We Only Know That He Is with Us
Parashat VaYeshev, Genesis 37:1–40:2
Russ Resnik, UMJC Rabbinic Counsel
With this week’s parasha the great saga of Genesis takes a decisive turn. The dramatic visitations of God that characterized the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob come to an end. In the following story of Joseph and his brothers, we might be tempted to ask where God is amidst all that they have to go through.
The narrative shift comes with the opening words of our parasha: Vayeshev Yaakov b’eretz m’gurey aviyv. “Jacob dwelt in the land of his father’s sojournings.” These words hint at a crucial distinction: Jacob is dwelling, settling down, staying put, in the land where his father sojourned as a stranger. Yes, Genesis says that Abraham and Isaac also dwelt in the land, but this verse uses “dwelt” in contrast with “sojourning” to suggest that the pioneering era of sojourning is drawing to a close. Conditions for the sons of Jacob, the Children of Israel, will differ from those of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—and come to resemble our own.
In one of the last scenes before this shift, God had appeared and spoken personally to Jacob when he returned to Beth-El, reiterating the promises he’d earlier made—also in person—to both Abraham and Isaac.
I am El Shaddai: be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall come from your own body. The land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac I will give to you, and I will give the land to your offspring after you. (35:11–12 ESV modified)
With one exception, this is the last tangible manifestation of God in Genesis. The exception comes when God appears one final time to Jacob, encouraging him to go down to Egypt and be reunited with Joseph (46:2–4). In the rest of Genesis 37–50, Jacob’s sons experience God in less direct fashion, in a fashion that resembles the experience of succeeding generations including our own. Later in the Tanakh, prophets occasionally arise and are granted the same sort of direct encounter with the Almighty as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Later still, such encounter is embodied in the person of Messiah Yeshua, and is available to his followers through the gift of the Spirit. But in our day-to-day lives we are far more familiar with the sort of divine connection that is sometimes evident, and often hidden, in the saga of Joseph and his brothers.
As the story opens, Jacob favors his son Joseph, the first-born of his uniquely beloved Rachel, and gives him a richly ornamented tunic as a sign of his status. Joseph foolishly flaunts his status and two visionary dreams he has, which depict it. His older, less-favored brothers come to hate him. One day, they go off to the region of Shechem to pasture their father’s flock, and afterwards Jacob sends Joseph off to check on his brothers and bring back a report. When Joseph finds his brothers, wearing his magnificent tunic of favor, the brothers strip it off him and throw him into a pit. He ends up being carted off by traders and sold as a slave in Egypt. God’s presence is far less evident here than in the days of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Indeed, we might ask where God is while all this is going on.
Well, God might have been at work behind the scenes when Joseph was still trying to find his brothers. Shechem is about fifty miles from the region of Hebron, where Joseph started out, and when he finally got to Shechem . . .
A man found him wandering in the fields. And the man asked him, “What are you seeking?” “I am seeking my brothers,” he said. “Tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock.” And the man said, “They have gone away, for I heard them say, ‘Let us go to Dothan.’” So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan. (37:15–17)
This man appears out of nowhere, conveys crucial information to Joseph, and disappears from the narrative with not a word of explanation. He’s like the “man” who appeared back at the ford of the Jabbok in chapter 32, who wrestled with Jacob, blessed him, conveyed some crucial information, and disappeared from the narrative. Jacob was convinced he’d seen God face-to-face. Is Joseph’s encounter with this man another divine visitation? The events about to unfold all depend on that encounter, because without it he’d never find his brothers, never be carried down to Egypt, and (spoiler alert!) never become the rescuer of his family many years later.
When Joseph finally finds his brothers, they greet him by throwing him into a pit. He is soon pulled out of it, carried off to Egypt, and sold as a slave to Potiphar, an Egyptian official. At that very moment in Joseph’s ordeal, we’re told that the Lord was with him (39:2). But there’s no vision of angels, no voice from heaven, no place of revelation as with Joseph’s ancestors. And not only does the Lord not rescue Joseph, but things get worse. Potiphar’s wife is wowed by this young Hebrew slave and propositions him. Joseph turns her down and, for the first time, as far as we’re told, mentions God directly: “How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” (39:9). Joseph knows God is with him despite his endless tsuris and he behaves accordingly. Nevertheless, he is falsely accused of sexual assault by Potiphar’s lovely wife and thrown into prison. “But the Lord was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison” (39:21). The Lord shows Joseph steadfast love and favor . . . and leaves him in prison for years! If Joseph asked God why, he didn’t get much of an explanation, but he continued to faithfully serve.
So, when events go bad, as they so often do in the post-Patriarchal era in which we’re still living, it doesn’t mean God is absent or uncaring, much less that we should give up on serving him. We might often have occasion to ask “Where is God?”—as many of us did on October 7, 2023, and countless times since. It’s part of our human make-up to ask this question at such times, or when a loved one unexpectedly dies, a partner or friend deserts us, or disease invades our bodies. There’s usually not an immediate answer to that question, but perhaps the simple words from Joseph’s story can provide some comfort: God is with us. The world is broken, dangerous, difficult, and we don’t know why God doesn’t repair it. We only know that he is with us.
At the end of the story, Joseph will finally be able to make some sense of all that he had to endure. After their father Jacob dies, he tells his finally-repentant brothers: “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (50:20). Through all their trials, God remained with Joseph and with his brothers, and worked out their deliverance in the end. As in Joseph’s day, God’s activity in the world today is often veiled, but we can be confident that he is at work, and that the final outcome, whether near or far off, will be for good and for life.
Scripture references are from the English Standard Version, ESV.