Forgetting Where You Come From: A Meditation on Joseph

Let me first summarize part of Joseph's story:

Joseph finds himself in jail because of trumped up sexual assault charges. He is innocent, but still finds himself in jail. Even there, however, God is kind with him and places him in a management role. Some time later, two new inmates arrive: a cupbearer and a baker. Apparently they have offended their master, perhaps he suspects them of a plot (who better to conspire together but the baker and the chief taster?), and they are jailed. The person who had Joseph thrown in jail, however, sees them placed under Joseph's care (40:4). (I have a suspicion that this captain of the guard, Potiphar, the captain of the guard (39:1), understands injustice in some form: rather than killing Joseph for assaulting his wife, he merely jails him. The Pharaoh then jails the baker and taster in the house of the captain of the guard, which is where Joseph's prison is [40:1-4].) Both the baker and the taster have dreams that Joseph interprets. The taster will be restored! The baker will be hung. Both of these events come true. But Joseph, even after urging the taster to remember him, is forgotten. (Perhaps the taster has good reason to forget Joseph: If your suspected conspirator is hung, you don't want to put your neck out on the line! Plus Joseph is in charge at the captain of the guard's house and there seems to be a wink-wink nudge-nudge thing going on there. This seems somewhat confirmed when the taster calls Joseph a servant of the captain of the guard--his pre-sexual assault post[41:12].) Anyway, two years pass and the taster is still alive and remembers Joseph. Joseph comes and interprets Pharaoh's dreams and is put in charge of Egypt. Ultimately the people of Egypt are saved from famine. But Joseph, in the meanwhile, has two sons: Manasseh and Ephraim. Manasseh is so named because Joseph has forgotten his trouble and his father's household; Ephraim because God has made Joseph fruitful in the land of his suffering (41:50-52).

Now some reflections. First, and I owe this point to Dr Jeff Crosno, pastor at a Nazarene Church in Bourbonnais, Ill., the Joseph story refigures how we are to think about power. Joseph, a slave, a foreigner, a prisoner consistently ends up in places of power because of God. Dr Crosno pointed out that it is the most powerful who look for Joseph--who by all accounts is powerless. When God is involved, the slave, foreigner, outcast (though egotistical!) is sought after. However, Joseph, methinks, forgets this. He is always mindful that interpretations come from God and they are not open to his reworking. God is also behind the famine: God is sending plenty of food; God is sending famine (41:28-32). But in the sending of the plenty of food, Joseph does not treat the food as God's gift, but as Pharaoh's resource. If the food is God's gift, it is to be given to the people; but treating it as Pharaoh's resource means that it can be sold and enslave the hungry. Joseph has forgotten that he was slave, foreigner, and prisoner, as Manasseh's name makes clear; Joseph has forgotten his household, his previous identity. Second, there is irony in Ephraim's name, so named because God has prospered Joseph in the land of his suffering. What's ironic is that in Joseph's prosperity and not treating the food as a gift from God to all, the land becomes one of suffering for all his descendants.

I know one man who never forgot that one small town was his "Big Apple" and his descendants remember. If God grants any of us favour, let us remember where we come from.