Perspective-Taking in Vayeshev
They said to one another, “Here comes that dreamer! Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; and we can say, ‘A savage beast devoured him.’ We shall see what comes of his dreams!”
But when Reuben heard it, he tried to save him from them. He said, “Let us not take his life.” And Reuben went on, “Shed no blood! Cast him into that pit out in the wilderness, but do not touch him yourselves”—intending to save him from them and restore him to his father.
When Joseph came up to his brothers, they stripped Joseph of his tunic, the ornamented tunic that he was wearing, and took him and cast him into the pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it.
Then they sat down to a meal. Looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, their camels bearing gum, balm, and ladanum to be taken to Egypt.
Then Judah said to his brothers, “What do we gain by killing our brother and covering up his blood?
Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, but let us not do away with him ourselves. After all, he is our brother, our own flesh.” His brothers agreed.
When Midianite traders passed by, they pulled Joseph up out of the pit. They sold Joseph for twenty pieces of silver to the Ishmaelites, who brought Joseph to Egypt.
When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit, he rent his clothes.
Returning to his brothers, he said, “The boy is gone! Now, what am I to do?”
Then they took Joseph’s tunic, slaughtered a kid, and dipped the tunic in the blood.
They had the ornamented tunic taken to their father, and they said, “We found this. Please examine it; is it your son’s tunic or not?”
He recognized it, and said, “My son’s tunic! A savage beast devoured him! Joseph was torn by a beast!”
Jacob rent his clothes, put sackcloth on his loins, and observed mourning for his son many days…The Midianites, meanwhile, sold him in Egypt to Potiphar, a courtier of Pharaoh and his prefect. (Genesis 37:19-36)
The Midanites sold him” – how many bills of sale were written for him? Rabbi Yudan said: Four – his brothers to the Ishmaelites, the Ishmaelites to the merchants, the merchants to the Midianites, and the Midianites sold him to Egypt. Rav Huna said: Five – the Midianites sold him to the country’s treasury. Potifar came and purchased him from the country’s treasury. (Bereishit Rabba)
Wwhile the brothers had been sitting down to consume their meal, having distanced themselves somewhat from the pit into which they had thrown Joseph in order not to be guilty of “eating while spilling blood,” they were waiting for the Ishmaelites whom they had seen in the distance, to arrive. During this period the Midianites, coming from a different direction had passed there, saw Joseph in the pit, pulled him up, and proceeded to sell him to the Ishmaelites. One may assume that the brothers had no knowledge of this. Even though the Torah appears to attribute the sale of Joseph to the Ishmaelites to the brothers, (based on Joseph accusing them of having sold him to Egypt, 45,4) we would have to say that because of their having been instrumental in bringing about that sale they are considered as if having assisted in that sale. This appears to me the deeper meaning of the plain meaning of the text both here and in chapter 45. The line describing the Midianites passing that way is described as something totally coincidental, having nothing to do with what the brothers had planned to do with Joseph. Even if the Torah says: “they sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites,” this sounds as if the brothers did the selling. It is also possible that the brothers noting the Midianites suddenly materialising out of nowhere, instructed them to pull Joseph out of the pit after which they themselves sold him to the Ishmaelites. (Rashbam on 37:28)
The Torah describes treachery of Joseph’s brothers in terms that are peripatetic, confusing, and open to competing accounts; who sold Joseph to whom? How many times did he trade hands? What was the order? Nonetheless, mainstream readings repress the formal quagmire and focus on the net effect: Joseph’s brothers sold Joseph into bondage. At an abstract level, one point is clear: Joseph’s descent into Egypt comes through indirect transgression, leading to plausible deniability along the supply chain.
The brothers intend to kill Joseph; Reuben protests and advocates putting him in a pit (presumably to kill him only indirectly, but possibly so that he might rescue him later); Judah suggests the brothers sell Joseph to Ishmaelites; Midianites lift Joseph from the pit and sell him to Ishmaelites; Ishmaelites bring Joseph to Egypt…Potifar purchases Joseph.
In Rashbam’s telling, the brothers don’t actually sell Joseph at all. He is snatched from the pit without their knowledge while they’re taking a lunch break. Thus, when they present the bloody tunic to Jacob, they are deceiving him—but they aren’t covering up a sale; they’re covering up their ignorance of where Joseph is. The bloody garment is their attempt to place premature closure on the story, convincing not just Jacob, but themselves, that Joseph is dead. We witness a story of botched execution—the brothers fear of incurring guilt leads to Joseph’s sale. In one sense, the brothers have indeed avoided the worst. Their deferral of Joseph’s immediate murder, which turns into a deferred plan to enslave him, leads to his survival. The motif of indirection continues in their posture towards their father. They never explicitly lie and say Joseph is dead; they simply present the tunic and allow Jacob to infer Joseph’s death from it. In a technical sense, what have the brothers done? They haven’t murdered; they haven’t enslaved, and they haven’t lied. This suggests they are among the first characters to be self-conscious; if they are not concerned fro the morality of their behavior, they are concerned for the consequences. This is how moral progress works in the Torah, where indirect violence replaces the hot-headed direct brutality of Cain.
The narrative works on multiple levels. On a macro-cultural level it’s a story about how the evolution of law and norms leads to better outcomes, even as human nature remains base. On a moral level it’s a critique of the legal loophole; the brothers are considered to have transgressed irrespective of the mechanics of their transgression. On a literary level, the complexity of the sale of Joseph is a sign of civilizational and economic advancement. The Midianites are “market makers.” Robust societies enable better coordination, but also make it harder to assign culpability. When all are responsible, none are. As Bob Dylan put it: “Who killed Davey Moore, why and what’s the reason for?… “I hit him, I hit him, yes it’s true, but that’s what I’m paid to do…don’t say murder, don’t say kill, it was destiny; it was God’s will.”
Which brings us to the theological dimension: Joseph’s story appears to be the result of a sequence of rational moves and stumbles, but expresses the subtle providence of a God who guides this story. Nowhere in Joseph’s tale do we read of overt miracles or divine interventions. God’s will is expressed through the very sins and errors that we would condemn from a zoom-out view. So while the brothers err, God moves through their error. This view enables us to regard the story not simply as a story of oppressor and oppressed, but as a story of moral failure and spiritual resilience.
Wall Street veterans use “Greenspan put” as shorthand to describe the idea of a free insurance policy afforded to speculators by the Federal reserve. If markets go bust, the Fed will rescue you. A common critique of the Greenspan put is that people will take advantage of this, leading to moral hazard. If Greenspan is taking on the risk, that lessons your own skin in the game. So we find in the Joseph saga that God backstops the brothers’ betrayal by saving Joseph from murder, by protecting him in Egypt, and by enabling his ascent to power. But the backstop is unknown to the brothers. It is known only to Joseph, and to us, the readers. We are asked to live in a world in which we assume total responsibility for our choices, and at the same time, appreciate that God is backstopping them. Beyond a certain point, we are not in control. We cannot know the long-term upside or downside of the choices we make. We cannot judge Joseph’s life with finality or certainty to be a damaged life. Joseph suffers, but is not a victim. He can choose to see his life as providentially blessed rather than socially oppressed.
Is it true that the Jews have been an oppressed minority for as long as we can remember? Yes. But should we define ourselves by this oppression and assert our group pride simply in the negative, as a fulfillment of the commandment, “Let Hitler enjoy no posthumous victories?” No. Joseph is sold into slavery, yet he is blessed. The Jewish people have been directly and indirectly subject to violence and maltreatment from Egyptian Slavery to pogroms to UN hypocrisy regarding Israel. But we have been backstopped by God’s Greenspan put. Our oppressors cannot and should not rely on the fact that the Jewish people are too holy to fail. But we can transcend the mental state of the victim who defines himself by antisemitism by remembering what great things God has in store for us.
Shabbat Shalom,
Zohar Atkins