East, most countries were theocracies; gods were considered the ultimate rulers, and their deputies were anointed kings and priests.

Both Egypt and the two kingdoms of Israel conscripted soldiers for war and laborers for major building projects.¹ But how did they fund the programs that kept at least some of their people from starving?

The book of Genesis credits Joseph, the pharaoh’s viceroy, with refinancing the government of Egypt. The next four books of the bible state what Israelites must contribute when they have their own nation, their own king, and their own clergy.

Joseph, Overseer of Pharaoh’s Granaries, by Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1874

Egypt in Genesis

Joseph stockpiles grain in Egypt during the seven years of plenty in the Torah portion Vayigash. Then in the first year of the seven-year drought, he sells it (to Egyptians as well as Canaanites) for silver. In the second year, he sells grain to Egyptians in exchange for their livestock. The third year, when the pharaoh owns all of Egypt’s silver and livestock, the farmers offer:

“Acquire us and our farmland for the food, and we ourselves will be Pharaoh’s slaves, and our land.” (Genesis 47:19)

Joseph agrees. All the farmland of Egypt, except what belongs to the priests, becomes the property of the government, and the farmers become serfs. Joseph gives them grain for planting and eating. And from then on, the farmers have to give one-fifth of their produce to Pharaoh as rent.

Joseph does not create any means for them to buy back their former land. In fact, he moves whole villages to other parts of the country. This underscores the claim in the story that the pharaoh now owns all the land and the farmers are mere serfs.

Israel in Numbers and Deuteronomy

Moses, speaking for God, decrees a different plan for the Israelites to follow after they have conquered their own country. God is the true owner of all the land, but God has assigned a landholding to every Israelite in every tribe. Plots of land can be sold, but only for temporary ownership; all lands return to the original clans every fifty years.²

Kings throughout the Ancient Near East appointed tax collectors to make sure landowners paid taxes, mostly in the form of foodstuffs. In the bible, King Solomon divides the united kingdom of Israel into twelve districts, each supervised by an official who had to provide food for the king and court one month out of the year.³

Landowners are also responsible in the Torah for supporting the kingdom’s two most important social programs: the state religion, and care for the poor. While the priests and their households receive portions from individual offerings at the altar,⁴ and wealthier Israelites are obligated to extend loans to their poorer neighbors and kin,⁵ the primary method for supporting people without their own land is mandatory tithing.

The Talmud distinguishes three kinds of tithes in the Hebrew Bible. The first tithe is brought to the temple for the resident priests and their households. The second tithe is also brought to Jerusalem, but consumed on the spot in a feast for the landowner’s family, slaves, and employees; Levites and landless immigrants are also invited to feast.⁶ Every third year, the second tithe is replaced with a “poor tithe” stored in the towns and doled out to the local Levites, immigrants, widows, and orphans.

This week’s Torah portion, Ki Tavo (“when you come”), requires landowners to accompany their tithes both in Jerusalem and in their home towns with declarations that they owe their livelihood to God and they are tithing to obey God’s orders. First Moses addresses the annual contribution of the best of the first fruits:

First Fruits, bible card by Providence Lithograph Co. ca. 1900

You shall take some of the first of every fruit of the earth that you bring in from your land, which God, your God, is giving to you, and put it in a basket. And you shall go to the place where God, your God, chooses to let [God’s] name dwell. And you shall go to whoever the priest is at that time, and you shall say to him: “I announce today to God, our God, that I have come into the land that God vowed to our fathers to give to us.” (Deuteronomy/Devarim 26:2-3)

The farmer then recites a brief history from Jacob’s descent to Egypt through his descendants’ arrival in Canaan.⁷ He concludes:

“And [God] brought us to this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And now, hey! I bring the first fruits of the earth that you gave to me, God!” And you shall leave [the basket] in front of God, your God, and you shall bow down in front of God, your God. (Deuteronomy 26:9-10)

The baskets of first fruits are presented to God, then eaten by the resident priests and their households.

Then you shall rejoice in all the good things that God, your God, gave to you and your household—you and the Levite and the immigrant who is in your midst. (Deuteronomy 26:11)

The summer pilgrimage festival in Jerusalem, Shavuot, is identified as the “Day of First Fruits” in Numbers 28:26. But the Israelites must continue to bring the first fruits of each of seven species⁸ as they ripen through the summer, until the fall pilgrimage festival, Sukkot. The Israelites are obligated to bring the first-born animals from their herds and flocks to the temple for the spring pilgrimage festival, Pesach or Passover.⁹

For all three pilgrimage festivals, as well as for other offerings at the temple, landowners are obligated to invite the Levites and immigrants from their own neighborhoods to accompany them to Jerusalem and join in the feast.¹⁰ Perhaps the participation of Levites and immigrants is why the Talmud calls this the “second tithe”.

But a feast every few months is not enough to sustain life. So every third year, landowners must bring the “poor tithe” to a central location in the nearest town. This tithe includes foods that have a longer shelf life (grain, wine, and olive oil), and it is also accompanied by a declaration in this week’s Torah portion.

When you have finished laseir every maseir of your produce in the third year, the year of the maseir, and you give it to the Levite, to the immigrant, to the fatherless child, and to the widow, then they will eat inside your gates and they will be satisfied. Then you shall say in the presence of God, your God: “I cleared out the sacred [portion] from the house, and also I gave it to the Levite and to the immigrant, to the fatherless child and to the widow, as in your commands that you commanded me. I did not bypass your commands, and I did not forget.” (Deuteronomy 26:12-13)

laseir (לַעְשֵׂר) = tithing, assembling a tithe, collection one-tenth. (From eser, עֶשֶׂר = ten.)

maseir (מַעְשֵׂר) = tithe. (Also from eser.)

The Levites serve at the temple on a rotating schedule as administrators, guards, assistants, and musicians, and by God’s decree cannot own farmland of their own. The third tithe also provides sustenance for immigrants who have not been able to buy land, and for two other categories of people who were often impoverished in ancient Israel: widows and children who have lost their fathers.

The grain and other foods set aside for the third-year tithe are considered sacred because they are prohibited for mundane use; they cannot be either sold or eaten by the owner’s household. This tithe is also sacred because it serves God; giving food to those who do not have the means to feed themselves is a sacred obligation.

Today the citizens of most nations are required to pay taxes. Portions of our taxes go to the military, though sometimes we also conscript soldiers. In modern nations, no one is conscripted to provide labor for government building projects; they are supported by taxes (including roads and other infrastructure). Our taxes are also spent on education, on health care, and on supporting those who do not have the means to support themselves—the elderly and disabled, minor children whose parents cannot take care of them, recent victims of disasters.

I believe we should treat the taxes we pay for these social programs as a sacred obligation.

—

Corvée labor, called mas (מַס) in Hebrew, is imposed by both pharaohs in Exodus on the Israelites to build brick storehouses (Exodus 1:11-13. 5:6-9) and by the Israelite tribes on Canaanites (Josiah 16:10, 17:13; Judges 1:27-35). A list of King David’s top officials includes an officer in charge of mas (2 Samuel 20:23-26); so does the list of King Solomon’s top officials (1 Kings 4:6). King Solomon imposes mas on 30,000 Israelites who spent every third month in Lebanon cutting wood and quarrying stone (1 Kings 5:27). Then he imposes mas on resident Canaanites to build the temple, his own palace, a citadel, and city walls around Jerusalem, Chazor, Megido, and Gazer.
Leviticus 25:10-24.
1 Kings 4:7-19, 5:7-8.
Numbers 18:8-19.
Leviticus 25:35-37.
Except in Numbers 18:21-29, which describes an earlier system of tithing. In that system, the first tithe is given to the Levites, who then give one-tenth of what they receive to the priests.
See my post Ki Tavo: A Perishing Aramean.
Deuteronomy 8:8-9 calls Israel “a land of wheat and barley, of grapevines and figs and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey/date syrup; a land where you need not stint on eating food …” Mishnah Bikkurim 1:3 states that only these seven species are brought to the temple, and they are not brought before Shavuot.
Exodus 13:11-13 and 22:28-29; Numbers 18:13-18. God assigns the first fruits of Pesach and the meat of the firstborn animals to the Levites (including the priests), as well as a contribution of five shekels for each firstborn son.
In front of God, your God, you shall eat them, in the place that God, your God, chooses—you and your sons and your daughters and your male slaves and your female slaves and the Levites who [live] within your gates. And you will rejoice in front of God, your God, in everything you put your hand to. Guard yourself lest you abandon the Levite on any of your days on the earth. (Deuteronomy 12:18-19)

Tetzaveh & Vayigash: Testifying to Divine Providence

What can you give God, when God has given abundantly to you?

Illustration from Northrop, Treasures of the Bible, 1894

Burning something is the standard method for expressing gratitude to God in the Torah. God loves the smell of smoke, whether it comes from animal fat burning on the courtyard altar, or incense burning on the golden altar just inside the Tent of Meeting.

In this week’s Torah portion, Tetzavveh, God tells Moses the ritual for consecrating both the courtyard altar and the new priests, a ritual that includes a lot of fat burning.¹ After burning the fat parts of a bull and all of one ram, the priests to be ordained must hold up the fat parts of the “ram of ordination”, along with its right thigh and three kinds of grain products.

Then you shall take them from their hands and you shall turn them into smoke on the altar, on top of the rising offering, for a soothing fragrance before God; it is a fire-offering for God. (Exodus 29:25)

The end of the Torah portion describes the construction of the incense altar and decrees that the high priest must burn incense on it twice a day.² Apparently God needs a lot of soothing.

Only a few psalms and the writings of a few prophets indicate that one can also worship God through words. See my post: Tetzavveh & Psalms 141, 51, and 40: Smoke and Prayer.

Serving God through words also has a precedent in the Joseph story in the book of Genesis. In the chapter in my book on the portion Vayigash, Joseph reveals himself to his brothers and explains that they are not to blame for throwing him into a pit and selling him as a slave all those years ago, because it was all part of God’s plan to bring the whole family down to Egypt during the seven-year famine.³

He intends to reassure his older brothers, but they are not thrilled to hear that they have no free will. Joseph kisses them and sobs on their necks, but they merely become able to speak to him.⁴

The author of Psalm 40, like Joseph, expresses his religious attitude by giving verbal testimony about divine providence.⁵ Unlike Joseph, he later becomes insecure and reminds God:

I did not conceal your righteousness in the middle of my heart;

I spoke of your reliability and your deliverance.

I did not conceal from a great assembly your loyal kindness and your fidelity.

You, God, you will not hold back your compassion from me;

Your loyal kindness and your fidelity will always guard me. (Psalm 40:11-12)

Faith in divine providence is easy in hindsight, as it was for Joseph. But when troubles are still threatening you, you need to keep reminding yourself of your belief, like the author of Psalm 40. And when someone else tells you not to worry about your past crime because it all worked out for the best, you may feel cheated of a chance to make amends, like Joseph’s brothers.

—

Exodus 29:12-25.
Exodus 30:1-9.
Genesis 45:4-8.
Genesis 45:15.
We can assume the speaker is a man because he is allowed to speak to a “great assembly”, something no woman could do at that place and time.

Vayigash & Terumah: Silver and Slavery

Egyptian silver bowl, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Silver stands for both magic and money in the Torah.

Shining silver glimmers with beauty and mystery (as long as someone polishes it). In the book of Genesis, the viceroy of Egypt’s cup made of silver, and Joseph claims to use it for divining as well as drinking.¹ In the book of Exodus, the Israelites make parts of the portable sanctuary for God out of silver.²

Silver was also used as money in Egypt, Canaan, and the rest of the Ancient Near East. The first example in the Torah is when Abraham purchases the cave of Makhpeilah for 400 shekels of silver.³ At that time, a shekel was a unit of weight, not a coin.⁴

The first time Joseph’s brothers come down to Egypt to purchase grain during the seven-year famine, each man brings a bag of silver pieces, probably molded into convenient ingots. They use their silver to pay for the grain they bring back to Canaan, but the mysterious viceroy (actually Joseph) has their silver secretly returned to their packs, on top of the grain.⁵ At their first camp on the way north, one of them opens his pack.

And he said to his brothers: “Kaspi! It’s been returned! Hey, it’s actually in my pack!” And their hearts left them and they trembled. Each man said to his brother: “What is this God has done to us?” (Genesis 42:28)

kaspi (כַּסְפִּי) = my silver. (A form of the noun kesef, כֶּסֶף = silver.)

Spooked, the brothers are psychologically primed for further mysteries. They return to Egypt for more grain the following year, this time bringing their youngest brother, Benjamin, as the viceroy requested. They are afraid they will be accused of stealing back their own payment, so they carefully explain what happened to the viceroy’s steward, who says their God must have done it.⁶

That night, Joseph has his steward repeat the trick—and this time he also has his own silver cup hidden in the mouth of Benjamin’s bag. He uses the apparent theft of the silver cup as a pretext to arrest all eleven brothers.⁷ Then he decrees that the rest can go home, but Benjamin must stay in Egypt as his slave.⁸ At this Judah, the ringleader who talked his brothers into selling Joseph as a slave 22 years before, steps forward and begs the viceroy to let him stay as the slave instead of Benjamin. Joseph now has proof that Judah and his brothers have changed, so he reveals his identity and unites the family.

Joseph brings his own family down to Egypt and promises to support them, but he continues to charge everyone else for the grain he stockpiled before the famine began.

And Joseph collected all the kesef to be found in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan through the sale of grain, while they were buying grain. And Joseph brought the kesef to the house of Pharaoh. Then the kesef from the land of Egypt and from the land of Canaan ran out. So the Egyptians came to Joseph, saying: “Bring us food! Why should we die in front of you, because the kesef is gone?” Then Joseph said: “Bring your livestock and I will give [grain] to you for your livestock, if the kesef is gone.” (Genesis 47:14-15)

Now Pharaoh owns all the livestock of Egypt as well as all the silver of Egypt and Canaan. The following year, the Egyptians tell the viceroy that they have nothing left to buy grain with except themselves and their land. So he acquires them as slaves under a system of serfdom. Pharaoh now owns all the land in Egypt except for the allotments of the priests, and all the farmers must give a fifth of their produce to Pharaoh.⁹

This week, as I delve into the ethics of Joseph’s enslavement of the Egyptians for the book I am writing on Genesis, I am also reading about the call for donations of silver and other precious materials in the current Torah portion, Terumah. Here is the blog post I wrote on the subject: Terumah: Heavy Metals.

The purpose of the donations is to supply the raw materials to build a portable sanctuary for God. But how do the Israelites, ex-slaves in the wilderness of Sinai, have gold and silver to donate?

When God strikes the Egyptians with the final plague, the death of the firstborn, the Israelite slaves pack up to leave the country.

And the Israelites had done as Moses had spoken and asked the Egyptians for objects of kesef and gold, and garments. And God had given the people favor in the eyes of the Egyptians, and they let them have what they asked for. So they plundered Egypt. (Exodus 12:35-36)

All the Israelites had to do was ask, according to this story, and the Egyptians eagerly handed over their money and everything else made with precious metals. They were desperate to see the Israelites leave the country so that the God of Israel would finally stop afflicting them with plagues.

Silver in the Torah, like money in the world today, does not circulate evenly. It becomes concentrated in the hands of whoever has the most power. When Joseph is the viceroy of Egypt he has power over all the stockpiles of grain, so the all the silver in Canaan and Egypt goes into Pharaoh’s coffers, and all the farmers of Egypt are enslaved. About 400 years later, according to the Torah, the Israelites are enslaved and the Egyptians have silver. After the Egyptians discover that the God of Israel has the most power, they hand over their wealth so God will leave them alone. Now the Israelite ex-slaves have gold and silver.

In a moment of panicked insecurity, the Israelites donate some of the jewelry they extorted from the Egyptians to make a golden calf, hoping that then their god will inhabit something they can see.¹⁰ Meanwhile, God tells Moses in this week’s Torah portion to have the people make a portable sanctuary for God to inhabit.¹¹ After Moses comes down from Mount Sinai and the Israelites have been punished and redirected, they eagerly donate their plundered silver and gold to make the sanctuary.¹²

The silver in the sanctuary is taken out of circulation as money. The people donate their silver and other precious materials because they need to believe God is right there with them, inside the beautiful sanctuary they are building. After all, they need to eat, just like the Egyptians and Canaanites in the book of Genesis who handed over their silver to Pharaoh’s viceroy, who controlled the grain supply. By the portion Terumah in the book of Exodus, the Israelites know that God has the power to give them manna to eat, or withhold it. They hand over their silver and gold to God.

But this time the precious metals are not just money stored away in some strongman’s coffers. The people can see the silver hooks holding up the cloth courtyard walls and the silver bands on its posts; the gold hooks holding up the richly colored cloths of the tent-sanctuary walls, the silver sockets securing the cross-pieces in the frame of the tent, and its gold-plated doorposts.¹³ These touches of shining metal add to the beauty and mystery of the enclosure, elevating the spirits of the Israelites as they worship God.

—

Genesis 44:2-12.
The walls of the sanctuary proper are cloth hung in wood frames whose sockets are silver (Exodus 26:19-25). The cloth walls of the open courtyard in front of the sanctuary hang from silver hooks, and the posts holding up the framework are banded with silver (Exodus 27:17).
Genesis 23:15-16.
One shekel was 8.4 grams. The oldest coins unearthed in the Israelite and Philistine region date to the late 6^th century B.C.E., when the Babylonian Empire fell to the Persians.
Genesis 42:25-28.
Genesis 43:18-23.
Genesis 44:1-9.
Genesis 44:17.
Genesis 47:18-24.
Exodus 32:1-4.
Exodus 25:8.
Exodus 35:21-24.
Exodus 27:17, 26:19-25, 26:36-37.

Repost: Vayiggash

I went back to my 2014 post on Joseph as a “Serial Sobber”, and I could not resist tearing it in two and rewriting both parts extensively. You can read the first part here: Mikeitz & Vayiggash: Serial Sobber, Part 1. I’ll post the second part next week, after I finish rewriting it.

Unlike Joseph, I am a person who does not cry easily. I only break into sobs once every five to ten years, when I have been trying and trying to accomplish something, and I finally realize I have to give up.

There are also times when another person touches my heart and I feel moved, like Joseph, but the closest I get to weeping then is a small tightening of my throat.

My throat tightened a bit this week when I was walking around Split, Croatia. Most of the other folks on the streets are Croatians, since this is definitely the off season. It dawned on me that only people under 30 looked happy. The faces of most older Croatians are engraved with lines of grim endurance, broken only when someone says hvala, “thank you”, and flashes a quick smile.

And then I remembered: Croatia used to be part of Yugoslavia under the totalitarian dictatorship of Josip Tito. After his death in 1980 the country deteriorated further, and then war began: first between Croats and Serbs, then between an independent Croatia and the splintering Yugoslavia. Croatia’s secession and independence were finally secured in 1995. The Croatian economy began to recover around 2000, and the country became a member of the EU in 2013.

View from Narodni Trg, a popular plaza in old Split (photo by M.C.)

Now Split has a prosperous tourist industry. Sunshine and a warm seashore help, but so do all the ancient stone buildings that nobody could afford to raze and replace during the second half of the 20th century, when so many other cities lost their architectural treasures to the brutal aesthetic of the time. Now, thanks to the segments of “Game of Thrones” filmed in Split, the old city is more attractive to tourists than ever.

The young adults look relaxed and happy here. But when I consider the older adults who lived through the war in the 1990’s, and some even through the Tito years, my throat tightens. I respect them just for carrying on.

Vayiggash: Near a Narcissist

Vayiggash to him, Judah did, and he said: “Pardon me, my lord. Let your servant speak, please, speak in your ears, my lord, and don’t be angry with your servant, since you are like Pharaoh.” (Genesis/Bereishit 44:18)

vayiggash (וַיִּגַּשׁ) = and he came near, and he approached, and he stepped forward. (A form of the verb nigash, נִגַּשׁ = came near, stepped up.)

Judah steps closer to the viceroy of Egypt. He does not know this all-powerful man is his younger brother Joseph, whom he and his brothers sold as a slave 22 years before. After Judah’s painfully polite introduction at the beginning of this week’s Torah portion, Vayiggash, comes a cascade of revelations: Judah’s empathy, Joseph’s identity, and the true extent of Joseph’s narcissism.

The trouble started with Jacob. He had four wives but loved only one, Rachel. After Rachel died in childbirth he had twelve sons but loved only Rachel’s two children, Joseph and little Benjamin.

At age seventeen, Joseph had become a tattletale and a narcissist —someone with a psychological condition characterized by an inflated sense of self-importance, a deep need for admiration and attention, and a lack of empathy for others. (See my posts Vayeishev: What Drove Them Crazy and Mikeitz & Vayeishev: A Narcissist in the Pit?)

When Joseph came to report on them again, his ten older brothers stripped him and threw him in an empty cistern. Then they talked about killing him and telling their father wild animals did it. Judah convinced the others to sell him as a slave instead, to a caravan bound for Egypt.

Joseph heard everything from the bottom of the pit.

At age 38, Joseph is the viceroy of Egypt, with absolute power over stockpiled grain during a severe famine. When his older brothers come from Canaan to buy grain he recognizes them, but they do not recognize him. The Torah says he sets up a “test” for them. Joseph imprisons one of the brothers, Shimon, and promises to release him only when the others return with their youngest brother. (See my post Mikeitz & Vayiggash: Testing.)

The opening of this week’s Torah portion is the culmination of the test. When the family in Canaan runs out of food in the second year of famine, Jacob finally lets his older sons return to Egypt with Benjamin. Joseph releases Shimon, shows favoritism toward Benjamin, and sells them more grain. Then he arranges a trap: he has his steward hide a silver goblet in Benjamin’s sack, then follow them, “discover” the goblet, and let them know that the punishment for stealing it is slavery. Will the ten older brothers head north and leave Benjamin behind as a slave?

They do not. They return to Joseph’s palace and say they will all be the viceroy’s slaves. When Joseph refuses this offer, Judah steps forward (vayiggash) and gives an eloquent and unselfish speech about how their father’s life depends on Benjamin. He concludes:

“And now, please let your servant stay instead of the youth as a slave to my lord, and let the youth go up with his brothers. For how can I go up to my father if the youth is not with us? Let me not see the evil that would meet my father!” (Genesis 44:33-34)

Judah has changed in the last twenty years;¹ he is no longer callous or selfish, and he has empathy for his father. Has Joseph also changed?

Joseph was not able to pull himself together before all those attending him, and he called out: “Clear out every man around me!” So not a man stood with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. And he wept aloud and the Egyptians heard, and the house of Pharaoh heard. (Genesis 45:1-2)

Twice before Joseph was overcome and left the room to weep: once when his older brothers expressed guilt for their lack of compassion for Joseph in the pit², and once when he saw his little brother Benjamin, all grown up.³ At the sight of Benjamin, the Torah says, Joseph’s rachamim (רַחֲמִים), his compassion or loving emotion, is kindled. It is the first unambiguous empathy Joseph exhibits. (See last week’s post, Mikeitz & Vayeishev: A Narcissist in the Pit?)

Now Joseph cries in front of all his brothers.

And Joseph said to his brothers: “Geshu, please, to me.” Vayiggashu. And he said: “I am Joseph, your brother who you sold to Egypt.” (Genesis 45:4)

geshu (גְּשׁוּ) = Approach! Come closer! (Another form of the verb nigash.)

vayiggashu (ו־יִּגָּשׁוּ) = and they approached, and they stepped forward. (Also a form of the verb nigash.)

Joseph asks his brothers to come closer, and they do—physically. But can they come closer emotionally? Joseph’s next words are:

“And now, don’t find fault and don’t be angry with yourselves that you sold me here, because God sent me before you to preserve life. Because this pair of years the famine has been in the midst of the land, and for another five years there will be no plowing nor harvest. But God sent me before you to set up food for you in the land and to keep you alive as a large group of survivors.” (Genesis 45:5-7)

In Joseph’s explanation, his older brothers bear no guilt—and have no agency. They are not responsible for their crime, because God made them do it. Their deeds have no importance; they were only God’s means for bringing Joseph to Egypt, where he would become a hero.

Joseph Dwelleth in Egypt,
by James Tissot

So now, you did not send me here, but God! And He has set me up as a father-figure to Pharaoh, and as the master of all his household, and as the one who dominates all the land of Egypt. (Genesis 45:8)

Joseph’s moment of compassion and affection for Benjamin did not transform him. His statement that God manipulated his brothers like pawns in order to make him the ruler of everything and the savior of his family is an undisguised expression of narcissism.

After delivering this statement and requesting that his brothers bring Jacob and the rest of the extended family to Egypt so Joseph can take care of them, he wants to exchange tears and embraces with his brothers. It is an opportunity for them to express gratitude toward their savior.

The first embrace is successful.

And he fell on the neck of his brother Benjamin and he wept, and Benjamin wept on his neck. (Genesis 45:14)

Benjamin has no bad memories or guilt regarding his brother Joseph. The ten older brothers do the best they can, but the Torah does not say they wept, or kissed him, or embraced him.

And he kissed all his brothers and he wept on them. And after that his brothers spoke with him. (Genesis 45:15)

Joseph may feel some affection for Benjamin. For all we know, he also feels affection for his own Egyptian wife and sons. But he exhibits more narcissism than empathy.

During the seven-year famine, his brothers have no alternative but to obey Joseph and bring Jacob and their own wives and children and grandchildren down to Egypt.

And Joseph settled his father and his brothers, and he gave them holdings in the land of Egypt, in the best part of the land … And Joseph sustained his father, his brothers, and all the household of his father with bread, down to the mouths of the little ones. (Genesis 47:12)

With his extended family members, Joseph acts like a benign God. As long as they are completely dependent on him, he is generous and happy.

With the Egyptian farmers, Joseph enjoys a different aspect of his importance and power. Sometime after the second year of famine they run out of silver to pay for the grain that Joseph collected and stored during the seven years of plenty.

And Joseph said: “Bring your livestock, and I will give to you in exchange for your livestock, if there is no more silver.” (Genesis 47:16)

Soon the Pharaoh owns all the livestock in Egypt (except for the animals belonging to Joseph’s family and to the Egyptian priests). The following year the Egyptian farmers tell Joseph that they have nothing left to trade for grain except themselves and their fields. Joseph calls it a deal.

And Joseph acquired all the soil of Egypt for Pharaoh, since each Egyptian sold his field, because the famine was so hard on them. And the land became Pharaoh’s. And he made the people cross, town by town, from one end of the border of Egypt to the other end. (Genesis 47:20-21)

Joseph not only takes each farming family’s title to its land, but moves the family away from home to farm in another part of the country.

And Joseph said to the people: “Hey! I have acquired you today, and your land, for Pharaoh. There is seed for you, and you shall sow the land. And it will happen at every harvest, you shall give one-fifth to Pharaoh …” And they said: “You have kept us alive. May we find favor in the eyes of my lord, and we will be slaves to Pharaoh.” (Genesis 47:23-25)

Joseph’s motivation is not greed; he arranges for the Pharaoh to own everything. His purpose is to display his power. Joseph, and Joseph alone, can rearrange the government and population of all Egypt.

One does not need to be a narcissist to lack empathy for members of a particular population. Even today, many people who are unselfish, sympathetic, and caring members of their own community also speak and vote callously when it comes to foreigners and outsiders. It is easier to blame the stranger than to love the stranger.

Joseph is a narcissist with his extended family as well as with the Egyptians; the only affection he exhibits in the Torah is for his younger brother Benjamin. Sometimes he is cold and calculating, and other times he is a drama queen. His narcissism makes him untrustworthy; even after his older brothers have lived for seventeen years living under his protection in Egypt, as soon as their father dies they are afraid Joseph will take revenge on them.⁴

You cannot really come close to a narcissist. But you can approach your own soul, and ask yourself for whom you feel no empathy.

—

Genesis 38:1-26.
Genesis 42:21.
Genesis 43:30-31.
Genesis 50:15-20. Fortunately for the brothers, Joseph still believes God arranged everything so Joseph would be the hero.

Vayiggash & Vayechi: Forgiving?

Salachtikha; I forgive you.

Joseph never says that. But then, no form of the verb salach, סָלַח (forgave) appears in the book of Genesis/Bereishit. When the word shows up elsewhere in the Bible, it is always God, not a human being, who forgives.

However, Joseph does know about pardoning, which men in command can do. In the Torah portion Vayeishev he interprets the dreams of two of his fellow inmates in an Egyptian prison. He tells one, the pharaoh’s chief cupbearer:

“In another three days the pharaoh yissa your head and he will restore you to your position and you will put the pharaoh’s cup on his palm…” (Genesis/Bereishit 40:13)

yissa (יִשָׂא) = he will lift. To lift up someone’s head is an idiom meaning “to pardon”. (A form of the root verb nasa, נָשָׂא = lifted, raised high, carried.)

Joseph then interprets the chief baker’s dream:

“In another three days the pharaoh yissa your head off you, and he will impale you on a pole and the birds will eat your flesh off you.” And it was the third day, the birthday of the pharaoh, and he made a banquet for all of his servants. Vayissa the head of the chief cupbearer and the head of the chief baker from among his servants. And he restored the chief cupbearer to bearing cups, and he put the pharaoh’s cup on his palm. But the chief baker he impaled… (Genesis 40:19-22)

vayissa (וַיִּשָּׁא) = and he lifted. (From the root verb nasa.)

The pharaoh lifts up the cupbearer’s head, pardoning him; but he lifts off the baker’s head, executing him.

Two years later, Joseph is brought up from prison to interpret two dreams of the pharaoh, and by the end of their conversation the pharaoh has made Joseph the viceroy of Egypt.¹

Joseph wants to forget his family back in Canaan, especially his ten older brothers, who hated him so much they were not able to speak to him in peace², and his father, who was responsible both for creating the discord among his sons and for sending Joseph out alone to find and report back on his brothers. (See my post Mikeitz: Forgetting a Father.) The brothers seized him, threw him in a pit, then sold him as a slave to a caravan bound for Egypt.

When he sees his brothers again, Joseph is 37 years old and the viceroy of Egypt. He now has the power to execute his brothers or to pardon them.

He decides to test them first. He overhears them express remorse over how they treated their younger brother Joseph. Then the brothers undergo a series of tests, and Joseph concludes that they have changed. (See my post Mikeitz & Vayiggash: Testing.) The tests are mysterious to Joseph’s brothers because they do not recognize him; they assume their younger brother died as a slave, and the viceroy is an Egyptian.

The conditions are ripe for forgiveness; Joseph’s older brothers have expressed remorse, and he can now trust them not to harm him or his younger brother Benjamin. But does Joseph ever forgive—or at least pardon—his brothers? Does he forgive his father for putting him in danger?

***Vayiggash*: Does Joseph forgive his brothers?**

Joseph reveals his identity to his brothers after they refuse to leave Egypt without Benjamin, the youngest of Jacob’s sons and the only one with the same mother as Joseph.

And Joseph said to his brothers: “I am Joseph. Is my father really still alive!” But his brothers were not able to answer him, because they were aghast before his face. (Genesis/Bereishit 45:3)

His brothers are too stunned, and perhaps terrified, to answer. The man who has absolute power over them is the man whom they once sold into slavery.

Meanwhile, Joseph realizes that events had to unfold this way, or his whole extended family would have starved to death during the famine. His brothers’ crime was necessary to get Joseph to Egypt, where God inspired him to interpret the pharaoh’s dreams and he became the viceroy in charge of the only food supply in the region.

“And now, don’t worry, and don’t be angry with yourselves that you sold me here, because God sent me ahead of you to preserve life. For this pair of years the famine has been in the land, and for another five years there will be no plowing nor harvest. So God sent me ahead of you to set up food for you in the land and to keep you alive as a large group of survivors.” (Genesis/Bereishit 45:5-7)

By telling his older brothers not to worry or be angry with themselves over their crime, Joseph is telling them that the concept of guilt does not apply in their case. They are not responsible for their bad deed; God made them do it.

So now, you did not send me here, but God! And He has set me up as a father-figure to the pharaoh, and as the master of all his household, and as the ruler of all the land of Egypt. (Genesis/Berishit 45:8)

Now, Joseph thinks, he can be a hero and save everyone—his brothers, his father, and the whole extended family.

“Hurry and go up to my father and say to him: Thus said your son Joseph: God placed me as master of all Egypt. Come down to me, don’t stand still. And you shall dwell in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your children and the children of your children, and your flocks and your herds and everything that is yours. And I will provide for you there …” (Genesis 45:9-11)

Although Joseph starts off attributing everything to God, he ends up promising that he, Joseph, will be a father-figure to his own family, as well as to the pharaoh. He is in charge.³ And he wants his actual father, Jacob, to be impressed by his long-lost son’s power.

“And you must tell my father about all my honor in Egypt, and all that you have seen. And you must hurry and bring my father down here.” (Genesis 45:13)

Joseph Embraces Benjamin,
by Owen Jones, 1869

Having reduced his brothers to mere dependents, Joseph embraces Benjamin and weeps. Benjamin hugs him back, also weeping.

Then he kissed all his brothers and he wept upon them, and after that his brothers spoke to him. (Genesis 45:15)

Maybe now his older brothers can “speak to him in peace” because they no longer hate him. Or maybe their hatred has been replaced by fear. Benjamin, who was six years old and at home when the older brothers sold Joseph, can embrace his long-lost brother. But the ten older men merely speak; they neither cry, nor kiss Joseph, nor embrace him.

By denying that his brothers made a choice to sell him into slavery, Joseph shows that he does not respect them as adult human beings who are responsible for their own actions. Personally, I would rather admit a crime and apologize for it, than be silenced because my victim insists I had no freedom of choice.

As far as Joseph is concerned, he has absolved his older brothers of guilt and reconciled with him. But his brothers do not see it that way. Joseph’s speech allays their fear of retribution for a while, but it does not resolve their guilt.

***Vayiggash*: Does Joseph forgive his father?**

Joseph sends his brothers back to Canaan with gifts, and his whole extended family moves to Egypt to live under Joseph’s protection.

Joseph and Jacob Reunited,
by Owen Jones 1869

Joseph hitched up his chariot and went up to Goshen to meet Israel [a.k.a. Jacob], his father. And he [Joseph] appeared to him, and he fell upon his neck, and he wept upon his neck a while. Then Israel said to Joseph: “I can die now, after seeing your face, [knowing] that you are still alive.” (Genesis 46:29-30)

Like many parents, Jacob does not know that he failed his son, so he does not apologize. Joseph could bring up what his father did 22 years before, and hope for an apology. (See my post Miketiz: Forgetting a Father.) Instead he treats Jacob the same way he treated the innocent Benjamin. There is no apology and no forgiveness; both father and son act as if their relationship is just fine.

This may be pragmatism on Joseph’s part. After all, Joseph has all the authority now, and he knows Jacob is not an insightful person. Why stir up old trouble?

Or Joseph may be thinking that if his father had not played favorites, then sent him alone into danger, he would never have been sold to the caravan headed for Egypt. Therefore God must have arranged Jacob’s behavior, too.

***Vayechi*: Does Joseph forgive his brothers after Jacob’s death?**

Jacob dies in this week’s Torah portion, Vayechi (“and he lived”). Then his ten older sons become afraid that Joseph only restrained himself from executing them so as not to upset Jacob. In desperation, they invent a deathbed command.

And the brothers of Joseph saw that their father was dead, and they said: “What if Joseph bears a grudge against us and he indeed pays us back for all the evil that we rendered to him?” And they sent an order to Joseph saying: “Your father gave an order before he died, saying: Thus you shall say to Joseph: Please sa, please, the offense of your brothers and their guilt because of the evil they rendered to you. And now sa, please, the offense of the servants of the god of your father.” And Joseph wept over the words to him. (Genesis 50:15-17)

sa (שָׂא) = lift! (A form of the verb nasa.)

This communication proves that Joseph’s brothers did not feel pardoned or forgiven when he first told them that God arranged everything, including their crime.

And they do not feel safe with Joseph. Why should they? According to Joseph’s philosophy, anyone might become a puppet in God’s hands, deprived of free will. In such a universe, no one can be trusted.

On the other hand, if Joseph is wrong and humans do have a measure of free will, they still cannot trust Joseph.

Then his brothers even went and threw themselves down before him, and they said: “Here we are, your slaves.” And Joseph said to them: “Don’t be afraid! Am I instead of God?⁴ And you, you planned evil for me, but God planned it for good, in order to bring about this time of keeping many people alive.” (Genesis 50:18-20)

Joseph implies that only God can decide whether to punish the brothers. He also continues to make God responsible for his brothers’ crime. And although their false deathbed order explicitly begs Joseph to pardon—sa!—his brothers, he does not do so. Instead he says:

“And now, don’t be afraid; I, myself, will provide for you and your little ones.” And he comforted them and he spoke upon their hearts. (Genesis 50:21)

In the Torah, to speak upon someone’s heart is an idiom for changing that person’s feelings. (See my post Vayishlach: Change of Heart, Part 1.) Joseph both comforts his brothers and persuades them that he will continue to be responsible for their well-being. Even without a pardon, they finally trust Joseph.

Forgiveness or pardon is not the only road to reconciliation.

It’s a tall order, but I try to do better than Joseph. When people offer me apologies, explicitly or implicitly, I remember Joseph, and I am careful to accept them. Instead of saying merely, “It’s okay,” I say: “It’s okay, I forgive you.” I do not want anyone to suffer lingering guilt or uncertainty on my account.

On the other hand, if people wrong me or those I love, and they never admit it nor apologize, I struggle to forgive them. Sometimes I can reach a working relationship with them, but I never feel safe. Any reconciliation is incomplete.

May we all be blessed with a greater ability to be responsible for our own actions, to apologize, to forgive, and to change.

—

Genesis 41:1-41.
Genesis 37:4.
Although Joseph is indeed second only to the pharaoh in power, he is not the absolute ruler he claims to be when he is bragging to his brothers. Later he has to ask the pharaoh for authorization for his family to settle in Goshen (Genesis 46:31-34) and for permission to leave Egypt to bury his father (Genesis 50:4-6).
Jacob protested “Am I instead of God?” when Rachel, his second wife, has not become pregnant and she demands that Jacob give her children (Genesis 30:2, Vayeitzei).

Mikeitz & Vayiggash: Testing

Someone harms you or your loved one. There is no apology, no reconciliation. Years later you are thrown together again. What do you do?

Joseph faces his ten older brothers 20 years after they seized him, talked about killing him, then sold him as a slave to a caravan bound for Egypt.¹ During that time, thanks to his own intelligence and a prophetic gift from God, Joseph has become Pharaoh’s viceroy. When Joseph sees his brothers again, they are bowing down to him and requesting permission to buy grain.

When the brothers last saw Joseph he was seventeen. Now he is in his late thirties. He has an Egyptian name, and wears Egyptian clothes. He recognizes his brothers, but they do not recognize him. So he pretends to be the stranger he appears, and speaks to them through an interpreter.

At first Joseph accuses them of being spies. (He wants to accuse them of something, and spying may occur to him because when he was 17 he was a spy; he brought “bad reports” of his brothers to Jacob. See last week’s post, Mikeitz: Forgetting a Father.) The brothers protest:

“All of us are sons of one man. We are keinim! Your servants would never be spies.” (Genesis/Bereishit 42:11)

keinim (כֵּנִים) = (plural) upright, honest, virtuous.

Joseph knows that they were hardly keinim when they sold him into slavery. But have they changed over the last 20 years?

He repeats that they are spies, and as the ten men from Canaan explain who they are, they mention that their father had twelve sons.

And hey! The youngest is with our father now, and the [other] one is absent. (Genesis 42:13)

Joseph uses this statement to test his brothers. He says:

“In this tibacheinu, by the life of Pharaoh! If you leave this place, then your youngest brother must come here. Send off one from among yourselves, and he will take your brother; and you will be imprisoned. And your words, yibachanu, [to see if] the truth is with you. If not, by the life of Pharaoh, then you are spies.” (Genesis 42:15-16)

tibacheinu (תִּבָּחֵנוּ) = you will be tested. (A form of the verb bachan, בָּחַן = tested.)

yibachanu (יִבָּחַנוּ) = they will be tested. (Also a form of the verb bachan.)

Joseph throws all ten of them in prison for three days. When he releases them, he overhears them speaking in Hebrew.

And they said, each man to his brother: “Alas! We are guilty on account of our brother, because we saw the distress of his soul when he pleaded with us for mercy, and we did not listen. Therefore this distress came upon us.” (Genesis 42:21)

This is the first evidence Joseph gets that his older brothers have changed. When he was seventeen, his brothers were only concerned about getting rid of Joseph for good without being technically responsible for shedding his blood. Now they remember Joseph as a human being with feelings, and they feel guilty.

Joseph’s Brothers Find the Silver,
Aunt Louisa’s Sunday Picture Book, c. 1870

The test continues. Joseph decides to keep only one brother, Simon, as a hostage. He sells grain to the other nine, and sneaks their silver back into their packs just before they leave for Canaan. Again he orders them to return with their youngest brother, threatening that they will not see his face unless they do.

The youngest of Jacob’s twelve sons is Benjamin, Joseph’s only full brother—the only other son Jacob had with his beloved Rachel. Their father, Jacob, always played favorites. He loved Rachel more than his other wife or his concubines, and after she died he loved her elder son Joseph more than his other sons. Joseph guesses that his father has become attached to Benjamin now, and he wants to find out if his half-brothers would treat Benjamin as badly as they once treated him.

He may also remember his baby brother fondly; he was an innocent child of six when Joseph’s older brothers could not speak a peaceful word to him. Maybe Joseph wants to protect Benjamin in Egypt if their half-brothers turn out to be just as wicked as before.

Jacob, having already lost Rachel and Joseph, refuses to let Benjamin go to Egypt. He would rather leave his unloved son Simon in an Egyptian prison for life. But the famine continues. Judah (Jacob’s fourth son) points out that the whole family will starve to death if they do not return to Egypt for grain, and he pledges to be responsible for Benjamin. Jacob finally lets him go.

When the brothers arrive in Egypt with Benjamin, Joseph releases Simon and invites them all to dine at his palace. Nervously, the brothers tell Joseph’s steward that they found silver in their packs last time, and offer to return it along with more silver to buy more food. This might show only that the brothers are smart enough to avoid being accused of theft; or it might indicate that they have become more honest.

At the feast, Joseph gives Benjamin five times as much food as the others, putting his little brother in the same position Joseph was in when Jacob gave him, and none of his brothers, an expensive tunic. This time the ten older brothers do not react to the favoritism.

Then the final test begins. Once again, Joseph has the silver returned to the brothers’ packs.² He also has his steward plant a silver cup in Benjamin’s pack. Then Joseph sends the man to overtake the brothers on the road, make a show of finding the “thief” of the cup, and declare that Benjamin must remain in Egypt as a slave.

Instead of letting Benjamin take the blame, the brothers all return to Joseph’s palace with him.

And Judah said: “What can we say to my lord? How can we speak, and how can we prove our innocence? God has found out the crime of your servants. Here we are, slaves to my lord, along with the one in whose hand the goblet was found.” (Genesis 44:16)

The older brothers’ solidarity with Benjamin might be the final piece of evidence Joseph needs. But a lingering doubt makes him repeat that only Benjamin will stay as a slave in Egypt.

Then, at the opening of this week’s Torah portion, Vayiggash (“And he approached”), Judah steps closer to the viceroy of Egypt and tells the story of Jacob’s love for Benjamin, predicting that if Benjamin does not return, their father will die. He concludes:

“And now, please let your servant stay instead of the boy as a slave to my lord. And let the boy go up with his brothers. For how can I go up to my father if the boy is not with me?—lest I see the evil that would find my father!” (Genesis 44:33-34)

At that point Joseph’s test ends. His older brothers have proven that they have changed for the better.

There is one piece of unfinished business. Joseph has not had the opportunity to test his father, who never overtly harmed him, but did smother him with a narcissistic love, and did send him off alone and unprotected to find his hostile older brothers far away to the north. (See my post Mikeitz: Forgetting a Father for two clues that Joseph blamed his father for some of his suffering.)

Joseph Recognized by his Brothers,
by Marc Chagall

Joseph has not forgotten his father. Overcome with emotion, he sends all his attendants out of the room, bursts into tears, and says:

I am Joseph. Is my father really still alive? (Genesis 45:3)

Having tested his older brothers, Joseph will not punish them, will not take revenge. But will he forgive them?

Will Joseph be able to forgive his father without testing him? I will address these questions in next week’s post, Vayiggash & Vayechi: Forgiving.

Testing people who once harmed you or your loved one is harder in real life than it is in the Torah. A few times in my life I have withheld my true feelings, looking for signs of change in people who once attacked me, but the evidence has always been ambiguous. If reconciliation is possible, it happens in a different way. And if reconciliation is not possible, the injured person can still find an inner healing.

May all of us who have been harmed without a reconciliation receive divine insight, so that like Joseph, we can reveal our feelings, let go of our disguises, and become whole.

—

Genesis 37:12-27 (in the Torah portion Vayeishev).
Robert Alter points out: “Meanwhile, as in dream logic—or perhaps one should say, guilt logic—the brothers, who once took silver when they sold Joseph down into Egypt, seem helpless to ‘return’ the silver to Egypt, as much as they try.” (Robert Alter, The Five Books of Moses, W.W. Norton & Co., New York, 2004, p. 253)