Joseph and His Brothers

 Gen. 37:1-11 and earlier selections

 

Welcome! Last week, we began our new series on Joseph from the book of Genesis. We talked about how the behavior of parents can profoundly affect the lives of their children, and so we began this series by focusing on Jacob, Joseph’s father. We focused on the lives of Jacob’s twin and slightly older brother Esau and their parents Isaac and Rebekah (who were Joseph’s grandfather and grandmother).

 

As we saw last week, Jacob first took advantage of Esau, getting him to trade his birthright for a bowl of lentil stew, and then, years later, he tricked his father Isaac into giving the blessing he meant for Esau instead to him. Once Esau realized this, he was furious, and he plotted to kill his brother. As we saw last week, there was inappropriate, immoral, and even juvenile behavior among all four of these people, Isaac and Rebekah, and Jacob and Esau.

 

Today we are going to focus on the next generation, the children of Jacob, but to get there I want to briefly cover key events in the life of Jacob that bring us to this point. Starting from Genesis 27:

 

When Rebekah was told what her older son Esau had said, she sent for her younger son Jacob and said to him, “Your brother Esau is planning to avenge himself by killing you. Now then, my son, do what I say: Flee at once to my brother Laban in Harran. Stay with him for a while until your brother’s fury subsides. When your brother is no longer angry with you and forgets what you did to him, I’ll send word for you to come back from there. Why should I lose both of you in one day?” – Gen. 27:42-45

 

Her question is an interesting one – she acknowledges that her actions have caused her to “lose” Esau. Has Esau figured out that the deception was in fact Rebekah’s idea? We don’t know for sure, but I am pretty sure that the children knew that each parent favored one son over the other – Isaac favoring Esau, and Rebekah favoring Jacob. As we discussed last week, this behavior in itself is highly problematic and inappropriate.

 

Now the exact nature of the blessing is not fully understood to us today, but it appears to be like a prophetic utterance – that what was spoken seemed to be sure to come true. In any case, the blessing was considered a huge deal, one of the most important things that a father could bestow on his children. The blessing was also seen as irrevocable, so that even after Isaac had realized he had been tricked, there was very little he could do for Esau.

 

Rebekah urged Jacob to flee hundreds of miles away to stay with her brother Laban in Harran, and this is what Jacob did. Along the way, Jacob dreamed about a stairway to heaven, with angels ascending and descending the stairway. In the dream, God spoke to Jacob and said,

 

“I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring. I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” – Gen. 28:13b-15

 

This dream affected Jacob strongly. Previously, he had referred to God, when talking to his father, as “your God.” But this encounter caused Jacob to change.

 

Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear so that I return safely to my father’s household, then the Lord will be my God and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that You give me I will give You a tenth.” – Gen. 28:20-22

 

Now, this is a big step forward for Jacob, but I want to point out that God’s promise to Jacob was unconditional. Yet Jacob’s response is conditional. In effect, Jacob is saying, “I know what you have promised me. But if You actually do what You promised, if You prove yourself in these particular steps, then I will follow You.” Genesis neither condemns nor affirms Jacob’s response, but today, given the promises of Christ, I believe such a response is inappropriate. God does not call on us to make conditional or even unconditional vows; He calls on us to believe in His promises, to believe in Him. But as I said, this is certainly progress for Jacob. And he is working from a singular vision or dream from the Lord. He knows little about God apart from what his father Isaac and grandfather Abraham have told about Him. We have the benefits of the entire Bible, of history, of science, of seeing lives changed by Christ. We do not need to make God prove Himself – He has already proven Himself – His goodness, His love, His faithfulness – and we should trust Him unconditionally as He unconditionally accepts us.

 

And so Jacob continued his journey and made it to Laban, and there he fell in love with one of Laban’s two daughters, Rachel. Jacob proposed that he work for Laban for seven years, and in return, be allowed to marry Rachel. Laban agreed, but at the end of the seven years, Laban deceived Jacob and instead gave him his other daughter, Leah. How did Laban explain his deception? He explained that it was not their custom to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older one. He agreed to give Jacob Rachel as well, provided he work for him for seven more years. Jacob agreed.

 

When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, He enabled her to conceive, but Rachel remained childless. Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, “It is because the Lord has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.” She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “Because the Lord heard that I am not loved, He gave me this one too.” So she named him Simeon. Again she conceived, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “Now at last my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” So he was named Levi. She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, “This time I will praise the Lord.” So she named him Judah. Then she stopped having children. – Gen. 29:31-35

 

We live in a culture where marriage is almost always based on love, and in which one husband has one wife, so it is hard for us to fully understand what this was like for Leah. In Ephesians 5:25, husbands are told to love their wives as Christ loved the church. This is a command, and it is unqualified. Don’t marry a woman unless you are willing to love her sacrificially, in effect, lay down your life for her. This includes making her feel loved, treating her compassionately, caringly. How sad it was for Leah, that she did not receive this kind of care from her husband. The names of her first three children are sad, painful to read. Reuben means “look, a son” (“ben” means son), but it sounds a lot like the Hebrew for “He has seen my misery.” Even after having the blessing of Reuben in the household, Jacob’s treatment of Leah did not seem to change appreciably, so she named her second son Simeon, which we think means “one who hears,” based on her statement that the Lord heard that she was still not loved. Her third son was named Levi, which sounds like the Hebrew word for “attached,” based on her wishful statement that maybe at least her husband would become attached to her. Now the name of her fourth son was quite interesting: Judah, which is close to the Hebrew word for praise. Did Jacob at last start truly treating her with love? We don’t know. It is possible. But it also possible that Leah at last found her joy in the Lord, rather than continuing to be disappointed by her husband.

 

Meanwhile, during all this time, Rachel became quite upset that she was not having children of her own and blames Jacob. Jacob reminds her that this is the Lord’s doing, not his. She then tells Jacob to have children through her servant Bilhah.

 

So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife. Jacob slept with her, and she became pregnant and bore him a son. Then Rachel said, “God has vindicated me; He has listened to my plea and given me a son.” Because of this she named him Dan. Rachel’s servant Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son. Then Rachel said, “I have had a great struggle with my sister, and I have won.” So she named him Naphtali. – Gen. 30:4-8

 

There are multiple issues here – first, Rachel’s jealousy is inappropriate, if not childish. Having multiple wives is never portrayed in Scripture as conducive to family harmony, and we see this here. Leah is the mother of the first four children, and although Rachel could certainly be an important part of their lives, she would not be her mother, and so it is certainly a challenging family dynamic, to say the least. And so although Rachel’s jealousy is inappropriate, it is also understandable.

 

But Rachel’s solution to this problem – taking matter into her own hands, rather than leaving them with God, creates additional problems. How does Bilhah feel about bearing her own children with Jacob but then effectively being told that she cannot be the mother? How hard this must be! And how confusing and challenging this must be for the children! These two children of Bilhah are named by Rachel as Dan, which means “he has vindicated”, and Naphtali, which means “my struggle.” Rachel’s statement associated with Naphtali is especially problematic. She sees children as a competition – but what about raising her children to love others and serve the Lord? It is hard to believe that this is happening with the childish attitude she displays here.

 

When Leah saw that she had stopped having children, she took her servant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife. Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son. Then Leah said, “What good fortune!” So she named him Gad. Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. Then Leah said, “How happy I am! The women will call me happy.” So she named him Asher. – Gen. 30:9-13

 

Gad means good fortune, and Asher means happy. So now we see that Rachel’s inappropriate behavior has spread to Leah, who also uses a servant to increase her count of children. This means that there are now four wives, in reality, three mothers of children (although Rachel and Leah want to think of it as only two). To call this a mess is a gross understatement. With mothers so self-centered like this, it is not hard to imagine that the children are going to have problems, that they will not be raised to be unselfish, that they will be governed by their emotions.

 

Then, Rachel wants some plants given by Reuben to his mother Leah. Rachel complains that Leah took away her husband and asks her if she intends to take away her child’s plants too. Rachel allows Leah to spend the night with Jacob in exchange for the plants. The result? A fifth son.

 

Then Leah said, “God has rewarded me for giving my servant to my husband.” So she named him Issachar. Leah conceived again and bore Jacob a sixth son. Then Leah said, “God has presented me with a precious gift. This time my husband will treat me with honor, because I have borne him six sons.” So she named him Zebulun. Some time later she gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah. – Gen. 30:18-21

 

Issachar sounds like the Hebrew word for reward, and Zebulun means honor. Again, the rivalry continues. There is seemingly no thought of being a good parent, or a role model – everything is about this endless contest. Leah even attributes God as somehow being on her side based on the fact that her servant had children.  

 

Where in fact is God in all this? God has a plan to create a people from whom the Messiah, Jesus would come. And in process to this plan, He plans to make a nation of the descendants of Jacob. So I think we can say that God allows Jacob to have many children. This does not mean that He condones the behavior of any of the adults in this family. In fact, I think we can say that God is faithful to fulfill His plan, and His promises to Abraham and Isaac, despite the behavior that we see here. God indeed even uses “broken vessels” to carry out His will.

 

Then God remembered Rachel; He listened to her and enabled her to conceive. She became pregnant and gave birth to a son and said, “God has taken away my disgrace.” She named him Joseph, and said, “May the Lord add to me another son.” – Gen. 30:22-24

 

This is son number eleven. The name Joseph means “may he add.” Notice that rather than being content with at long last having a child of her own, she cannot even enjoy him a minute without wanting yet another son!

 

At this point, Jacob wants to separate himself from Laban. In preparation for this, Jacob asks Laban for nothing but the speckled, spotted, or dark-colored animals. Laban says he agrees, but then he takes away all these animals and hides them with his sons. And so Jacob the deceiver is again deceived. But it appears that God helped Jacob – in what seems to be a miraculous series of events, it turned out that whenever Jacob put peeled branches in the watering troughs, the next generation of animals had the characteristics that would make them belong to Jacob. Jacob did this selectively so that the strongest and healthiest animals had these characteristics. In this way Jacob’s flocks prospered but Laban’s did not. Laban began to treat Jacob differently, unpleasantly, and Jacob realized that it was time to leave.

 

After God revealed to Jacob that He would be with him as he went back to his family, Jacob left, suddenly, taking his flocks and other possessions, with his large family. Rachel, before they all left, stole her father’s idols to false gods. This reveals that Rachel did not share in the faith of Jacob.

 

Laban pursued Jacob, and confronted him about the theft, but Rachel successfully hid the idols. The disagreement went beyond this – as Laban still considered all the possessions and success of Jacob as if it were really his. But God had warned Laban earlier, and so Laban and Jacob made an agreement together. Laban’s only condition, interestingly, was that Jacob take on no more wives, and that he not mistreat his daughters. They separated in peace, and Jacob continued towards home.

 

Now, recall that Rebekah seemed to think this would be a relatively short visit, just until Esau cooled off, but in fact, Jacob lived many years with Laban. Now we do not have time to cover every aspect of what happened next, but Jacob was quite fearful of Esau, even after all these years, and was afraid that he might even attack his family. Jacob prayed about his concerns to the Lord, to his great credit. Here is his prayer:

 

“O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, Lord, You who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,’ I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness You have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps. Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. But You have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’” – Gen. 31:9-12

 

This prayer, in my opinion, is a big step forward from where Jacob was when he made his vow. He acknowledges his unworthiness, he proclaims God’s kindness and faithfulness, he asks honestly for help with the potential problem of Esau, and he recalls God’s previous promises.

 

Having prayed, he then makes a plan to shower Esau with a series of lavish gifts, one after the other. The gifts were sent on ahead of Jacob. He also sent his families across the river, and he stayed behind alone. There he wrestled with man all night – but it seemed to be more than a man, very possibly a pre-incarnate experience with Christ. This more-than-a-man told Jacob he would have a new name, Israel, which means he struggled with God, because he had struggled with God and overcome.  To do this passage justice would require a separate message – but one thing I see is that Jacob wanted this person to bless him, and he persisted in his struggles with him, even after being injured. It is interesting to me that we sometimes use the term wrestling when we discuss prayer – and we also see that God wants us to persist in prayer. I believe that Jacob was commended because, in effect, this is what he was doing, asking for God’s blessing as he faced such terrible uncertainty with his encounter with Esau the next day.

 

I do not have time to go through Jacob’s encounter with Esau in depth – but suffice it to say that Jacob was extremely humble and respectful, and Esau was likewise very kind – in fact, in a kind of foreshadowing of the parable of the prodigal son, Esau ran up to Jacob and embraced and kissed him. And in this way, the two of them were reconciled.

 

I will skip some events of Jacob’s life, but he did return to Bethel, where God had appeared to him previously, and God appeared to him again, reiterating that he would henceforth be known as Israel. Also:

 

And God said to him, “I am God Almighty; be fruitful and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations will come from you, and kings will be among your descendants. The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you.” Then God went up from him at the place where He had talked with him. – Gen. 35:11-13

 

Despite Jacob’s growth, his children had grown up in a difficult environment, to say the least. And there is no evidence in Scripture that the spiritual growth that took place in Jacob occurred with his wives or his eleven children. But as you know, there are not eleven children of Jacob, but twelve. Let’s look at the sad account of the birth of Joseph’s little brother.

 

Then they moved on from Bethel. While they were still some distance from Ephrath, Rachel began to give birth and had great difficulty. And as she was having great difficulty in childbirth, the midwife said to her, “Don’t despair, for you have another son.” As she breathed her last—for she was dying—she named her son Ben-Oni. But his father named him Benjamin. – Gen. 35:16-18

 

Rachel, the one wife Jacob truly loved, the mother of Joseph, and now Benjamin, which means son of my right hand but whom she named Ben-Oni, son of my trouble, did not survive this birthing experience. And so Jacob, on what should have been a happy day, experienced what was probably the saddest day of his life. How this traumatic day affected Jacob’s other wives or his children we are not told. But you can be sure it affected them all, possibly in ways even they didn’t understand.

 

Let us now move on to the account of Joseph, which begins in Genesis 37.

 

Jacob lived in the land where his father had stayed, the land of Canaan. This is the account of Jacob’s family line. Joseph, a young man of seventeen, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them. – Gen. 37:1-2

 

Joseph saw something going on, something his older brothers were doing. We do not know what this “bad report” was. Whatever it was, Joseph was not willing to go along with it, and so he reported it to their father, Jacob.

 

Every family with more than one child has experiences where one child reports on one or more other children. A godly response would be to repent, to apologize to one’s parents, and to hold no ill will against the child who gave the report. The clear implication of this passage, especially given what is to follow, is that this is not how Joseph’s brothers responded. Instead, they were obviously very upset.

 

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made an ornate robe for him. When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him. – Gen. 37:3-4

 

And so now we see a repeat of the errors of Jacob’s parents, showing clear favoritism to one child over another. Yet, rather than expressing their displeasure with their father who is the one guilty of showing favoritism, they take it out on Joseph, the object of the favoritism. Why do they do this? Because they are jealous of him, and because it is always easier to bully someone younger or smaller than you.

 

Note that the battle of the wives over who could have the most children was also fueled by jealousy, so Jacob’s children have been raised in an environment where jealousy was the norm, and it was not condemned. In contrast, although the Bible refers to God as a jealous god, this is a very different situation. God hates it when we worship idols instead of Him not because He is jealous of the idols like in a human sense, but because the idolatry is sin and like all sin, leads to separation from God. We were made to be able to love God and enjoy Him forever, and God loves us and wants this for us. You could say that God is jealous for us rather than jealous of the idols. This godly kind of jealousy is really wanting the best for someone, and in some ways it is almost the direct opposite of the human kind of jealousy we see in the children and in Jacob’s wives, which is really all about the self.

 

In James 3 we see a contrast between jealousy and wisdom.

 

Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice. – James 3:13-16

 

Jealousy is also described as one of the works of the flesh in Galatians 5, works that are not of those who will inherit the kingdom of God.

 

Proverbs repeatedly warns against jealousy, here in terms of what it does to the jealous person:

 

A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones. – Prov. 14:30

 

And here in terms of what it can do the object of jealousy:

 

For jealousy makes a man furious, and he will not spare when he takes revenge. – Prov. 6:34

 

And this brings me back to Jacob. His actions are what are causing this jealousy. I am reminded of Ephesians 6:4:

 

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. – Eph. 6:4

 

Now returning to our passage in Genesis:

 

Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. He said to them, “Listen to this dream I had: We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.” His brothers said to him, “Do you intend to reign over us? Will you actually rule us?” And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said. – Gen. 37:5-8

 

Now, in our modern culture, we tend to view the fact that Joseph would share such a dream with his brothers as either a sign that he is proud, or at least, having a low “social intelligence score.” Surely Joseph would know that telling such a dream would not be well received? But if the dream was from God (and since it came true, we know that it was), it was not wrong to share it. Although nobody then appreciated it, the dream came to give glory to God, as only God knows the future.

 

Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. “Listen,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, “What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?” His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind. – Gen. 37:9-11

 

Again, we might tend to fault Joseph, pointing out that surely he should have known this would not go well, given how the telling of the previous dream was received. Now Jacob immediately identified the implied meaning of the dream – eleven stars were Joseph’s eleven brothers, so the sun and moon represented the parents. Although maybe it should have been a sun and four moons!

 

Freud would have a field day with these dreams, as he believed that dreams were how a part of a person which he called the id was able to express its secret desires. In a healthy family, these dreams could have been told, and the worst that might happen is that the siblings laugh at the teller, because the dreams do seem at this point to reveal more about the dreamer’s secret desires for dominance than they do about God. But in Jacob’s dysfunctional family, the telling of these dreams would lead to unimaginable consequences, which we will see next week.

 

As we close today, we will spend a minute in silent prayer. If you are a parent or someone who has people under you in a work or other environment, I encourage you to reflect on whether you are showing favoritism or participating in other unhealthy behaviors that are damaging the spiritual and emotional health of those under your care. If so, I encourage you to confess this to the Lord and ask Him to give you the wisdom and the power to make healthy changes. And for everyone, I encourage you to reflect on whether jealousy has any kind of foothold in your life, and if so, to renounce it and ask the Lord to help you change your patterns of thinking. Change in either area is difficult if not impossible apart from the Lord. Recall the progression we saw in Jacob, from making vows to do things in his own strength, to humbly admitting his faults. Like Jacob, we are all works in progress, but if we have given our lives to the Lord, God is faithful to help us to grow in Him, if we ask Him. In Christ all things are possible. Let’s pray.