Gen 44 · Read 10 min · think and write 15 min
In the last lesson, the brothers came to Egypt to buy grain, and “Joseph recognized his brothers, but they didn’t recognize him” (Gen 42:8). Joseph told them to bring their youngest brother, Benjamin. To get their father to let Benjamin go, Judah said to him, “I’ll be collateral for him. From my hand will you require him” (Gen 43:9).
In this lesson, something happens to Benjamin in Egypt.
1He commanded the steward of his house, saying, “Fill the men’s sacks with food, as much as they can carry, and put each man’s money in his sack’s mouth.
2Put my cup, the silver cup, in the sack’s mouth of the youngest, with his grain money.” He did according to the word that Joseph had spoken.
At first light the brothers set off with their donkeys. They had not gone far when the steward caught up with them and said they had stolen his master’s cup. The brothers said they would never do such a thing: whoever had it would die, and the rest would become slaves. The steward said that whoever had it would be a slave, and the rest would be blameless. (vv. 3–11)
12He searched, beginning with the oldest, and ending at the youngest. The cup was found in Benjamin’s sack.
13Then they tore their clothes, and each man loaded his donkey, and returned to the city.
14Judah and his brothers came to Joseph’s house, and he was still there. They fell on the ground before him.
15Joseph said to them, “What deed is this that you have done? Don’t you know that such a man as I can indeed do divination?”
16Judah said, “What will we tell my lord? What will we speak? How will we clear ourselves? God has found out the iniquity of your servants. Behold, we are my lord’s slaves, both we and he also in whose hand the cup is found.”
17He said, “Far be it from me that I should do so. The man in whose hand the cup is found, he will be my slave; but as for you, go up in peace to your father.”
18Then Judah came near to him, and said, “Oh, my lord, please let your servant speak a word in my lord’s ears, and don’t let your anger burn against your servant; for you are even as Pharaoh.
19My lord asked his servants, saying, ‘Have you a father, or a brother?’
20We said to my lord, ‘We have a father, an old man, and a child of his old age, a little one; and his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother; and his father loves him.’
Judah goes on: Joseph had told them to bring the youngest brother; they had told Joseph that if the boy left his father, his father would die; then, when the food ran out at home, their father sent them back to buy grain. (vv. 21–26)
27Your servant, my father, said to us, ‘You know that my wife bore me two sons.
28One went out from me, and I said, “Surely he is torn in pieces;” and I haven’t seen him since.
29If you take this one also from me, and harm happens to him, you will bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to Sheol.’
30Now therefore when I come to your servant my father, and the boy is not with us; since his life is bound up in the boy’s life;
31it will happen, when he sees that the boy is no more, that he will die. Your servants will bring down the gray hairs of your servant, our father, with sorrow to Sheol.
32For your servant became collateral for the boy to my father, saying, ‘If I don’t bring him to you, then I will bear the blame to my father forever.’
33Now therefore, please let your servant stay instead of the boy, my lord’s slave; and let the boy go up with his brothers.
34For how will I go up to my father, if the boy isn’t with me?—lest I see the evil that will come on my father.”
To read the whole chapter: Gen 44, 34 verses.
Another sack. Joseph has his steward put the silver cup in Benjamin’s sack (v. 2). When the cup is found, “they tore their clothes, and each man loaded his donkey, and returned to the city” (v. 13). Years earlier, when the robe came back covered in blood, it was their father who tore his clothes: “Jacob tore his clothes” (Gen 37:34). This time it is the brothers themselves.
An easy way out. Joseph says that only the one man will stay — “but as for you, go up in peace to your father” (v. 17). It looks a lot like the first time: give up the youngest, the one their father loves most, and everyone else can go home. The passage does not say why Joseph set things up this way. It only records how the brothers answered.
God has found it out. Judah says, “God has found out the iniquity of your servants” (v. 16). They had not stolen the cup, and the passage does not tell us which iniquity Judah had in mind. On their first trip to Egypt they had already said to one another, “We are certainly guilty concerning our brother” (Gen 42:21).
Judah keeps talking about his father. From verse 18 to verse 34, Judah speaks at length. He tells of an old father who loves this boy, and he repeats his father’s words: “One went out from me, and I said, ‘Surely he is torn in pieces’” (v. 28). He says that his father’s “life is bound up in the boy’s life” (v. 30).
‘His brother is dead.’ Judah says to Joseph, “his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother; and his father loves him” (v. 20). He does not know that the man hearing this is the ‘dead’ brother. The passage says nothing here about how Joseph responded; only at the start of the next chapter do we read that “Joseph couldn’t control himself” (Gen 45:1).
Collateral. Judah says, “your servant became collateral for the boy to my father” (v. 32). He had said the same thing to his father in Canaan: “I’ll be collateral for him. From my hand will you require him” (Gen 43:9). Now he makes good on it: “please let your servant stay instead of the boy, my lord’s slave; and let the boy go up with his brothers” (v. 33).
The same man, twice. Back at Dothan, it was Judah who proposed selling Joseph: “Come, and let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites” (Gen 37:27). This time it is also Judah who asks to “stay instead of the boy” (v. 33). The passage does not tell us how Judah got from the first sentence to the second. It only lets us hear both sentences, from the same man.
Jacob’s twelve sons later became the twelve tribes of Israel. This family once sold a brother over a robe. This time, faced with another brother their father loved, they did not walk away: “each man loaded his donkey, and returned to the city” (v. 13).
God meant to bless all the families of the earth through this family. The passage does not say the family had become good. It records only that, this time, nobody left a brother behind.
Maybe you, too, have something like Judah’s day at Dothan, and you still remember it. This chapter does not tell you how Judah changed. But it lets you see that the same person can say a different second sentence.
This week: Think of someone near you who needs someone to stand up for them. This week, do one practical thing for them — go with them to take care of something, or say a fair word for them in front of others.
Scripture: World English Bible.