Joseph in Prison 2 - Genesis 40

40:1-7 - If I have my timeline right, then Joseph was 17 when he was sold into slavery, then he was taken out of prison when he was 30 which means he spent 12-13 years in Egypt going through his transformation process. I’m not exactly sure how long he worked in Potiphar’s house and how long he was in prison, but my guess is that it was relatively split time because he had to earn the trust and favor of Potiphar and the chief jailer in order to be put in and excel in those leadership positions.

In prison, specifically because it was the place where Pharoah’s prisoners were kept, there were two members of Pharoah’s staff that displeased him and were “put them in ward in the house of the captain of the guard, into the prison, the place where Joseph was bound.” This is probably where the idea came from that Joseph was put into some kind of holding cell attached to Potiphar’s house. Potiphar is described as “an officer of Pharaoh’s, and captain of the guard,” in Genesis 37:36, so now this description of being held “in the house of the captain of the guard,” it seems like it has specific ties to Potiphar and his household.

Because Joseph is in charge of all the prisoners, these two new guys “the chief of the butlers, and… the chief of the bakers,” were put into Joseph’s care, “and he served them: and they continued a season in ward.” One night, each man had a dream, and these dreams disturbed them. This I understand because I have terrible dreams sometimes and they ruin my day after I wake up sometimes. The two guys are kind of moping around, and Joseph notices and asks “wherefore look ye so sadly to day?” They say that they have had dreams but “there is no interpreter of it.”

I don’t know a lot about ancient dream interpretation, but from some of the articles that I’ve read, it seems to me that dream interpretation was a specific skill set that could only be done by the religious elite and that it was done by reading from a book that already had all the meanings of all dream components. So it was essentially it was reading different definitions from a book and then formulating a meaning with all those different aspects, it was a highly respected position.

40:8-15 - Joseph’s rebuttal to them being distressed at not having anyone to interpret their dreams is interesting, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me them, I pray you.” Here he is taking the power away from the societal religiosity, and instead puts the focus on his own God. The chief butler tells his dream first that he saw a vine with three branches with ripe grapes, and he took the grapes and made wine with them and gave the cup of wine to Pharaoh to drink.

Joseph interprets the dream saying that the three vines are three days and that in three days “shall Pharaoh lift up thine head, and restore thee unto thy place.” Interestingly, when Joseph realizes that the butler is going to be reinstated, he begs “think on me when it shall be well with thee, and shew kindness, I pray thee, unto me, and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring me out of this house: for indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews: and here also have I don’t nothing that they should put me into the dungeon.”

40:16-23 - Encouraged by the butler’s positive interpretation, the baker tells his dream which was that he had three white baskets on his head, with the highest basket having “all manner of beak-meats for Pharaoh; and the birds did eat them out of the basket upon my head.” I wonder if Joseph was a little more hesitant to give the interpretation of this dream, but he did which was that the three baskets also represented three days, but instead of being reinstated, “Pharaoh shall lift up thy head from off thee, and shall hang thee on a tree; and the birds shall eat thy flesh from off thee.”

I have often thought about what these two men could have been guilty of that would cause them to be put into prison at the same time, but have one be not only released, but put back into the same position he was in when he was arrested, and the other executed. Like I just don’t get what they could have done that displeased the Pharaoh so much that one of them had to die. But sure enough, three days later “was Pharaoh’s birthday, that he made a feast unto all his servants: and he lifted up the head of the chief butler and the chief baker among his servants,” and he restored the butler “unto his butlership again” but “he hanged the chief baker: as Joseph had interpreted to them.”

Interestingly, even though it had only been three days since their interaction, after all this had happened, “yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him.” But then again on the other hand, the butler probably felt like his situation was precarious enough that he didn’t want to go around putting in good words for people, or maybe he didn’t have that kind of pull anymore. Even though it really sucks that two whole years had to pass before the subject of Joseph the dream interpreter would come across his mind again, it really seems like that was God’s plan the whole time. And that makes sense because if the butler had said something and if by some miracle Joseph was taken out of prison and put into some random position in Pharaoh’s household, he might not have been in a position to go immediately to interpret Pharaoh’s dream when it happened two years later.

It seems needlessly cruel to make Jospeh suffer for an additional two years, but I have to remind myself that God is not cruel, so that was not any other way.