Genesis 45 · Story · Forgiveness
Joseph Forgives His Brothers
Genesis 42 to 45 tells how Joseph tested his brothers and then made himself known to them, and Genesis 50:15 to 21 returns to the family after the funeral in Canaan.
Joseph knew his brothers on the day they bowed before him to buy grain, and they did not know him.
But Joseph replied, “Do not be afraid. Am I in the place of God?
- Where
- Egypt, Goshen, Canaan
- Who
- Joseph, Judah, Reuben, Simeon, Jacob
Summary
Joseph's brothers sold him as a slave, and years later a famine brought them to Egypt to buy grain from him. Genesis shows his forgiving in what he did. He wept over them, kissed them, brought their families to Egypt and fed them. After their father Jacob died, the brothers sent a plea asking him to forgive their transgression. Joseph answered with comfort and a promise to provide, and the word forgive is never his.
- On their first visit the brothers said among themselves, "Surely we are being punished because of our brother", and Joseph turned away from them and wept (Genesis 42:21 to 24).
- Judah, who had proposed selling Joseph, offered to stay as a slave in place of Benjamin, and Joseph then made himself known (Genesis 37:26 to 27, 44:33 and 45:1).
- Joseph named the wrong plainly, "the one you sold into Egypt", and told his brothers not to be distressed, because God had sent him ahead to save lives (Genesis 45:4 to 5).
Forgiving the Brothers Who Sold Him
A ruler of Egypt meets the men who had wronged him, and Genesis records each step of their reconciliation.
This is the story of Joseph and the brothers who sold him into Egypt, told from their first journey there for grain to the days after their father Jacob died. It belongs to forgiveness, the value Scripture asks of everyone whom God has forgiven, and it shows that value in a man who held his brothers' lives in his hand.
The question it answers is what forgiving looked like when the wronged man had all the power and the guilty men were afraid of him. Genesis gives the answer in what Joseph did and said over many years. The story sets the events on a timeline and tells each scene with its verses. It reads Joseph's two answers to his brothers' fear and gives three readings of the message they sent him after their father's death.
The Reconciliation in Ten Events
Nine of the ten events stand in Genesis 42 to 50, and the first is the sale of Genesis 37 that the others answer.
Joseph's dealings with his brothers run from the sale near Dothan to the kind words he spoke to them after Jacob's death.
- The brothers sell Joseph to traders bound for Egypt"sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt."Genesis 37:26 to 28
- Ten brothers come to buy grain and bow before the governor of Egypt"they bowed down before him with their faces to the ground."Genesis 42:6
- The brothers name their guilt, and Joseph turns away and weeps"And he turned away from them and wept."Genesis 42:21 to 24
- Joseph sees Benjamin and leaves the room to weep"Joseph hurried out because he was moved to tears for his brother"Genesis 43:29 to 30
- Judah offers to stay as a slave in place of Benjamin"Now please let your servant stay here as my lord’s slave in place of the boy."Genesis 44:33 to 34
- Joseph makes himself known to his brothers"I am Joseph, your brother,"Genesis 45:3 to 5
- Joseph kisses his brothers, and they talk with him"Joseph kissed each of his brothers as he wept over them."Genesis 45:14 to 15
- After Jacob's death the brothers send Joseph a plea"I beg you, please forgive the transgression and sin of your brothers"Genesis 50:15 to 17
- The brothers bow before Joseph and offer themselves to him"We are your slaves!"Genesis 50:18
- Joseph promises to provide for them and comforts them"So Joseph reassured his brothers and spoke kindly to them."Genesis 50:21
A timeline of ten events, each card carrying words of its verse from the Berean text.
Joseph kisses his brothers, and they talk with him, After Jacob's death the brothers send Joseph a plea, The brothers bow before Joseph and offer themselves to him, Joseph promises to provide for them and comforts them
The Story Told in Order
Seven scenes in Egypt carry the reconciliation, and Joseph weeps in six verses of them.
The brothers bowed to a governor they did not knowGenesis 42:1 to 24
The famine drove Jacob to send ten of his sons to Egypt for grain, and he kept Benjamin at home for fear that harm might befall him (Genesis 42:1 to 4). Joseph, who sold grain to all the people of the land, treated them as strangers, spoke harshly to them and called them spies (Genesis 42:6 to 9).
Then they said to one another, “Surely we are being punished because of our brother. We saw his anguish when he pleaded with us, but we would not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.”The brothers' own words tie their distress in Egypt to the day they would not listen to Joseph's pleading.
They did not know that Joseph understood them, since an interpreter stood between them. Joseph left them for a time in tears, then came back and had Simeon bound before their eyes (Genesis 42:23 to 24).
John Chrysostom read Joseph's harshness as a test in his Homilies on Genesis. He wrote that "everything he does is to test their attitude out of his wish to discover if they had been like that in dealing with Benjamin".
Joseph wept again at the sight of BenjaminGenesis 43:29 to 34
When Joseph looked up and saw his brother Benjamin, his own mother’s son, he asked, “Is this your youngest brother, the one you told me about?” Then he declared, “May God be gracious to you, my son.” Joseph hurried out because he was moved to tears for his brother, and he went to a private room to weep.Joseph's first words to his mother's son are a blessing, and his tears come long before any word of reconciliation.
At the meal the brothers were seated before Joseph in order by age, and Benjamin's portion was five times larger than any of the others (Genesis 43:33 to 34).
Judah offered to stay as a slave in Benjamin's placeGenesis 44:1 to 34
Joseph had his silver cup put in Benjamin's sack. When the steward found it, the brothers tore their clothes and went back to fall to the ground before him (Genesis 44:1 to 14). Judah said, "God has exposed the iniquity of your servants" (Genesis 44:16).
Now please let your servant stay here as my lord’s slave in place of the boy. Let him return with his brothers. For how can I go back to my father without the boy? I could not bear to see the misery that would overwhelm him.”Judah's plea turns on his father's grief, which he says he could not bear to see.
Joseph made himself known and named the wrongGenesis 45:1 to 8
Joseph could no longer control himself. He sent everyone else out of the room, and he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him (Genesis 45:1 to 2).
Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But they were unable to answer him, because they were terrified in his presence.The brothers' terror shows that they expected judgment from the brother they had sold.
Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Please come near me.” And they did so. “I am Joseph, your brother,” he said, “the one you sold into Egypt! And now, do not be distressed or angry with yourselves that you sold me into this place, because it was to save lives that God sent me before you.Joseph calls himself their brother before he names what they did to him.
He kissed each of his brothers, and they talked with himGenesis 45:9 to 24
Joseph sent word to his father to come down to Egypt, and he promised to provide for the whole household in Goshen through the five years of famine still to come (Genesis 45:9 to 11).
Then Joseph threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and wept, and Benjamin wept as they embraced. Joseph kissed each of his brothers as he wept over them. And afterward his brothers talked with him.Joseph's tears for Benjamin come first, and the scene ends with the brothers at ease enough to speak with him.
Rashi, the French Jewish commentator, explains the order in his commentary on Genesis. The brothers spoke "after they saw that he wept and realized that he was peaceably inclined towards them", because at first they had been ashamed before him.
As he sent them home, Joseph told them not to quarrel on the way (Genesis 45:24). Rashi takes the plain sense to be that Joseph feared they would quarrel over his sale and blame one another for it.
After Jacob died, the brothers feared a grudgeGenesis 50:15 to 18
When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “What if Joseph bears a grudge? Then he will surely repay us for all the evil that we did to him.”The brothers fear that Joseph's kindness lasted only while their father lived, and Jacob had lived seventeen years in Egypt (Genesis 47:28).
So they sent word to Joseph, saying, “Before he died, your father commanded, ‘This is what you are to say to Joseph: I beg you, please forgive the transgression and sin of your brothers, for they did you wrong.’ So now, Joseph, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” When their message came to him, Joseph wept.The brothers plead their father's command and their service to their father's God, and Joseph weeps when the message comes to him.
His brothers also came to him, bowed down before him, and said, “We are your slaves!”The men who sold their brother as a slave now offer themselves to him as slaves.
Joseph answered their fear with comfortGenesis 50:20 to 21
As for you, what you intended against me for evil, God intended for good, in order to accomplish a day like this—to preserve the lives of many people.Joseph sets his brothers' intention and God's intention over the one act of selling him into Egypt.
Therefore do not be afraid. I will provide for you and your little ones.” So Joseph reassured his brothers and spoke kindly to them.Joseph's answer ends in a promise to feed his brothers and their children, and the narrator says that he spoke kindly to them.
The Plea and Joseph's Two Answers
The brothers asked for forgiveness with the Hebrew verb nasa, and Joseph comforted them in Genesis 45 and again in Genesis 50.
In the Berean text Genesis 50:17 is the only verse of Genesis with the word forgive and the first verse of the Bible to use it. The word stands twice in that verse, both times in the message the brothers sent. The STEP Bible tagging from Tyndale House gives the Hebrew verb as nasa, whose root sense is to lift.
Joseph's reply does not take up the word. He had answered their shame once already in Genesis 45, and in Genesis 50 he answered their fear, opening and closing his reply with the command not to fear.
Joseph's question about the place of God refused the seat of judge that his brothers offered him when they called themselves his slaves. Matthew Henry, in his Commentary on the Whole Bible, ties the question to Paul's command in Romans 12: "Those that avenge themselves step into the place of God".
Do not avenge yourselves, beloved, but leave room for God’s wrath. For it is written: “Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, says the Lord.”Paul gives the rule that Joseph's question assumes, that repaying a wrong belongs to God.
What Genesis Leaves Unsaid
Genesis leaves two questions about Joseph and his brothers unanswered.
Genesis never states why Joseph treated his brothers as strangers, held Simeon and hid the cup in Benjamin's sack. The narrator tells what Joseph did and that he wept, and the reasons readers give for the tests are their own inferences.
Genesis does not say whether the brothers ever told Jacob that they had sold Joseph. When they came home they told their father all that Joseph had said to them (Genesis 45:26 to 27), and the text records no confession to him.
What Joseph's Forgiving Rested On
Chrysostom, Stephen and Ambrose each drew a lesson from Joseph's welcome of his brothers.
Joseph's forgiving rested on his trust that God had ruled over his brothers' wrong.
John Chrysostom drew the lesson for his hearers in his Homilies on Genesis. He urged, "In the same way let us comfort those badly disposed to us, relieving them of responsibility for what has been done to us".
Stephen retells the scene in his speech before the council, "On their second visit, Joseph revealed his identity to his brothers" (Acts 7:13). His speech ends with the coming of the Righteous One, whom his hearers betrayed and murdered (Acts 7:52). Ambrose of Milan, in his work On Joseph, read Joseph's words to his brothers as the words of Christ.
Teachers on the Reconciliation
John Calvin and Matthew Henry drew three lessons on forgiving from Genesis 45 and 50.
1509 to 1564 · John Calvin
Commentaries
The quotation1 quotation
“And whereas it thus bursts forth in tears, this softness or tenderness is more deserving of praise than if he had maintained an equable temper. Therefore the stoics speak foolishly when they say, that it is an heroic virtue not to be touched with compassion.”
John Calvin · Commentaries · on Genesis 45:1Reformed
1509 to 1564 · John Calvin
Commentaries
The quotation1 quotation
“By this example we are taught to take heed lest sadness should overwhelm those who are truly and seriously humbled under a sense of shame. So long as the offender is deaf to reproofs, or securely flatters himself, or wickedly and obstinately repels admonitions, or excuses himself by hypocrisy, greater severity is to be used towards him.”
John Calvin · Commentaries · on Genesis 45:3Reformed
1662 to 1714 · Matthew Henry
Commentary on the Whole Bible
The quotation1 quotation
“Note, Though we must be ready to forgive all that are any way injurious to us, yet we must especially take heed of bearing malice towards any that are the servants of the God of our father: such we should always treat with a peculiar tenderness; for we and they have the same Master.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible · on Genesis 50:17Puritan
Did Jacob Send the Message?
Genesis reports the brothers' message and records no such word from Jacob, and three commentators read it three ways.
The brothers invented the command for the sake of peaceRashi, commentary on Genesis, on Genesis 50:16
The question is open, and invention is the less likely readingAdam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible, on Genesis 50:16
Adam Clarke leaves the question open: "Whether he did or not we cannot tell. Some think they had feigned this story, but that is not so likely." He suggests that Jacob may himself have feared for them and told them to humble themselves before their brother.
The command stands and teaches the penitent how to pleadJohn Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, on Genesis 50:16
John Wesley takes the command as given and applies it to the sinner who comes to Christ. He writes, "Thus in humbling ourselves to Christ by faith and repentance, we may plead that it is the command of his father and our father we should do so."
Forgive as the Lord Forgave You
Joseph's dealings with his brothers show in deeds the forgiving that Paul later asks of every believer.
Joseph met the men who had wronged him with a mercy they had not earned, and he left judgment with God. Paul asks the same of every believer, and he grounds it in the forgiveness each believer has received from the Lord.
Bear with one another and forgive any complaint you may have against someone else. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.Paul sets the Lord's forgiving as the measure of the believer's forgiving of anyone who has wronged him.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- STEP Bible TBESH, Tyndale House, CC BY 4.0.
- John Calvin, Commentaries on the First Book of Moses Called Genesis (1554)
- Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.
- John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis, in a modern English translation whose translator is not named.
- Rashi on Genesis, Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A. M. Silbermann, 1929 to 1934, public domain as Sefaria states its licence, via Sefaria.
- Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible.
- Ambrose of Milan, On Joseph, in modern English translation.
- John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)
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