Monday, February 9, 2015

Genesis 45: A Series Of Awkward Conversations

OK, so how do you tell your long-lost brothers that you've been pulling their leg for months and pretending to be a stranger when in fact you really knew who they were all along?  And what do you say to your brother that you ganged up on with the rest of your siblings and threw into a pit and then sold into slavery?  And just how do you go about confessing to your aged father that the son you let him think was killed by wild animals years ago is actually still alive - and you were responsible for his disappearance?

Genesis 45 is a big ol' chapter full of awkward.  It begins by Joseph weeping so loudly at his grand unveiling to his brothers that he could be heard throughout his house, and even over at Pharaoh's! (vs. 2)

I'm sure his brothers felt like weeping themselves when they discovered that their brother Joseph was still alive - and extremely powerful, holding their fate in his hands!  "But his brothers could not answer him, so dismayed were they at his presence" (vs. 3).

Thus Joseph has his awkward conversation with his brothers as he reveals his history since they parted ways those many years ago in Canaan.  He tells them all about the remaining famine and urges them to move with their father to Egypt where there is food (thanks to Joseph!)

Finally, the speechless brothers find their tongues.  "And he kissed all his brothers and wept upon them; and after that his brothers talked with him" (vs. 15).

With their relocation plan blessed by Pharaoh, the brothers set out to return to their father and bring him back from Canaan to Egypt.  Perhaps worried that his agitated brothers would turn on themselves during the journey, as they had certainly showed a propensity to do, Joseph warns them, "Do not quarrel along the way" (vs. 24).

We aren't told what kind of reception they received from Israel, or how their father took the news of what they had done to Joseph so many years previously.  Of course, Israel himself knew a little something about displacing a brother and tricking a father (see Esau/Isaac), so maybe he took it well.  Regardless, he quickly makes up his mind: he wants to see his son Joseph again before he dies (vs. 28).

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