Dreams of Greatness and Sibling Rivalry—Lectionary Reflection for Pentecost 11A/Proper 14A (Genesis 37)

Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28 New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

          37 Jacob settled in the land where his father had lived as an alien, the land of Canaan. ² These are the descendants of Jacob.

           Joseph, being seventeen years old, was shepherding the flock with his brothers; he was a helper to the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives, and Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father. ³ Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his children because he was the son of his old age, and he made him an ornamented robe. ⁴ But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably to him.

                 ¹² Now his brothers went to pasture their father’s flock near Shechem. ¹³ And Israel said to Joseph, “Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem? Come, I will send you to them.” He answered, “Here I am.” ¹⁴ So he said to him, “Go now, see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock, and bring word back to me.” So he sent him from the valley of Hebron.

                He came to Shechem, ¹⁵ and a man found him wandering in the fields; the man asked him, “What are you seeking?” ¹⁶ “I am seeking my brothers,” he said; “tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock.” ¹⁷ The man said, “They have gone away, for I heard them say, ‘Let us go to Dothan.’ ” So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan. ¹⁸ They saw him from a distance, and before he came near to them they conspired to kill him. ¹⁹ They said to one another, “Here comes this dreamer. ²⁰ Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; then we shall say that a wild animal has devoured him, and we shall see what will become of his dreams.” ²¹ But when Reuben heard it, he delivered him out of their hands, saying, “Let us not take his life.” ²² Reuben said to them, “Shed no blood; throw him into this pit here in the wilderness, but lay no hand on him”—that he might rescue him out of their hand and restore him to his father. ²³ So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the ornamented robe that he wore, ²⁴ and they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it.

                        ²⁵ Then they sat down to eat, and looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels carrying gum, balm, and resin, on their way to carry it down to Egypt. ²⁶ Then Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? ²⁷ Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers agreed. ²⁸ When some Midianite traders passed by, they drew Joseph up, lifting him out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver. And they took Joseph to Egypt.

**************

                The story of God’s covenant with Abraham and his descendants is not at all straightforward. From the very beginning, when God approached Abraham and told him that the world would be blessed through his descendants in Genesis 12, the story is filled with twists and turns, from the delay in Abraham getting the proper descendant to the near sacrifice of Isaac to Jacob’s sojourn in Haran and return to Canaan. But, as for Jacob (who becomes Israel through a wrestling match with God in Genesis 32), for good measure not only will he have four wives, but twelve sons. One of those sons, the son of his favorite wife, who went by the name of Joseph was a bit of a troublemaker. He was a dreamer who envisioned himself as being the top dog among his brothers (all older than him, except for Benjamin who was yet to be born). As you might expect that didn’t make him popular with his brothers. Nevertheless, God would use this dreamer to further God’s plan for this family and for the world itself.

                 You might call what we read here a case of sibling rivalry. It also serves as a reminder that when we think of biblical family values, there is a lot of family dysfunction present. In this story, Joseph is the younger brother. He has to help his brothers tend the flocks, but he also serves as something of a snitch. Since he was the favorite of his father (he was the son of Jacob’s favorite wife, Rachel) he was treated with a certain deference by his father, even receiving an ornamented robe, the famed Coat of Many Colores. He also had dreams, which he revealed to his brothers, telling them that they would bow down to him. As you can imagine, that didn’t make him very popular with his brothers.

                It is worth remembering that in the biblical story, it’s often the youngest child who will prove to be the one who gets the divine calling. Isaac was the second son, though the first son of the first wife. Jacob was the second son. While Benjamin will come along later, at the time this story takes place, Joseph is the youngest.

                Of course, the reason that this story is included in Genesis isn’t that this family is dysfunctional, though there are sufficient examples of it (see the later story of Judah and Tamar). The story functions as part of the providential unfolding of God’s work of blessing the nations. Joseph will be the final central figure in the Genesis story. Although Jacob and Joseph’s brothers still have a part to play, it’s Joseph who will serve as the key figure in moving the story forward. He becomes, as we learn as we move the Joseph story, the savior of his people. But, that movement of salvation leads the family to Egypt, with Joseph being sent there, not of his own choosing. Of course, we know how this works out. The family immigrates to Egypt, and they sojourn there for several centuries before God once again intervenes, leading to the exodus and the reclaiming of the promised land. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We still have to get Joseph to Egypt.

                The lectionary creators offer the first four verses of chapter 37 as a context for the main part of the story, which begins in verse 12. When we arrive at verse 12, the real action begins to take place. We’re told that Joseph’s older brothers were out tending Jacob’s flocks in a place near Shechem. Although Jacob surely knew that Joseph’s brothers resented him both for the special favors he showed to Joseph and because of Joseph’s dreams of greatness, dreams that Joseph had shared with his brothers (the dream is found in verses 5-11). According to Joseph, he had received a vision (perhaps from God) that suggested his brothers would bow down to him and make him their ruler. Despite the possibility that things could easily go wrong if Joseph joined his brothers out at the camp, Jacob sent Joseph out to check on his brothers (in other words, spy on them) and then come back and report on what he saw going on out in the fields.

                Despite the possibility that things could go badly, Jacob sent Joseph out to find his brothers. When he arrived at a place near Shechem, Joseph encountered a man, who asked Joseph, who may have seemed lost, what he was seeking. Joseph told the man he was seeking his brothers who were out there pasturing the flock. The man reported that he knew the brothers and that he had heard they had gone off to Dothan. So, the man told Joseph he would take him to find his brothers who were at Dothan.

                When Joseph’s brothers saw him approach, they began to plot against him. They were tired of having to deal with Joseph, so perhaps this was the time to get rid of him once and for all. The first suggestion involved fratricide. They talked about killing Joseph and then blaming his death on wild animals. That would be the end of Joseph’s dreams of greatness! While that was a possible response, Joseph’s oldest brother, Reuben, suggested a less violent plan. Why don’t they throw Joseph in a dry cistern until they figured out what to do with him? Reuben understood the frustrations of his brothers but wanted a less violent response. According to the narrator, Reuben planned to eventually return Joseph to his father. However, in the meantime, they stripped Joseph of his fancy coat. Then they threw him into the cistern before eating their meal.

                While the brothers ate their meal, they noticed a caravan of Ishmaelites coming their way. The Ishmaelites were distant relatives—descendants of Jacob’s half-uncle.  When the brothers saw the caravan, Judah, who was the fourth son of Leah, suggested that they should sell Joseph to the Ishmaelites and then tell Jacob that Joseph had been killed. While their father would be sad at the death of his favorite son, they would be free of their bothersome younger brother. By selling him instead of killing him, they wouldn’t have Joseph’s blood on their hands. Everyone seemed to agree with this plan, including Reuben. So when the Ishmaelites drew near, the brothers pulled Joseph out of the cistern and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver. The Ishmaelites took Joseph to Egypt. Thus ends the reading for the week. There is one more lectionary reading from Genesis left, a reading from Genesis 45, which records the reunion of Joseph with his brothers. However, that’s for another day.

                Although the brothers acted out of frustration and jealousy, their actions would not undo God’s plan to bless the nations. In time, Joseph will gain the favor of Pharaoh and become an important figure in the empire. In that position he would eventually prove to be the means of salvation for his family, but not before providing salvation for Egypt during a time of famine. Joseph’s family would benefit from this work. That might not have been the plan of his brothers, but it works out, as we’ll see next week.

                As the Joseph story continues (It runs from Genesis 37 to 50), he will get knocked down and then lifted up once again. Each time he rises further up in the land of his captivity. The result is that he will be put in a position to benefit his family, the family that sought to get rid of him. While the Genesis authors have the benefit of hindsight, it appears that all along the way, God is in control. The path might have its twists and turns, but in the end, things will work out as God would have it. The question raised by the passage has to do with determinism. Is God controlling every element here, or does God respond to choices made by the players in the story? How we read this passage will depend in large part on our own theological framework. If we believe that God controls everything, then everything goes according to script. But what if we have choices? Maybe God wanted to work through Joseph to bless the nations, but what they might look like might depend on the situations Joseph finds himself in.  Since I’m not a theological determinist, I believe that God does respond to our choices. I also believe that God has a sense of where things should go even if there isn’t a script. In other words, God’s ultimate purposes can be resisted and slowed down, but God will persist, such that even family dysfunction ultimately can’t defeat God’s ultimate purposes from being fulfilled.  

Image Attribution: Overbeck, Johann Friedrich, 1789-1869. Joseph sold into slavery, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=47452 [retrieved August 4, 2023]. Original source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Friedrich_Overbeck_002.jpg.