Глава 42

Joseph's brothers first arrival in Egypt Gen.42:1–4. And Jacob learned that there was bread in Egypt, and Jacob said to his sons, “What are you looking at?” And he said, Behold, I have heard that there is bread in Egypt; go there and buy us bread from there, so that we may live and not die. Ten brothers of Joseph went to buy grain in Egypt, But Jacob did not send Benjamin the brother of Joseph with his brothers, for he said, “No harm would have happened to him.” The news of the sale of bread in Egypt reaches the old man, and, by his order, his 10 sons, who at that time probably lived each in a separate house (cf. Gen. 38:1), go to Egypt (expecting, perhaps, to buy more bread for 10 people). But Jacob does not let go of Benjamin, the only son of his beloved Rachel after Joseph, for fear of any danger for him on the way, from the outside, or even from the brothers themselves. Gen.42:5. And the children of Israel came to buy grain, along with the others who came, for there was a famine in the land of Canaan. On the road, the sons of Jacob joined together in one caravan with foreigners going to Egypt for the same purpose. The Egyptian city where they came was, according to some interpreters, Memphis, according to others - Tanis. Gen.42:6. Joseph was a ruler in that land; he sold grain to all the people of the earth. Joseph's brothers came and bowed down to him with their faces to the ground. Heb. schallit (chief, ruler) comes from a Chaldean root rather than a Hebrew one, and is used mainly in sacred books of later origin, for example. Dan. 5:29, but this does not give reason to consider this word here as a later insertion, since in ancient times there were Aramaisms in the Hebrew language (Gen. 31:47). Joseph had, without a doubt, only the highest supervision in the sale of grain. It is possible that his personal participation was required when selling grain to foreigners and, moreover, in any significant quantities - since, as a ruler, he had to ensure that the demands of foreigners were satisfied only after satisfying the needs of the Egyptians and not at all to the detriment of the latter. Hearing about the arrival of a caravan from his native Canaan, he demands those who arrived to him, and in the first scene of the meeting, Joseph’s long-standing dreams are fulfilled (Gen. 37:6–9). Joseph's harsh reception of them Gen.42:7–8. And Joseph saw his brothers and recognized them; but he showed that he did not know them, and spoke to them sternly and said to them: where did you come from? They said: from the land of Canaan, buy food. Joseph recognized his brothers, but they did not recognize him. Joseph could easily recognize his brothers, since when Joseph was sold they were already almost adults (“with beards,” as the Midrash notes) and during the separation, given the monotony of nomadic life, they could not change significantly. Then, Joseph could expect their arrival in Egypt for bread and now he saw them all together, moreover, he knew and understood their language, although, following etiquette, he spoke to them through an interpreter. The brothers, on the contrary, naturally did not recognize Joseph, who had been sold by them for 17 years, and now had 38, held the post of the first Egyptian nobleman, by his costume, appearance, language, etc. seemed to them to be an Egyptian: in such a situation they least of all expected to find their brother, of whose death they were, moreover, convinced (v. 22). As for Joseph’s harsh treatment of the brothers he recognized, it can be assumed that at first two opposing feelings fought in Joseph: bitterness and vindictiveness on the one hand, love on the other (the latter feeling triumphs already at the first meeting, v. 24) - Joseph did not know the Christian commandment about love for enemies, and it is possible to assume an unkind feeling of revenge in him. With all that, “the trick he used, no doubt, had good motives, such as: to arouse the conscience of the guilty brothers with threatening misfortune to admit the crime they committed and to blot it out; receive quick news about the fate of his father and half-brother and, before revealing the secret, bring Benjamin to complete safety, against whom envy and malice, deceived in Joseph, could turn their weapons” (Metropolitan Philaret, Zap. on Genesis 2, 212). Gen.42:9. And Joseph remembered the dreams that he had about them; and he said to them, “You are spies, you have come to spy out the nakedness of the ****** of this land.” (cf. 12, 14). The accusation (insincerely) by Joseph of the brothers of espionage was aimed, on the one hand, at some punishment and testing of his brothers, and on the other, to prevent the displeasure of the Egyptians regarding Joseph’s immediately favorable relations with foreigners. In the spirit of Egyptian policy, Joseph accuses his brothers, who came to Egypt from the northeast, of looking out for the most unprotected places, from Heb.: nakedness, countries - and in Egypt this was especially the northeastern border, open to raids by Asian nomads (from here the Hykses probably entered Egypt); moreover, Joseph’s brothers came in a whole caravan; finally, the custom of sending out spies before occupying a particular land was noted more than once in biblical antiquity (Num. 21:32; Josh. 2:1; Judg. 18:2). In this sense, Joseph's brothers really turned out to be scouts for a new territory, since the consequence of their arrival in Egypt was their settlement here. Gen.42:13–16. They said: We, your servants, are twelve brothers; We are the sons of one man in the land of Canaan, and behold, the youngest is now with our father, but one is gone. And Joseph said to them: This is what I spoke to you, saying, “You are spies; This is how you will be tested: I swear by the life of Pharaoh, you will not leave here unless your youngest brother comes here; send one of you, and let him bring your brother here, and you will be detained; In noble indignation at the accusation, Joseph's brothers, with all the strength of conviction in their own innocence, pretend that they are the children of one father (who, it is understood, would not have risked sending all his sons as spies and thereby exposing them to danger), honest people (according to LXX, Vulg., Slav. - “peaceful”), members of a small tribe in Canaan, and therefore cannot in any way be dangerous for Egypt. For obvious reasons, they speak in a low voice about Joseph’s death, but they reveal the information Joseph needs about his father and half-brother Benjamin. Wanting to be better convinced of the good feelings of his brothers towards Benjamin, Joseph demands his arrival in Egypt. But Joseph’s deep emotional unrest is expressed in the inconsistency of his decisions: either he accuses them of a crime (vv. 9, 12, 14), for which death was due, then he sentences them to imprisonment (v. 15), then, leaving everyone in Egypt, he suggests sending one of the brothers for Benjamin (v. 16), then he makes the opposite decision - he leaves one as a hostage, and releases the others (v. 18–20). The oath by the life of the king was very common in the ancient and modern East (now among the Persians), and from there it probably passed to Rome (where its formula was “per salutem Caesarum”); according to Herodotus, it also existed among the Scythians (4 books, 68). The Bible more than once notes the custom of swearing by the life of a king (1 Kings 17:55, 20:3, 25:26; cf. 2 Kings 2:4). LXX: νὴ τὴν ὑγίειαν Φαραώ, Vulg:. per salutem Pharaonis, glory:. “This is the health of the pharaoh.” Their imprisonment and release under the condition of bringing Benjamin and leaving Simeon as a hostage. Gen.42:17. And he put them in custody for three days. The imprisonment of the brothers, according to Joseph's intention, was to awaken in them repentance for their long-standing crime against Joseph; this goal, as can be seen from Art. 21–22, was achieved; In addition, by the measure mentioned, Joseph wanted to show his brothers the immutability of his decision to see Benjamin with him. Gen.42:18–20. And Joseph said to them on the third day, Do this and you will live, for I fear God: if you are honest people, then let one brother of you be kept in the house where you are imprisoned; and you go, bring bread, for the sake of the hunger of your families; Bring your youngest brother to me, so that your words may be justified and so that you will not die. So they did. In his second conversation with his brothers, Joseph, without yet freeing them from suspicion, however, softens the tone of his speech and his sentence, demanding that only one brother be left as collateral. Joseph motivates this gentleness of his decision with a feeling of fear of God, which, of course, assured the brothers that the ruler of Egypt would not allow anything unfair towards them. Gen.42:21. And they said to each other: As if we are being punished for sin against our brother; we saw the suffering of his soul when he begged us, but we did not listen to [him]; That is why this grief befell us. Having accepted the decision announced by Joseph, the brothers, under the influence of the same feeling of fear of God that Joseph mentioned, feel remorse for their guilt before Joseph: in the disaster that befell them, they, according to the biblical view, see retribution for their cruelty towards their brother. “Now an incorruptible judge, conscience, arises, although no one denounces them and brings them to trial: they accuse themselves” (John Chrysostom, Bes. 64, 684). Gen.42:23–24. But they did not know that Joseph understood; for there was an interpreter among them. And [Joseph] went away from them and wept. And he returned to them and spoke with them, and taking Simeon from them, he bound him before their eyes. The beautiful scene of the brothers’ repentance, heard and understood by Joseph (to ward off suspicions, he spoke to them through an interpreter; subsequently the interpreter is not mentioned in the relations of Jacob and his sons with the Egyptians due, probably, to the proximity of the Hebrew and Egyptian languages), touched Joseph to the depths of his soul, but he, having made an effort over himself, leaves Simeon hostage - according to the above probable assumption of the rabbis, the main culprit the cruel act of the brothers towards Joseph. According to the Midrash, he tied Simeon only in front of the brothers’ eyes, and after leaving, he freed them, fed and watered them (Beresch. r. 91, s. 450). The return of the 9 sons of Jacob to their father and his refusal to let Benjamin go Gen.42:25. And Joseph ordered that their sacks be filled with bread, and their silver returned to each one in his sack, and that they be given provisions for the journey. That's what was done with them. Joseph generously provides the brothers with bread (not only one bag for each, but as much as each brother could fit in different bundles) and at the same time, perhaps out of a desire to save the brothers from financial difficulties on a new trip to Egypt, he orders the payment for the bread to be put back into each bag - a measure that served as a new source of embarrassment for his brothers. Gen.42:27–28. And one of them opened his sack to give food to his donkey for the night, and he saw his money in the hole of his sack, and he said to his brothers, “My silver is returned; here it is in my bag. And their hearts were troubled, and they said to one another with trembling, “What has God done to us?” The lodging for the night (Heb. malon, Vulg. diverssorium), where Joseph’s brothers stayed, could hardly have been a caravanserai, which was later common in the East (cf. Jer 9:1–2), and, probably, in accordance with the Jewish etymology of the word, the most convenient place for spending the night was near a watering hole and under the shade of palm trees. At this halt, one of the brothers (according to Jewish tradition, Levi), cf. Art. 35, or all 9 brothers at once (Gen. 43:21), opening the bags of donkey feed, were surprised and horrified to find the silver they had paid in Egypt. In amazement at this, they attribute it to God. Gen.42:29–35. And they came to Jacob their father in the land of Canaan and told him everything that had happened to them, saying: the ruler of that land spoke to us sternly and took us for spies of that land. And we said to him: We are honest people; we were not spies; We are twelve brothers, sons of our father; one is gone, and the youngest is now with our father in the land of Canaan. And the ruler of that land said to us: this is how I will know whether you are honest people: leave with me one brother of you, and you take bread for the sake of the hunger of your families and go, and bring to me your youngest brother; and I will know that you are not spies, but honest people; I will give you your brother, and you can work in this land. And when they emptied their sacks, behold, each one had a bundle of his money in his sack. And they saw the bundles of their silver, they and their father, and were afraid. Upon returning to Jacob, his sons rush to convey to him everything that happened to them in Egypt, with the goal of now inducing Jacob to release Benjamin to Egypt, which is why they deliberately emphasize (v. 34) the categorical order of the Egyptian ruler regarding this arrival of Benjamin to Egypt, and the special promise of the ruler to grant Jacob’s sons the right to unhindered trade in Egypt (this was not discussed above said, but the correctness of this addition cannot be disputed). Gen.42:36. And Jacob their father said to them, “You have deprived me of my children: Joseph is gone, and Simeon is gone, and you want to take Benjamin—it’s all on me!” Jacob's answer, filled with inexpressible sorrow, makes it probable that some assumed that in his hyperbolic accusation of his sons, as if they had made him childless, Jacob involuntarily expressed his suspicion of his sons' involvement in the supposed death of Joseph. Gen.42:37–38. And Reuben spake to his father, saying, Kill my two sons, if I do not bring him to thee; give him into my hands; I'll return it to you. He said: My son will not go with you; because his brother died and he was left alone; if misfortune happens to him on the path you go on, then you will bring my gray hair with sadness to the grave. The guarantee offered by Reuben once again characterizes his kind heart and noble spirit, but in its form it reveals a kind of crude heroism, thoughtlessness and unreasonableness (the Midrash paraphrases Jacob’s refusal to Reuben: “foolish firstborn! are your sons only yours, and not also mine?” Beresch. r. Par. 101, s. 451), v. 38. For this reason, and mainly due to Jacob’s distrust of Reuben after his well-known insult to his father (Gen. 35:22), cf. Blessed Theodoret Rev. to the question 106, the grief-stricken father resolutely refuses to let Benjamin go to Egypt. The long-standing heart wound over the loss of Joseph has now been touched again, and he repeats his thought expressed then about Sheol (a place in the afterlife, Gen. 37:35). So little did Jacob feel the upcoming happy turn in his fate when “the spirit of Jacob came to life” (Gen. 45:27)! You might be interested in: