When we closed yesterday, the older brothers of Joseph saw him coming to check on them and they hatched a plot to kill him. Reuben is going to balk at using such extreme measures to rid themselves of their father's favorite son and intended heir. Judah is going to agree with him about not resorting to murder, but not because he feels compassion for his seventeen-year-old brother. Judah will come up with a plan that allows them to be rid of Joseph and that will provide them with monetary gain at the same time. Jacob will be deceived by these men who are going to convince him Joseph is dead.
Joseph is approaching the group as they talk among themselves. "'Here comes that dreamer!' they said to each other. 'Come now, let's kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we'll see what comes of his dreams.'" (Genesis 37:19-20) We don't know which brothers make this statement. It might have been all of them with the exception of Reuben and Judah, two of the sons of Leah. The other two sons of Leah, Simeon and Levi, have already murdered men before and may think little of doing it again. We were told earlier in our chapter that the sons of Jacob by the maids Bilhah and Zilpah hated Joseph, so I have little doubt these men are part of the conspiracy to murder. Benjamin, Joseph's younger full brother, I am certain is not with them but is at home. Joseph is the age where young men were tasked with management of flocks and herds, but Benjamin is several years younger and would only have been expected to perform simple chores at home. Some scholars estimate that Benjamin was probably no more than ten years old here in Chapter 37, but there's no way to know his age for certain.
Reuben is horrified at the idea of killing his half brother and he tries to talk the men down. "When Reuben heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. 'Let's not take his life,' he said. 'Let's not shed any blood. Throw him into the cistern here in the wilderness, but don't lay a hand on him.' Reuben said this to rescue him from them and take him back to their father." (Genesis 37:21-22) Reuben hasn't been a very upstanding man so far in the Bible. He's been rebellious and disrespectful. He's looted and pillaged. He's committed adultery. Based on his actions so far, we might have thought there's nothing he wouldn't do, but he won't kill Joseph and he won't allow anyone else to kill Joseph if he can help it. Why didn't he simply stand against these men and rescue Joseph from their hands right now? Some of the commentators whose works I consulted are very critical of Reuben for not doing this, but I tend to think his own life would have been in danger if he'd outright refused to go along with them and if he'd said, "I'm taking Joseph back to our father right now and I'm going to tell him what you almost did!" These guys are a violent bunch. If they're perfectly willing to kill one brother, no doubt they wouldn't mind killing a second brother at the same time. Reuben is outnumbered. He'd have to fight nine tough, physically fit men to rescue Joseph. Even if Joseph joined in the fight with him, it would still be two against nine and the two of them would easily be overpowered.
Reuben's brothers have no idea he intends to sneak back and pull Joseph out of the cistern. Throwing a man into a cistern and leaving him there was a death sentence, but less of a hands-on method of murder than if they beat or stoned him to death or stabbed him. They like Reuben's idea and decide to take him up on it. They will seem even more convincing when they protest their innocence about Joseph's disappearance if their father sees none of his blood on their garments. "So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe---the ornate robe he was wearing---and they took him and threw him into the cistern. The cistern was empty; there was no water in it." (Genesis 37:23-24) The brothers take away the robe that symbolizes the disproportionate love their father feels for the eldest son of Rachel. They must have been so sick of seeing this seventeen-year-old boy strutting around in it as if he is their master. Every morning at the breakfast table they must have been sickened by the sight of the heir-apparent wearing his special robe while their father made a bigger deal of Joseph than of anyone else. They can't stand the thought that when he dies in the cistern and the cistern becomes his grave, he will forever be interred while adorned in this robe.
There's no water in the cistern, so he doesn't drown while his brothers sit down nearby and unpack their lunches. Imagine how hard-hearted they must have been to be able to enjoy a meal to the sound of his pitiful cries! I think the sound of his pleas for help must have been music to the ears of all of them but Reuben. I feel some sympathy for Reuben right now because even though he intends to come back later and pull Joseph out of the hole, there's nothing he can do at the moment to ease the boy's fear and torment. I don't believe he's able to bear the sound of his brother's cries and that he walks away from the rest of the group. I don't think he sits down and has a picnic lunch with them, and the reason I believe this is we will see that he's not present a few minutes later when the men come up with a different idea to rid themselves of Joseph. "As they sat down to eat their meal, they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded with spices, balm and myrrh, and they were on their way to take them down to Egypt." (Genesis 37:25)
This is when a lightbulb comes on over Judah's head. I can't help picturing him pausing with his full mouth hanging open when it occurs to him that he and the others can not only rid themselves of Joseph forever today but that they can also make a handsome profit at the same time. "Judah said to his brothers, 'What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come, let's sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood.'" (Genesis 37:26-27) He cloaks his greed with feigned compassion for the boy. He says, "If we let Joseph die here, we'll be rid of him but we really won't be better off financially. Not until our father's death anyway. But if we sell him to these traders we won't be guilty of his death. He'll be alive somewhere else, far away from us, and we'll have the price of a slave to divide among ourselves. Besides, he is our brother even though we despise him. Surely selling him is a better option than bearing the guilt of having killed a man who shares our blood."
"So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt. When Reuben returned to the cistern and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes. He went back to his brothers and said, 'The boy isn't there! Where can I turn now?'" (Genesis 37:29-30) A period of time passes in which Reuben is not with the rest of the group. The men have gone back to tending the flocks and when they're far enough away he sneaks back to the cistern intending to pull Joseph out but finds him missing. He's so grief-stricken that he tears his robes in an age-old gesture of anguish. He rushes to find the others and in his distress his intention to save Joseph becomes clear to them, but the deed is already done and they don't lay a hand on him for being upset with them. Reuben, as the firstborn of Jacob, feels responsible for what's happened today. He feels guilty for being too afraid of his gang of unscrupulous brothers to try to fight them all to save Joseph. He wonders what more he could and should have done. He thinks he ought to have been able to maintain control over this whole mess but he didn't know how and now he's overwhelmed with the knowledge of what has happened to Joseph. How can he face his father? What will he say to him? What excuse can he give for the fate of Jacob's favorite son? Reuben has already disgraced himself by announcing his candidacy for head of the family by adulterously sleeping with one of his father's wives. Obviously,he was wrong about his abilities and he's not capable of leading the family, as the events of our chapter today prove. But his father has already dismissed him as the primary heir and if Jacob realizes Reuben failed to save Joseph then Reuben risks being disowned entirely and excommunicated from the family.
Knowing Reuben would prefer not to have to account to their father for what's happened today, the others draw him into the deception they plan to perpetrate upon Jacob. If Reuben will go along with this plan he will never have to admit any guilt to their father. If Jacob thinks Joseph was attacked and killed by a wild animal on his way to check on the brothers, it will never occur to him to cast a suspicious eye on any of them. "Then they got Joseph's robe, slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood. They took the ornate robe back to their father and said, 'We found this. Examine it to see whether it is your son's robe.'" (Genesis 37:31-32) I bet they're congratulating themselves on tearing the robe off Joseph in the first place. Having him in his plain tunic helped them pass him off as a slave to the Ishmaelites and now the robe dipped in blood helps them pass him off as dead. I have a feeling Reuben is completely silent during this sad gathering with their father. In my mind I picture him standing in the shadows in a corner, not willing to come close enough to look his father in his eyes. Although he knows Joseph is alive, depending on what type of work he was expected to do as a slave, it could mean a life of backbreaking hard labor and an early death. I think Reuben is struggling with this knowledge, with his inability to keep this from happening, and with having to watch his father cry tears of grief over a son he believes is dead.
"He recognized it and said, 'It is my son's robe! Some ferocious animal has devoured him. Joseph has surely been torn to pieces.' Then Jacob tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and mourned for his son many days. All his sons and daughters came to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. 'No,' he said, 'I will continue to mourn until I join my son in the grave.' So his father wept for him." (Genesis 37:33-35) Jacob believes in the eternal life of the soul. He thinks Joseph is dead and that his remains are eaten and scattered. There's no gravesite beside his son in which he can be buried. When he says he's going to join Joseph some day, he's talking about being reunited with him after death. He says, "I will mourn my son until the day I see him again in heaven. I will never be happy again until then." King David said a similar thing about a son he lost. While his baby boy was sick, he fasted and prayed day and night for him to be healed, but the child passed on. David made this statement of faith about seeing his son again: "I will go to him, but he will not return to me." (2 Samuel 12:23) David couldn't revive his son from the dead. His baby boy's soul had gone on to be with the Lord. But all was not lost because, although he would not see his son again in this life, he would be reunited with him again after death in the presence of the Lord.
The narrative of Genesis is going to move back and forth for a period of time to keep us updated on Joseph's life in Egypt and on his family's life in Canaan. Joseph's family believes they will never see him again. Jacob and his wives and his son Benjamin and his daughters think Joseph is dead. The other ten know he is alive but believe he will be a slave in Egypt for the remainder of his life and that they will never lay eyes on him again. But all of these events are part of God's plan. Sometimes the things that happen to us in this world aren't pleasant. Sometimes those unpleasant things are a result of our own errors but other times they are part of God's plan for us. Joseph's family will see him again, and when they do, the one they tried to kill will save their lives. The one they hated so much will have forgiven them, will have recognized that the Lord used his circumstances to accomplish something of enormous importance and eternal significance, and will say to them: "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good." (Genesis 50:20)
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