Genesis 37

             This chapter begins my favorite story of the Old Testament. The saga of Joseph is, on one level, a simply great story full of drama, betrayal, suspense, intrigue and adventure with a deeply emotional, heartfelt ending. But, as part of scriptural canon and the holy word of God, the biography of Joseph – the naïve, proud, innocent boy who is sold into slavery by his jealous brothers, and then slowly rises to power in a foreign government, only to be in the right place at the right time to save his family in the end – takes on a much deeper spiritual meaning. The key verse to Joseph’s life and story is Genesis 50:20. God has always used the evil and selfish choices of sinful mankind to bring about His divine will, and this is demonstrated so clearly in the story of Joseph and his brothers, the chosen seed from whom descended the nation of Israel, God’s chosen people.
          But God, at the same time, works on a deeply personal level with the ones whom He chooses to be the specific instruments of His will. Joseph consistently displayed a deeply rooted and unshakeable faith in God that sustained him through the seemingly endless string of trials and hardships that he was forced to endure in the course of his young life. Through his father, no doubt, Joseph not only knew of God, but he had a close, personal relationship with Him that mirrored Israel’s own trust and faith in the Almighty. And, as a reward for his faith and steadfast obedience, God granted Joseph’s two sons the honor of fathering two of the twelve tribes of Israel.
            One more interesting aspect of Joseph’s life is just how closely it parallels that of Jesus Christ in the NT. As we study the OT, it becomes clear that Joseph is one of the earliest typologies of Jesus. See the chart at the end of this post (which I borrowed from John MacArthur’s Bible commentary).

           Verse 1: We are reminded again that Jacob settled in a land where his father, Isaac, had been a stranger. Even though God had promised this land to Abraham and his seed, He had not yet fulfilled that promise. Israel and all his house are still just sojourners here.
 
           Verses 2-4: We are introduced to Joseph, who is now seventeen years old. He spends his days helping his older brothers in the field, feeding and tending to the flock. Verse 2 states specifically that it is Dan, Naphtali, Gad and Asher, the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, that Joseph is most often helping. He also returns to his father each day and tattles on his brothers, bringing Jacob a bad report of all their doings. Verse 3 states that Israel loved Joseph more than all his other children, indicating that he had learned nothing from his previous experiences with familial favoritism and all its negative consequences. (Genesis 25:28) This is also an indication of Jacob’s continued favoritism of his late wife, Rachel. Even after her death, he still regards her as his first – and only true – love by publicly showing favoritism to Joseph, the oldest of the two sons born to him by Rachel.
            Jacob gifts Joseph with a coat of many colors, something that, for that time period, was truly precious and rare. The dyes used to make colored cloth, as well as the process itself, were quite expensive and time consuming to produce, and so Jacob’s gift naturally spawns jealousy and bitterness among his older sons against Joseph. Joseph, for his part, behaves like a typical teenager, basking in his father’s constant show of favoritism and naively ignoring his brothers’ animosity and jealousy towards him because of it.
 
          Verses 5-11: The situation is made worse when God grants Joseph a truly unusual gift: dream interpretation. Joseph has a dream one night, and he foolishly brags about it to his brothers the next day as they are all in the field tending to the flocks. In his dream, Joseph and his brothers are binding sheaves for the harvest, and Joseph’s sheaf of grain stands upright while all his brothers’ sheaves bow down to it. Naturally, the other sons of Jacob are upset at this, and angrily rebuke Joseph. Joseph had clearly understood that the dream meant that all of his brothers would one day bow down and serve him, and this makes his brothers even more angry and resentful of him. (v.8)
          But Joseph blithely ignores this, and when he has another similar dream a few nights later, he not only tells his brothers about it, but his father as well. This time, Jacob rebukes him. “Shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth?” (v.10) But where Joseph’s brothers dismiss him again, Jacob instead ponders Joseph’s dreams and his gift of interpreting them, perhaps because of his own experience with God speaking to him in his dreams. (v.11)
 
            Verses 12-24: Israel sends Joseph to check on his brothers who are tending to the flocks in Shechem.  But when Joseph arrives there he is told by a man in the fields that the brothers moved the herds to Dothan, another region nearby. When his brothers see him coming, while he is yet afar off, they begin conspiring to kill him. But Reuben convinces them to instead throw Joseph into a nearby pit, for he secretly plans to rescue Joseph later when the others have returned to tending the herds. (v.22) And so Joseph is assaulted by his brothers, stripped of his beautiful coat, and then cast into a pit.
 
            Verses 25-28: As everyone sits down to have lunch, they see a band of Ishmeelites – also known as Midianites – coming from Gilead on their way down to Egypt. Their camels are laden with rich spices, balm (Jeremiah 8:22) and myrrh (Genesis 43:11, Exodus 30:23, Esther 2:12, Psalm 45:8, Proverbs 7:17, Song of Solomon 1:13, 3:6, 4:6 & 14, 5:1, 5, 13, Matthew 2:11, Mark 15:23, John 19:39). Judah suggests that they sell Joseph to the Ishmeelites instead of killing him, and the other agree. They sell Joseph to the Egyptians for twenty pieces of silver, the common price for a slave in that time.
 
        Verses 29-35: Reuben, who had apparently been away from his brothers when they encountered the Ishmeelites, now returns to the pit to rescue Joseph, but becomes distraught when he finds it empty. He returns to his brothers, but it is unclear from the wording in verse 30 whether or not Reuben is told the truth about Joseph. All that is recorded is that he is upset because Joseph “…is not…”, meaning that he believes Joseph is dead. (Genesis 42:13, 36) Reuben is also upset because he will be held accountable by his father for Joseph’s fate since he is the oldest. “…and I, whither shall I go?”
           So all the brothers concoct a scheme to deceive Israel by killing a young goat and dipping Joseph’s coat of many colors into the blood. They return to their father and show him the coat, which he recognizes immediately. They tell him that a wild beast killed Joseph. Israel is, of course, devastated by this news, and promptly goes into mourning for many days. None of his family can comfort him.
 
         Verse 36: the Midianites sell Joseph to Potiphar, an officer in Pharaoh’s court and a captain of the guard.