Joseph Part 13: Judah's Offering

Judah’s Offering

Genesis 43:26–34 CSB

26 When Joseph came home, they brought him the gift they had carried into the house, and they bowed to the ground before him. 27 He asked if they were well, and he said, “How is your elderly father that you told me about? Is he still alive?” 28 They answered, “Your servant our father is well. He is still alive.” And they knelt low and paid homage to him. 29 When he looked up and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother’s son, he asked, “Is this your youngest brother that you told me about?” Then he said, “May God be gracious to you, my son.” 30 Joseph hurried out because he was overcome with emotion for his brother, and he was about to weep. He went into an inner room and wept there. 31 Then he washed his face and came out. Regaining his composure, he said, “Serve the meal.” 32 They served him by himself, his brothers by themselves, and the Egyptians who were eating with him by themselves, because Egyptians could not eat with Hebrews, since that is detestable to them. 33 They were seated before him in order by age, from the firstborn to the youngest. The men looked at each other in astonishment. 34 Portions were served to them from Joseph’s table, and Benjamin’s portion was five times larger than any of theirs. They drank and became drunk with Joseph.

"Yoseph came into the house and they," that is the brothers, "brought to him the offering in their hand into the house and they bowed down to him on the ground." So they, they stand, they bow down to the image of Pharaoh with the offering in their hand. I mean, and they're doing it in the house.

I talked earlier about how, that the word "house" is the word "ark" backwards.

The word "house" is also one of the standard Hebrew words for, just, referring to the temple. The house of the Lord.

House of the Lord? "I will dwell in your house all the days of my life," the house So they're going into the house, bowing, bringing their offerings. It's painting it as if they're entering the temple.

With their offerings.

"And he asked them about their shalom." this is a callback, do you remember all the way back in chapter 37

The brothers couldn't speak shalom to him and, and then when Jacob sends him out to the brothers in the field, he says, "You know, find out about their shalom." And now he, there he is, finding out about their shalom.

He said, "'Is there shalom to your father, the old one, of whom you spoke, is he still alive?' And they said, 'There is shalom for our father, he is still alive,' and they kneeled and they bowed down," this the second bowing. It's the second, the double bowing. Remember his two dreams? He dreamed of it two times, and now it's happening two times.

"And he lifted his eyes and he saw Benyamin, his brother, the son of his mom.

And he said, 'Is this your brother, the little one of whom you spoke?' And he said, 'May Elohim show favor to you, my son.' And Yoseph had to act real quick because his guts became hot." The word, the Hebrew word for com- that's translated "compassion" means womb. For a man, this center, and then for a female, the womb and then connected to the pregnant womb as a, a center of, like, maternal compassion.

bowels of compassiony.  "But his guts were warm for his brother and he had to go quick," not to the bathroom but just, "He sought to weep, and he went to a room and he just broke down.

He had to wash his face, come back out, restraining himself, and he said, 'Bring out the bread.' And so they set him," by himself, "And they set them," brothers, "by themselves and then they set the Egyptians who ate with him, by themselves." So this is gonna be a scene of reconciliation, but he sets the room with everybody separate. 

The son of Jacob there's conflict still that has to be resolved, and then the Shem/Ham conflict between Israel and Egypt because the Egypts, yeah, they don't eat bread with, with Hebrews, it's taboo.

"So they sat before his face." It was so interesting, you know, the little name cards on the table, the order of seats was the firstborn, according to his firstborn status, that's Reuven, all the way down to Benyamin but notice the names aren't used, it's just their title of birth order. "The firstborn, according to his firstborn status, the small one, according to his small one status, and the men were shocked, shocked, each to his companion.

And so he took portions to them," Yoseph did, "before his face, and the portion of Benyamin was greater than all the other portions by five," five times or five hands. "And they drank and they drank even more with him."

So notice this is, we're building up to the reconciliation, but the room is set in a way that will symbolize the disunity.

Joseph's putting him up in front of other brothers almost as if to test their jealousy again.

But they drink

So the birth order becomes a symbol of the rivalries.

It makes Benyamin's position very prominent, and then he gets five times, the plates and so on. So this is, like, the coat, this is like the, the favor on the younger one, the other son of Rachel. 

Genesis 44:1–13 CSB

1 Joseph commanded his steward, “Fill the men’s bags with as much food as they can carry, and put each one’s silver at the top of his bag. 2 Put my cup, the silver one, at the top of the youngest one’s bag, along with the silver for his grain.” So he did as Joseph told him. 3 At morning light, the men were sent off with their donkeys. 4 They had not gone very far from the city when Joseph said to his steward, “Get up. Pursue the men, and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good? 5 Isn’t this the cup that my master drinks from and uses for divination? What you have done is wrong!’ ” 6 When he overtook them, he said these words to them. 7 They said to him, “Why does my lord say these things? Your servants could not possibly do such a thing. 8 We even brought back to you from the land of Canaan the silver we found at the top of our bags. How could we steal silver or gold from your master’s house? 9 If it is found with one of us, your servants, he must die, and the rest of us will become my lord’s slaves.” 10 The steward replied, “What you have said is right, but only the one who is found to have it will be my slave, and the rest of you will be blameless.” 11 So each one quickly lowered his sack to the ground and opened it. 12 The steward searched, beginning with the oldest and ending with the youngest, and the cup was found in Benjamin’s sack. 13 Then they tore their clothes, and each one loaded his donkey and returned to the city.

"So he commanded," that one over his house, "saying, 'Hey, let's do that, you know, the silver thing again in their bags,'" but with a twist, always with a twist. "'Fill the sacks with food, as much as they can carry. Put the silver again in the mouth of each one's sack but also take my goblet, you know, the silver goblet and put it in the mouth of the sack of the little one and the silver of his grain.' And so, you know, the guy did what Joseph said.

And so in the morning the men set out, they and their donkeys, and they were going out of the city, not far, when Yoseph said to the one over his house, 'Get up! Chase after them! Overtake them! And say, "Why have you repaid evil, bad, in the place of good? I've only done good to you and you do evil to me."'" Remember what Jacob said, "Why did you do evil to me by mentioning that I have another son?" Why have you done evil in the place of good? "Isn't this what my master uses to drink?

Doesn't he perform divination with it? You have done evil by doing this."

So speaking harsh words, accusing them of spies, giving the money back, but this is, he's pulling out all the stops here.

Performing divination.

kings perform divination, rulers, it's a thing, and these are fascinating Google searches or Wikipedia searches, like, common ways as they would sacrifice an animal, take its liver, and then they have these liver templates and they would drop the liver onto this mold and however the liver broke apart into the mold would have a message into it. It was called examining the liver. It's, it's mentioned a few times in the Hebrew Bible.

but here, a cup of divination, you know, so a, a, some sort of ritual performance where the liquid in the cup and the drinking from it or the swirling in it tells you a message. That's the kind of thing going on here. 

The word "divination" is spelled "nakhash," and it so turns out that the word "snake" in Hebrew is the word "nakhash," so it's a homonym. You know how we have, like, lead, L-E-A-D, and lead

So it's a homonym. Different words, different roots, but they happen to be spelled with the same letters, nakhash and nakhash. "So isn't this what he uses to nakhash?"

The snake is the archetypal deceiver and, but, remember Tamar taught us a category of the counter-deception. You can deceive the deceiver in order to accomplish righteousness, to save the family.

And, lo and behold, here is Yoseph being the inverted snake. Not to spin a lie that leads to death, but to create a test that will open up the door to life. It's the opposite here.

Verse 6, "He overtook them. He spoke to them these words and they say, 'Why does my master speak words like these? I mean, far be it for your servants to do anything like treachery, betrayal, lying, you know, that's not us. Look, the silver that we found in the mouth of our sacks, we gave it back to you, right? I mean, why would we steal from the house of our master silver or gold? You know what, we're so confident in our uprightness, the one among your servants here with whom that cup is found, they will, they will be put to death and the rest of us will become your slaves.'" They're very confident in their righteousness.

"And the man said, 'All right, according to your words, it will be.

The one with whom it is found will become my slave and the rest of y'all will be innocent.'" Did you catch what,

He's like, "Okay, just like you said," but not.

Nobody's gonna die here today, but somebody is gonna become the servant. 

So one will become, 'cause what he said is, "We will all become the servants and somebody will die.".

No, no, no, just one person will become the servant, and when that one does what the servant does, the rest of you will become innocent.

See the idea of the suffering servant being furthered here.

"So they each quickly got down the sack, their sacks onto the ground, they opened them up, and he searched, starting with the biggest."

Starting with the oldest, finishing with the smallest. When Laban searches the tents for his stolen divination idols, he starts with the older, Leah, and he ends with Benjamin's mom, the tent of Rachel. "And he found the goblet in the sack of son of the right hand. And they tore their garments."

Do you remember what Jacob did when he realized or believed that Yoseph had been eaten? He tore his garments. "They burden their donkeys and go back into the city."

The wordplay with divination is linking Joseph to, a righteous counter-deceiver like Tamar. 

There are moments when people take up a ruse or a deception to expose the truth about someone. That's what God is doing with Abraham, it's what God's doing with Adam and Eve.

Again, there's a choice. It's not a ruse, it's a real choice, and what is a test of their faithfulness becomes a trap when the snake twists lies around it. 

And so as you go out of the garden, God and the snake become these inversions of each other where God will give an opportunity to expose the truth through a test. But then snake figures will come in and weave webs of lies and deception, and they become, it's just this interesting inversion. And so, in this moment, Joseph is the righteous tester, and you allude back to the pattern by the goblet of nakhash, of divination. 

he's, he is not like a snake, but in, but he's performing a testing role. 

The focus on the “silver goblet” is curious, along with the apparently random statement of Yoseph that he uses the goblet to perform divination. This phrase is very intentional, however, as it forms a hyperlink to two earlier stories.

Yaaqov’s flight from Laban

Rachel’s theft of the idols

These parallels clearly establish an analogy between Yaaqov and Rachel’s deception of Laban and the staged “deception” of the brothers against Yoseph. This parallel, however, only highlights the ironic reversals at work.

In reality, it is Yoseph who is counter-deceiving his brothers for their original betrayal and deception against him and Yaaqov.

This is another example of the children replaying and intensifying the failures of their parents, in ways that twist and invert the original evil.

Yehudah Surrenders His Life for Binyamin

Genesis 44:14–34 NASB95

14 When Judah and his brothers came to Joseph’s house, he was still there, and they fell to the ground before him. 15 Joseph said to them, “What is this deed that you have done? Do you not know that such a man as I can indeed practice divination?” 16 So Judah said, “What can we say to my lord? What can we speak? And how can we justify ourselves? God has found out the iniquity of your servants; behold, we are my lord’s slaves, both we and the one in whose possession the cup has been found.” 17 But he said, “Far be it from me to do this. The man in whose possession the cup has been found, he shall be my slave; but as for you, go up in peace to your father.” 18 Then Judah approached him, and said, “Oh my lord, may your servant please speak a word in my lord’s ears, and do not be angry with your servant; for you are equal to Pharaoh. 19 “My lord asked his servants, saying, ‘Have you a father or a brother?’ 20 “We said to my lord, ‘We have an old father and a little child of his old age. Now his brother is dead, so he alone is left of his mother, and his father loves him.’ 21 “Then you said to your servants, ‘Bring him down to me that I may set my eyes on him.’ 22 “But we said to my lord, ‘The lad cannot leave his father, for if he should leave his father, his father would die.’ 23 “You said to your servants, however, ‘Unless your youngest brother comes down with you, you will not see my face again.’ 24 “Thus it came about when we went up to your servant my father, we told him the words of my lord. 25 “Our father said, ‘Go back, buy us a little food.’ 26 “But we said, ‘We cannot go down. If our youngest brother is with us, then we will go down; for we cannot see the man’s face unless our youngest brother is with us.’ 27 “Your servant my father said to us, ‘You know that my wife bore me two sons; 28 and the one went out from me, and I said, “Surely he is torn in pieces,” and I have not seen him since. 29 ‘If you take this one also from me, and harm befalls him, you will bring my gray hair down to Sheol in sorrow.’ 30 “Now, therefore, when I come to your servant my father, and the lad is not with us, since his life is bound up in the lad’s life, 31 when he sees that the lad is not with us, he will die. Thus your servants will bring the gray hair of your servant our father down to Sheol in sorrow. 32 “For your servant became surety for the lad to my father, saying, ‘If I do not bring him back to you, then let me bear the blame before my father forever.’ 33 “Now, therefore, please let your servant remain instead of the lad a slave to my lord, and let the lad go up with his brothers. 34 “For how shall I go up to my father if the lad is not with me—for fear that I see the evil that would overtake my father?”

Verse 14.

"So Yehudah came and his brothers into the house of Yoseph,"

"And Yoseph was still there, and Yehudah came and fell before him on the ground. And Joseph said to them," verbatim what God said to Cain after he murdered his brother, "What is this thing that you have done?" It's exactly what God said to Cain.

"Don't you know that a man like me does nakhash?" You're supposed to snicker right there. "'Don't you know, I do nakhash?' Yehudah said, 'Oh, what can we say? What can we speak? How can we prove ourselves righteous?'" Remember what he said about Tamar? "She's proven herself to be righteous. She's the one in the right." How can we, we can make no argument here. We are not in the right. And he's saying, again, more than he probably means.

"'Elohim has found out the iniquity of your servants. Listen, we're servants for my master. All of us will become your servants, both us and the one in whom the goblet was found in his hand.' And Yoseph said, 'No, no, no, I would never do such a thing, just the man with the goblet.

That one will become my servant. The rest of you, go in shalom.

And Yehudah," to his credit, "he draws near," temple language, "he draws near and says, 'Please my master, let your servant speak just a word in the ears of my master.'" Notice how deferential he's being. "Don't let your anger burn," you know, like, Cain's burn against his brother, "Don't let your anger burn against your servant because you, you're basically Pharaoh."

which is in analogies,

I'm basically talking to God here.

So he's gonna retell this story. "My master asked about his servant saying, 'Do you have a father? Do you have a brother?' And we said to my master, 'Well, yeah, we do have a father, he's really old, and he does have a child of his old age. A little one. And his brother, well his brother's dead. And so the little one, he alone remains of his mother, and his father loves him. He's the beloved of his old age.'"

That's right from the beginning of the story. 

"And you said to your servants, 'Bring the little one down to me so I can set my eyes on him.' And we said to my master, 'What, he's not actually able to leave his father. If he leaves his father, his father will die.' And you said to your servants, 'Well if your brother, the little one, doesn't come down with you, you will not again see my face.'

So we went back up to your servant, my father, we told him the words of my master, and our father said to us, 'Hey, go buy some more food,' and we said, 'Well, we can't.'"

It's obvious, it's verbatim. The same but it's all structural. It's creating the symmetry around the test on the other side. 

"'If our brother, the little one, goes down with us, we'll go. 'Cause we're not able to see the face of the man if he doesn't come with us.' And your servant, our father, said, 'You all know that my wife bore for me two,'" this is new, this is not, we didn't learn this from the, from earlier. "'You all know that my wife bore for me two. The one, he went out from me. And I said, "Indeed, he's been torn apart," and I have, I haven't seen him to this day.

And so you're also gonna take this one from before my face? 

No, disaster will happen and he'll make my gray hair go down in evil to the grave.'

So, now, when I, Judah, go to your servant, my father, and the boy is not with us, you need to understand his, his nephesh." It's usually translated soul but it's, like, his whole being is bound together with the being of the beloved son.

The father and the son are bound together.

"When he sees that the boy is not with us, he'll drop dead, and your servants would be responsible for making his gray hair of your servant, our father, go down to the grave in grief."

So notice, up to this point, he replayed the father's position, which is, no way my son's going down. 

Then he replays Joseph's position, which is, no way you're gonna see me without your brother, and then he's like, what are we supposed to do? 

"So we finally got him to let the brother go. You can't, you can't do this." So notice what, I mean, what Judah is showing here is that he actually really cares about his father.

This couldn't be further from the Judah back in, earlier in the story. 

So this is all a part of revealing the transformation of his character. And then it comes to a culmination here. "Surely your servant has given himself as a down payment for the boy with my father saying, 'If I don't bring him to you, it will be my sin against my father all my days.'

"Let your servant sit in the place of the boy as a servant to my master, and the boy let him go with his brothers. How could I go up to my father with the boy not with me? So that I don't have to see the evil that would find, find my father."

So in this whole structure here, at the end, it's all about the down payment, that's the substitute or sits in, in the place of. 

This is a long speech.

Yehudah Becomes Adam and Eve and Cain

This exchange between the two brothers Yoseph and Yehudah is packed with verbal links to earlier narratives that carry on the analogies with Genesis 3-4 that began earlier.

Yoseph is portrayed as Elohim, who tests Adam and Eve and shows up asking Cain what he has done.

Yoseph’s confrontation with his brothers is compared here to God coming to Adam and Eve and Cain immediately after their acts of folly and evil (and recall that Gen. 3-4 first set up the analogy between parents and children).

The snake/cup turns out to be an instrument of testing the faithfulness of the chosen ones.

Binyamin and Yehudah, the Son and the Substitute

Yehudah’s speech culminates a large-scale design pattern that has been at work since Genesis 37. Since the beginning of the story of Yoseph and his brothers, the narrator has been showing how the two sons of the beloved Rachel are parallel to Yaaqov, Isaac, and Abel.

Parallels With Abel

Abel is the younger son who is murdered by his older brother because he’s filled with jealousy and anger at Yahweh’s favor on his offering. // Binyamin is the younger brother of Yoseph, who is sold as a slave and virtually “murdered” by his jealous and angry older brothers.

The deceased Abel is replaced with Seth, who is born “in the place of” (תחת) his brother Abel (see Gen. 4:25-26). // Binyamin is replaced by Yehudah, who offers himself “in the place of” (תחת) Binyamin.

Parallels With Yaaqov

Binyamin is, along with Yoseph, a beloved son of Yaaqov’s beloved wife Rachel. // Yaaqov is the beloved son of Rebekah. Binyamin is the last remaining son of Rachel, and he is not allowed to leave the land because of his brothers’ treachery that involved a deceptive goat-skin designed to trick their father (Gen. 37). // Yaaqov is the beloved son of Rebekah, and he is forced to leave the land because of his treachery that involved a deceptive goat-skin designed to trick his father (Gen. 27).

Binyamin is finally made to go into exile where he and his brothers are tested with a “stolen” cup of divination hidden in the camel bags. // Yaakov goes into exile and eventually is tested with “stolen” idol-gods for divination that are hidden in camel bags.

Binyamin is restored to his father once his older brother Yehudah offers himself as a substitute. // Yaaqov is restored to his father after he offers his own life in the place of his wives and children (Gen. 32).

Parallels With Isaac

Isaac was a miraculous son born to an infertile Sarah. // Yoseph and Binyamin were miraculous sons born to an infertile Rachel.

Isaac was the beloved and favored secondborn son of Abraham. // Yoseph and Binyamin were the beloved and favored sons of the beloved and favored Rachel who was the secondborn herself.

Abraham and Sarah wronged and abused Hagar and Ishmael in their efforts to produce a son. // Yaaqov wronged Leah because of his love for Rachel.

God tested Abraham by demanding that he give up the life of the beloved son, often called “the boy” (הנער) as an offering. // Yaakov is double-tested as he loses the life of Yoseph (which involved a substitute animal death), and then he is forced to surrender the life of Binyamin (also called “the boy” הנער).

At the last moment, God provides a substitute for Isaac in the form of a ram offered in the place of the beloved son. // At the last moment, Yehudah offers himself as a substitute in the place of the beloved son.

Abraham’s surrender of Isaac opens up God’s covenant blessing for all the nations. // Yehudah’s surrender of his own life opens up reconciliation, abundant food, security, and life for Yaaqov’s family.

Conclusion

These portraits of Binyamin, Yehudah, and Yoseph bring the themes of Genesis 1-3 to their culmination. The promise of the seed of the woman in Genesis 3:15, who is at odds with the snake and those who give in to its lies, has led to a clash of siblings and the death or exile of a child in every generation. In each case, it is only after a chosen son gives up their life and is replaced by a sacrificial substitute that the story of God’s purposes moves forward.

This is the precisely the same theme we see surfacing in the Prophets of the Hebrew Bible. God plans to raise up a suffering servant who is a royal-prophet-priest, who will stand up to rebellious Israel, only to be rejected and killed as a substitute, leading to victory and rule over Israel and the nations. This is what Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the scroll of the twelve are all about!