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Genesis 39 tells the story of Joseph, who is brought as a slave into Egypt. Joseph becomes the steward of Potiphar, a powerful Egyptian official. Joseph rejects the sexual advances of Potiphar's wife, and she retaliates by accusing him of attempted rape. He is then taken to jail, where he is promoted to a high position among the prisoners.
The story is strikingly similar to the earlier to the earlier Tale of Two Brothers, in which Anpu is the master of his brother Bata, and Anpu's wife grabs Bata and suggests intercourse. Bata, like Joseph, gives a short speech on the evil of betraying his master in such a way, and is then falsely accused of sexual abuse. Both wives use falsified evidence to convince their husbands they were abused. Both Bata and Joseph endure difficult circumstances when the master believes his wife, but both Bata and Joseph are later elevated to rule over Egypt.[1]
Like the previous chapter, Richard Elliot Friedman credits this whole chapter to J. See the table in the back of the second edition of Who Wrote the Bible?.
[I'd like to add some notes from Kittel and Dillmann later.]
1 And Joseph was brought down to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, captain of the guard, an Egyptian man, bought him from the hand of the Ishmaelites, who had brought him down there.
2 And Yahweh was with Joseph, and he was a successful man, and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian. 3 And his master saw that Yahweh was with him, and all that he did Yahweh made prosper in his hand. 4 And Joseph found favor in his eyes, and served him, and he placed him in charge over his house, and all that he had he placed in his hand. 5 And then, from the time he placed him in charge of his house, and over all that he had, Yahweh blessed the house of the Egyptian for Joseph's sake, and the blessing of Yahweh was on all that he had, in the house and in the field. 6 He left everything he had in Joseph's hand, and did not know about anything that was his, except for the bread which he would eat. And Joseph was beautifully built, and beautiful in appearance.
7 Now, after these things, his master's wife set her eyes on Joseph, and said, Lie with me.
8 And he would not, and said to his master's wife, Behold, my master does not know what is with me in the house, and everything he has he has placed in my hand. 9 There is no one greater than me in the house, and he has withheld from me nothing but you, for you are his wife. So how can I do this great evil and sin against God?
10 And so, as she spoke with Joseph day by day, he would not listen to her, to lie with her, to be with her.
11 And around this time, he went into the house to do his work, and none of the men of the house were there in the house. 12 And she seized him by his garment, saying, Lie with me. And he left his garment in her hand, and fled, and went outside.
13 And when she saw that he had left him garment in her hand, and fled outside, 14 she called to the men of her house, and said to them, Look! He brought in a Hebrew man to mock[7] us. He came to me to lie with me, and I shouted loudly. 15 And when he heard that I lifted my voice and shouted, he left his garment with me, and fled, and went outside.
16 And she set his garment next to her until his master came home. And she spoke to him in this manner: The Hebrew slave that you brought to us came in to mock me. 18 And when I lifted my voice and shouted, he left his garment with me and fled outside.
19 And when his master heard what his wife said, how she spoke to him, to say, This is how your slave treated me, his wrath was kindled. 20 And Joseph's master took him and put him in the prison,[8] a place where the king's prisoners were bound. And he was there in the prison. 21 And Yahweh was with Joseph, and extended kindness to him, and gave him favor in the eyes of the keeper of the prison. 22 And the keeper of the prison set in Joseph's hand all the prisoners who were in the prison. And whatever they did there, it was he who did it. 23 The keeper of the prison did not look into anything in his hand, because Yahweh was with him, and what he did Yahweh made to prosper.
On the Documentary Hypothesis in general, see Richard Elliot Friedman's Who Wrote the Bible?. See also Joel Baden (2012), The Composition of the Pentateuch: Renewing the Documentary Hypothesis. For a parallel work in Egyptian literature, see Anpu and Bata at Reshafim.org.[2]
(39:1) "officer." Hebrew saris. Sometimes the word is used for eunuch. Here I would go with officer because Potiphar has a wife. Do I know for a fact that eunuchs couldn't have wives? No, I don't.
(39:1) "Ishmaelites". Note that in the earlier story of Joseph's sale, there is some confusion about whether Joseph is sold to Midianites, Medanites, or Ishmaelites. These repetitions, in turn, are relevant to the Documentary Hypothesis. For more on this question, see the introduction to Joel Baden's The Composition of the Pentateuch: Renewing the Documentary Hypothesis. It contains some interesting examples of people tying themselves in exegetical knots trying to resolve the problem.
Note that if we are reading the book of Genesis literally, Ishmael would be Joseph's great-great-uncle.
(39:9) God. Hebrew makes no grammatical distinction between "God" (elohim) and "gods" (elohim). So if we assume that Joseph is speaking to a polytheist, what he is saying could easily be taken as "and sin against the gods". On the other hand, it was perfectly normal for pagans to speak in the singular of "God". Though of course capitalization doesn't come into it one way or another -- there was no capitalization then.
(39:14) mock. The Hebrew word is related to the idea of laughter. But I wonder if it might sometimes imply a sexual connotation. We find it associated with sex not only here but in Genesis 18:12 and Genesis 26:8. us. See also Ezekiel 23:32. Compare, perhaps, the relationship in English between foolishness and fooling around.
(39:19) the prison. I'm following the lead of the KJV here in translated the "beit sohar" (house of sohar) as "prison." But the term, in the whole Bible, is only used in this story, which leads me to wonder whether perhaps this might be a misunderstanding. Perhaps beit sohar is simply the name of this particular prison, which is why the writer feels the need here, with its very first use, the explain that the beit sohar is "a place where the king's prisoners were bound". Or perhaps beit sohar really did mean "prison", but perhaps it had become an obsolete term and an editor felt the need to define it for an audience that might not understand it. So also for the other uses of "prison" in the story of Joseph.
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