Joseph, a Favorite Son

GOLDEN TEXT: “Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.” —Ephesians 4:32

GENESIS 37:3-8, 23, 24, 28, 31-34

JOSEPH was born to Jacob in his old age. His mother was Rachel, who was Jacob’s favorite wife, for whom he had served Laban throughout the first seven years of his stay in Padam-aram and even for an additional seven years. It was partly, no doubt, because of his fervent love for Rachel that Jacob esteemed Joseph so highly. He loved Joseph more than any of his other children, and when he was seventeen years old he presented him with a “coat of many colors”—the marginal translation says “pieces.”

Joseph’s older brethren noticed this display of favoritism, and resented it, and they began to hate Joseph “and could not speak peaceably unto him.” The proper attitude would have been to rejoice with their father in his love for Joseph, and endeavor to appreciate the boy more themselves. But too often selfish human nature leads in the direction of jealousy and hatred

About then, Joseph had a dream in which he and his brethren were “binding sheaves in the field.” In the dream he saw his sheaf stand upright and the other sheaves bow down to his. He insisted on telling this dream to his brethren. In this perhaps we see the not infrequent urge of youth to prove to its elders that they were wrong, and that some day they would find it out. They could hardly be expected to react any differently than they did, which was to hate Joseph even more. Then Joseph had another dream in which he saw the sun and the moon and the stars making obeisance to him. He told this dream also to his brethren, and in front of his father. His father rebuked him for this, realizing, probably, the effect it would have on the older brethren. Jacob also saw a suggestion in this dream that one day even he might be bowing down to his son Joseph, and he probably was not pleased with this, either. However, there was a vast difference between the attitude of the brethren who hated Joseph and the father who loved him—“His brethren envied him; but his father observed the saying.”

In this we have an illustration of what often occurs in human, and even in Christian relationships. Where genuine love exists for a person, one is not likely to be easily offended by what he may say or do. But where a dislike exists, every trivial thing said or done by that one which may not be just as proper as it could be will be used as an excuse for the increase of hatred. This, however, is not the true way of the Christian. True, unselfish love will prompt a Christian to overlook the faults of foes as well as friends when it is at all possible.

Some time after Joseph told these dreams, his brethren went on a quest for good pasturage for their flocks. They went first to Shechem. Finding no suitable grazing land there, they went on to Dothan. Jacob became concerned over their welfare, and asked Joseph to go seek them, find out how they were getting along, and to bring back a report. Joseph gladly undertook this mission, indicating that he held no resentment toward his brethren.

But Joseph’s brethren continued to envy and hate him, and when they saw him approaching, decided that they would kill this “dreamer.” Reuben urged that instead of thus committing murder, they cast the boy into a pit and leave him there for whatever might happen to him. Reuben’s plan was that later he would rescue Joseph from the pit and take him back to his father.

The brothers agreed to the compromise and threw Joseph into a deep pit from which escape was impossible without help. They were about to abandon him there when, pausing for lunch before departing they saw a group of Ishmaelite traders en route to Egypt, and decided to sell Joseph to them to be taken into Egypt to serve as a slave.

Then Reuben, who evidently did not join with his brethren in their idea of selling Joseph into slavery, returned to the pit. Not finding Joseph there he supposed him to be dead, and so reported the matter to his brethren. Then together they plotted to deceive their father in the matter. They took Joseph’s special coat, which Jacob would be sure to recognize, smeared it with the blood of a young goat and, arriving home, spread it out before the aged father.

He interpreted the “evidence” just as they wanted him to, and concluded that Joseph had been killed and devoured by wild beasts. It was a dastardly crime on the part of his sons, and a heartbreaking experience for Jacob. He said, “I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning.” Here the Hebrew word translated “grave” is sheol, the only word in the Old Testament translated hell. This proves that the Bible hell is the state of death into which both the righteous and the wicked go when they die.

QUESTIONS

Who was Joseph, and why did his brethren hate him?

Does Christian love cause brethren in Christ to act differently than did Jacob’s sons?

What did Jacob say that proves the Bible hell to be the state of death into which both the righteous and the wicked go when they die?

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