Yoseph In The House Of Potiphar, Pharaoh's Eunuch
Yoseph settled in Egypt, therefore, which for something like half a century 5 had been under Hyksos domination. The Semitic merchants who had bought him at Dothan resold him to an official of the court called Potiphar, one of Pharaoh's officials and commander of the guard. The name of Potiphar and his various titles have been very closely examined by Egyptologists intent on verifying the historical nature of the facts given by the Scriptures.
5 The approximate dates of the Hyksos occupation of Egypt are 1720-1560 BC.
Potiphar.
Orientalists are still discussing even nowadays the composition of this name and the translation of its component elements. At least they are in agreement that these various elements have Egyptian roots.
One of Pharaoh's officials.
Potiphar is commonly described as 'one of Pharaoh's eunuchs'. In fact the Egyptians seem to have felt a marked repugnance for those who were castrated. The eunuch as the guardian of the harem appears nowhere in the pharaonic documents. Nowadays historians are inclined to the view that, physiologically, Potiphar could not be regarded as a eunuch for the following reasons. Certainly in Mesopotamia eunuchs occupied a predominant position in the royal palaces, the most important administrative offices were reserved to them, and the monarch consulted them in council. There was nothing like that in Egypt. Yet it appears that by analogy with the Babylonian courts the title of eunuch was gratuitously attributed to the Pharaoh's important officials. Following a verbal fashion of foreign origin, at Memphis and at Thebes this strange title was adopted. In Egypt the word eunuch had thus come to designate quite simply a high official with an important function at the court of the Pharaoh.
Commander of the guard.
This is the common translation. The view of J. Vergote, who himself adopts that of P. Montet, is that the meaning is 'officer of the mouth' and the root of the Hebrew word used on this occasion means 'cook'. At a later date the medieval royal courts provide examples of an analogous linguistic evolution: the former servant in charge of the stable took the name of constable (comes stabuli, the count of the stable); marshall and equerry or esquire are titles that have evolved in the same way.
So as a slave Yoseph entered the service of Potiphar, an official of some Hyksos Pharaoh whose name has not come down to us. 6 Yoseph had the good fortune to lodge in the house of his Egyptian master -in other words, he was not sent to be one of a team of agricultural workers engaged on the hard work of the fields. Yoseph took after his shrewd father; it was not long before his keen intelligence and sensible opinions caused him to stand out. YAHWEH was with him, Bereshith tells us, and also YAHWEH made everything succeed that he turned his hand to. Yoseph's master soon understood that his slave was under the special protection of his SET APART CREATOR. This in a short time earned Yoseph the position of steward to the official. It was a small beginning but YAHWEH blessed the Egyptian's household out of consideration for Yoseph; YAHWEH's blessing extended to all his possessions, both household and estate. As a result there was further promotion for Yoseph who became the trusted servant of his master who left Yoseph to handle all his possessions, and with him at hand, concerned himself with nothing beyond the food he ate.
In this story of Yacob's son exiled in Egypt we do not encounter any of those imposing and terrifying appearances with which YAHWEH sometimes honoured HIS creature. Here there are no theophanies, no solemn reminders about the mission entrusted to the chosen one, no startling confirmation of the Covenant and the Promise. And yet YAHWEH by no means left Yoseph to his own devices, but acted in him and around him by the discreet and very various ways of YAHWEH's anointing. This accounts for the profoundly human qualities of this part of the story, which is permeated by a veiled spirituality through which YAHWEH's active concern can be perceived. At this point of the story it might be thought that the bad times were over; despite his status as a slave Yoseph could now, it seemed, look with confidence to the future.
6 Probably a member of the Apopi family. The great difficulty in discovering anything much about the history of the Hyksos arises from the fact that after the victory of the Egyptians over the Asiatic invaders (in about 1560 B.C., shortly before Yoseph's death) the Pharaohs systematically destroyed the monuments, inscriptions and documents recalling this period of national disgrace.
Further Difficulties For Yoseph
From time to time, YAHWEH's providential action, as is fitting, appears to us to have been almost visible. Consequently, Yoseph's life was full of difficulties, dramatic events and a certain degree of confusion, all of which enabled YAHWEH to rescue his servant from the most desperate of situations, and bestow on him the most unexpected and startling of rewards. All this, of course, occurred almost exclusively at the material level, the only one which a man of the seventeenth century B.C. could really understand. To speak to individuals or communities YAHWEH can only use a language which they are capable of understanding. Thus we can see why Yoseph's life appeared to be a series of ups and downs.
Under YAHWEH's protection he led a happy life in his father's camp. He was sold by his brothers and was at once reduced to the dreadful condition of a slave. Under YAHWEH's protection in the house of the Egyptian high official he rapidly succeeded in achieving promotion to the highest office open to a slave, and his master entrusted everything to him; he could well hope that all his heavy trials were over. Then, surprisingly, as the result of an odious accusation, he was thrown into prison.
It had to happen this way: the honour, power and loving kindness of YAHWEH could then, on several occasions, be clearly manifested in an entirely unforeseen manner to preserve Yoseph, Abraham's great grandson, from the malice of men, and on each occasion to advance him to an even higher and more successful position.
The incident is too well known for it to be repeated in detail here (Bereshith 39:7-20), Yoseph's master's wife accused him of grossly insulting her by making indecent suggestions to her, whereas in reality it was the woman who made the advances, and Yoseph rejected them, But the husband believed his wife and Yoseph was thrown into prison.
There is a moral significance to this anecdote which should be noticed, since lessons of this kind are not very numerous in the history of the patriarchs. Yoseph, Bereshith tells us, was well-built and handsome. Custom afforded the legitimate wife great freedom, and Egyptian records show that she was regarded almost as the husband's equal. This was obviously quite different from the oriental custom of keeping wives far from the gaze of men, This social system, special to Egypt, left the way open on occasion to all sorts of abuse.
'How could I do anything so wicked,' Yoseph answered his seducer, 'and sin against YAHWEH?' In this way the Scriptures warns young people against the sin into which they could be thoughtlessly led. It did not matter that Yoseph's vehement refusal was the cause of so disastrous an outcome. The continuation of the story reveals that his scrupulous behaviour caused him to be imprisoned; he suffered cruel afflictions which were quite undeserved.
But YAHWEH was still at his side: Yoseph went to prison as a slave, he came out again to be Pharaoh's counselor.
Yahudah and his daughter-in-law Tamar
Between the purchase of Yoseph by the merchants and his arrival in Egypt there occurs a chapter belonging to the Yahwistic cycle which interrupts the story; it concerns Yahudah and his daughter-in-law Tamar (Bereshith 38). It is a passage of relatively little interest to the modern reader.
A genealogical table of a typically oriental kind explains how Yahudah, one of Yacob's sons, married a Canaanite woman. Yet it does provide a useful illustration of the profound difference of moral attitude between Yoseph and Yahudah. After various incidents in which the levirate law 7 plays an essential part, it is surprising to observe the behaviour of Yahudah towards a 'sacred prostitute' (or someone giving herself out to be one). There is written evidence concerning these strange rites which were an integral part of Canaanite religion with its orgiastic ceremonies. In the neighbourhood of the temples of Baal and Ashtoreth 'holy' men and women (for such was the description given to these peculiar persons) offered themselves to passers- by with the intention of placing a portion of their remuneration in the temple treasury. Right from their nomadic period the Hebrews expressed their horror of these pagan customs; Abraham's descendants abhorred and cursed them.
To return to Yoseph: the scabrous incident between Yahudah and Tamar when compared with Yoseph's behaviour enables us to appreciate at its proper worth his moral value; he refused to betray his master's confidence and rejected the advances of the married woman, saying that he did not wish to sin against YAHWEH. Here was a decided evolution in the human conscience,
7 Levirate (from the Latin word Ievir, brother-in-law, and more especially, husband's brother); it was an ancient Semitic institution which is also found among other ancient peoples. If, in a family, the husband died without children his widow was obliged to marry, in order of age, her dead husband's brother (or other relation); in this way, the name and inheritance of the dead man would fall to the first son of this new union. If the second husband died without leaving a son the widow was obliged to marry the third brother, if there was one. This levir, the brother of the dead man, could not avoid the strange duty incumbent on him save by submitting to a humiliating ceremony; before the elders gathered together 'at the gate of the city' his brother's widow removed his sandal and spat in his face, saying at the the same time, 'That is what a man deserves who refuses to raise up his brother's house'. From that time the dwelling of the unworthy brother was known among the Yisraelites as the 'house of the unshod'. No doubt this dishonouring procedure was intended to reduce the number of those who might be tempted to avoid too easily a levirate marriage.
Yoseph Index Yoseph Sitemap Scripture History Through the Ages Yoseph Egyptian Adventure Yoseph Scriptures and Dreams The Plot Against Yoseph Yoseph's Brothers Cruel Seqel Yoseph In The House Of Potiphar Yoseph In Prison Pharaoh's Strange Dreams Yoseph Slave Becomes Viceroy Of Egypt Yoseph's Unexpected Family Reunion The Ten Brothers Before Yoseph Yacob Goes To Egypt Yoseph and the Death Of Yacob YAHWEH's Sword History Further Anxieties Of Yoseph's Brothers Yisraelites Remain In Egypt Period Of The Great Persecution