8th Pentecost
By Rabbi Neil Comess-Daniels -
As we learned a few moments ago, this week’s Hebrew Bible verses for the Evangelical Lutheran Church are from the book of Genesis, chapter 50:15-21. This passage occurs only a few verses away from the end of Genesis, which concludes with the death of Joseph. As you may recall, Joseph was the 11th son of Jacob, favored in his father’s sight above all his brothers. The favoritism of one son above any others is an affliction that has dogged this family for three generations. It is a syndrome that has resulted in much familial strife among the matriarchs and patriarchs of the Jewish people. Favoritism was also at the root of some incredibly cruel behavior by both the parents and the children. This tri-generational story is often difficult to read in its sum and its parts. Yet, I see a silver lining in this edgy lineage. I am so grateful that my most ancient ancestors were so imperfect. As a result, I am free from pursuing flawlessness, and, in attempting daily to be a better person, I can learn from their mistakes as well as their successes.
Woven into the passage we study today are falsehood, deceit, insincerity, and the absence of both apology and forgiveness. Due to Jacob’s favoritism of Joseph, Joseph’s brothers had a strained relationship with Jacob and Joseph. You might recall that when the brothers were young, Joseph did not work the field and tend the flocks as did his siblings. He was a homebody, catering to the whims of his father. On the heels of a couple of Joseph’s dreams in which he cast himself as superior to his brothers and even his parents, Jacob asked Joseph to spy on his brothers to see if they were getting their work done. When they discovered they were spied upon, the ten brothers were so infuriated that they captured Joseph and put him at the bottom of a pit used to capture animals. Ultimately, they sold him to a traveling caravan and told their father that a beast attacked and ate Joseph. They brought his infamous coat of many colors, which they had torn and soaked in animal blood, as proof.
In other words, they lied. Joseph, fortuitously rising out of slavery to be appointed a magistrate over the Egyptian Pharaoh’s storehouses, is reunited with his brother’s when they came to Egypt for food during a famine. Joseph quickly perceives that they do not recognize who is this officer of the Pharaoh’s court, so he toys with them for a while before he reveals his identity. In other words, he deceives them. Even when Joseph reveals himself, his words and apparent attitude still fall on the biting side of the preference and privilege he experienced when he was young. He says to them, “I am Joseph, your brother. Does my father still live?” In acts of great benevolence and a demonstration of his power, Joseph brings Jacob and the entire family to Egypt. When Jacob dies, the brothers become afraid of their powerful brother and worry that he will take advantage of his position and punish them for selling him into slavery those many years ago. So…they lie again! They say to Joseph,
“Before his death, your father left this instruction: So shall you say to Joseph, ‘Forgive, I urge you, the offense and guilt of your brothers who treated you so harshly.’ Therefore, please forgive the offense of the servants of the God of your father.”
We can search the Hebrew Bible inside and out, and we won’t find any indication that Jacob ever said that. Consumed with fear, they fabricated that whole thing. Joseph responds quite magnanimously. He tells his brothers that while they sold him as a slave with anger and malevolence, God had another purpose in mind, to bring the whole Jewish family to Egypt under Joseph’s wings. Some Jewish commentaries on this verse work diligently to squeeze forgiveness out of what Joseph says, but it’s just not there. Their efforts are valiant. They struggle to make all the pieces of the story fit. They even picture G’d waiting in the wings for Joseph to forgive his brothers so that G’d can then release the Mercy of mercies for them.
Other interpretations are more honest. Daat Zekenim, “Knowledge of the Elders,” a commentary composed in Middle-Age France / Germany / Italy / England, plainly says,
“The Torah wrote this to preserve harmony between Joseph and his brothers, not because Jacob had actually said these words.”
In other words, there is a lie within the lie! Jacob never even knew that Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery. From the time that the brothers brought him the torn and bloodied coat until his death, Jacob believed what the brothers told him, that Joseph was the victim of a wild beast. How could the brothers have the audacity to put together this story of Jacob requesting that Joseph forgive them of selling him away when there would be no reason for Jacob to know that unless the brothers told their father the truth? Other commentaries release the pressure valve on this passage, interpolating a principle that they invent themselves because, otherwise, this and other biblical passages won’t make sense. We find this rabbinic principle articulated in the Babylonian Talmud:
And Rabbi Iliya further said in the name of Rabbi Elazar, son of Rabbi Shimon: “It is permitted for a person to depart from the truth in a matter that will bring peace, as it is stated: ‘Your father commanded before he died, saying: So you shall say to Joseph: Please pardon your brothers’ crime, etc.’ (Genesis 50:16–17). Jacob never issued this command, but his sons falsely attributed this statement to him to preserve peace between them and Joseph.”
I’m not so sure that Joseph’s brothers had the high purpose of “bringing peace.” I think they just wanted to save their necks, so they told a lie-based-on-a-lie they told themselves since returning to Jacob with what they claimed was all that remained of their brother.
In our own lives, besides the lies we tell ourselves or inflict upon others, other lies afflicted and still afflict our larger American society. We tell ourselves the lie that slavery ended with Emancipation, there are no lingering effects of slavery and Jim Crow, and nothing more needs rectifying. We tell ourselves the lie that all are equal in America while we ignore vastly different contexts and social conditions in which people are born. We tell ourselves that anyone can make it in America with hard work, discipline, and commitment knowing full well the reality is much more complicated than that. We tell ourselves that women have achieved equality when women still earn less on the dollar than men do. We tell ourselves that someone must be taking care of the effects of humanity on the planet and so we absolve ourselves of day-to-day personal responsibility. We tell ourselves that only criminals commit violence with guns, and we discount the bold facts that most gun violence occurs in the home when we allow the coupling of normal human emotions of anger and depression with the availability of weapons.
Joseph’s brothers lied to themselves so that they could lie to him. Those lies were corrosive to their family. We do that, too, personally and on a much broader scale. Our default about the biblical narrative is that it shows us the way things ought to be. Sometimes, and I believe, more importantly, it tells us how the way things should not be.
Rabbi Neil Comess-Daniels
Rabbi-in-Residence - Mt. Olive Lutheran Church
Santa Monica, California
Sermon for:
Sept 13, 2020
