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...
Uh, oh ... let the drama begin! (jealousy, rage, murder)
Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because h had been born to him in his old age; and he made a richly ornamented robe for him. WHen his brothers saw that their father loved him ore than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.
It's interesting how they "couldn't speak a kind word to him." I wonder if that's just an expression (probably) or if they somehow couldn't find the strength to say something positive to him. That would be funny if they wanted to pat him on the back and say, "Nice shot!" (in a game of soccer, using a lamb's bladder, of course) and instead had a demonic spirit change their speech to profanity and the slap turned into a swat...
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."
Poor Joseph might've just been naively explaining the trippy dream he had, not knowing how arrogant it was coming off. His brothers were like, "What?! You're going to rule over us? His father even rebuked him about the dreams. I'd hate to rebuke one of my children for a dream they had. How could they control what they dreamed? Wouldn't I be yelling for no reason?
His dad sent him out in the fields to check on his brothers later. When his brothers saw him from a distance, they plotted to kill him. I guess there was some demonic activity (I'd bet on it ... but I could be wrong. The human soul is capable of evil itself -- without the help of Beelzebub or his legions).
"Here comes the dreamer!" they said to each other. "Come now, let's kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we'll see what comes of his dreams."
Reuben talked them out of taking his life (whew! good thing).
So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe -- the richly ornamented robe he was wearing -- and they took him and threw him into the cistern. They ended up selling them to some travelling Ishmaelites (an interesting label, sons of Ishmael, born of Abraham). They tricked their father, Israel, by smearing animal blood on his coat of many colors. "Examine this," they told their dad, "to see if it's Joseph's coat." Of course, he recognized it and could not be comforted, convinced of his son's violent death.
Can you imagine the guilt they carried? Those scumbag brothers! They deserved to be beat up by the defensive line of the Chicago Bears. One can only imagine the look of betrayal and shock on Joseph's face as this was happening to him. Isn't it amazing that he was able to forgive his brothers? (more on that later)
Posted by Doug Van Pelt at February 21, 2007 10:49 AM