(Written
by Sheila Gail Landgraf)
So Jacob/Israel was living out his mature years in the land of Canaan where Isaac had lived
before him. Jacob/Israel had two sons by Rachel
that he loved very much. There was Benjamin whom she died giving birth to; he was the youngest son. The oldest son
was Joseph. The name Joseph means "he will add." Joseph was the eleventh and favored son of Israel.
When
Joseph was seventeen he was tending the flocks with his brothers (the ones born
to Leigh, Bilhah and Zilpah) and he brought their father a bad report of them. Israel always listened to Joseph and
Benjamin, his youngest two sons born in his old age from his beloved deceased
wife Rachel. Israel favored these two sons
above all the others. He was always
giving them special gifts.
One day Israel gave Joseph a very ornate robe that made the other brother’s envious. They became so jealous of Israel’s love for Joseph that they hated Joseph and never had one kind word for him again.
One day Israel gave Joseph a very ornate robe that made the other brother’s envious. They became so jealous of Israel’s love for Joseph that they hated Joseph and never had one kind word for him again.
One
day Joseph had a dream that they all were binding sheaves of grain out in the
field. Suddenly Joseph’s sheaves rose
and stood upright and all the other’s sheaves bowed down to Joseph’s
sheaves. When Joseph told this dream to
his brothers they hated him even more.
They scoffed at him and asked if he intended to rule over them?
Then
Joseph had another dream and again he told it to his brothers. In this dream the sun and moon and eleven
stars were bowing down to Joseph. The
brothers hated him even more. Joseph
told the dream to his father and his father rebuked him this time. Israel said to the young Joseph; “What is
this dream you had? Will your mother and
I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?” Afterwards Israel wondered at the meaning of
the dream.
A few days later Joseph’s brothers went to graze their father’s flocks near Shechem and Israel said to Joseph, “As you know, your brothers are grazing the flocks near Shechem. Come, I am going to send you to them.”
“Very
well.” Joseph replied. So Israel said to Joseph; “Go and see if all
is well with your brothers and with the flocks and bring word back to me.” So Joseph left from the Valley of Hebron and
headed toward Shechem. When he arrived
at Shechem a man found him wandering around in the fields and asked him what he
was looking for. Joseph replied that he
was looking for his brothers and asked the man if he could tell him where they
were grazing their flocks. The man
answered Joseph that they had moved on from there. He said he had heard them say “Let’s go to Dothan.”
So
Joseph went to Dothan and found them.
They saw him coming in the distance and before he reached them they
plotted to kill Joseph. They said “Here
comes that dreamer! Come now, let’s kill
him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal
devoured him. Then we will see what
comes of his dreams.”
When
the oldest brother, Ruben heard this, he tried to rescue Joseph from their
hands. “Let’s not take his life,” he
said. “Don’t shed any blood. Throw him into this cistern here in the
wilderness, but don’t lay a hand on him.”
Reuben was hopeful he could come back and rescue Joseph and take him
back to their father.
So
as soon as Joseph approached they stripped him of his robe and they took him
and threw him into the cistern. The
cistern was empty; there was no water in it.
The
brother’s then stopped to eat lunch and as they sat there eating they saw a
caravan approaching. The men in the
caravan were Ishmaelites coming from Gilead.
Their camels were loaded down with spices, balm and myrrh, and they were
on their way to take them down to Egypt.
Judah
had an idea for his brothers to consider.
He said “What will we gain if we kill out brother and cover up his
blood? Let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites
and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and
blood.” The other brothers agreed with
him. So when the Midianite merchants
came by , his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for
twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who then took Joseph to
Egypt.
Ruben
had been away tending to something else when they sold Joseph. He came back to the cistern hoping to save
him and take him home. When he saw that
he was not there he was terribly upset.
He went back to his brothers and said, “The boy isn’t there! Where can I turn now?”
Then
they all got Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the
blood. They took the ornate robe back to
their father and said, “We found this.
Examine it to see whether it is your son’s robe.”
Israel recognized the robe right away and exclaimed that it belonged to Joseph. He thought some ferocious animal had devoured him and imagined that Joseph had been torn to pieces.
Terribly
upset, Israel tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and mourned for his son for
many, many days. All of his sons and
daughters came to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “No,” he said, “I will continue to mourn
until I join my son in the grave. So
Joseph’s father wept for him.
