The Jealous Brothers and Joseph

To say that Jacob had always treated Joseph different from his other sons would be a lie.  At one point he had treated them all equally, equal indifference.  Reuben had been a better father to his brothers than their actual father was.  Reuben had known that he treated Aunt Rachel better than his mom and Bilhah and Zilpah but that had never meant anything to him except that his mother was often sad.  His father had loved Rachel to the point of ignoring everyone else.  Though Reuben was angry on behalf of his mother, it didn’t affect him much so he just raised his brothers and sister and watched them run to his father when he remembered them.  None of this changed when Joseph was born.  It did, however, change when Benjamin was born.

I have always interpreted Benjamin being born before Joseph was taken to Egypt.  This made more sense in my mind as to why Jacob doted so much on Joseph if Rachel, his favorite wife, was already dead.  It also made sense that Benjamin was excluded from being a favorite since he was Rachel’s last child if Jacob blamed Benjamin for his beloved’s death.  I also imagine that the boys were treated differently once Joseph was favorite than they were after.  It would contribute to the bitterness if they knew it could be different.

My parents have never personally had favorites.   Or at least, they never treated us as if they did.  We may have teased them about favorites or claimed in anger that another was their favorite, but they never treated us that way.  I, however, have always believed myself to not be the favorite if there was one.  I counted presents at birthday parties for years and always determined that since my brothers had more, they must be liked by more people, and thus less people liked me than liked them.  This was how I looked at it for years.

When Benjamin was born, Reuben saw everything change.  Suddenly, he was no longer the one being a father to Joseph but his father had stepped into that role.  Also, Benjamin was not even looked at by his father for years.  It wasn’t until he was older did Reuben realize that his father blamed Benjamin for Rachel’s death.  His mom had cried for her sister’s death and was often seen with Jacob trying to comfort him.  Suddenly, his mom was too busy with his father to spend as much time with him and his brothers than she had before.

Reuben remembered the first time that Jacob’s favoritism came clearly into effect.  Zebulun and Joseph had gotten in a fight over the game that they were playing and were wrestling around in the dirt.  Reuben had just been getting ready to step in and stop it when their father came in yelling.  Without listening to a word any of the brothers said, he grabbed Zebulun’s arm and pulled him away to be spanked.  Reuben protested and tried to stop him because none of them had ever been punished that way before but their father had just continued and then punished Reuben for interfering.  Then he gently picked up Joseph and carried him away to take care of his scrapes.  It had been the first time any of them had been punished by their father.  Though it hadn’t been as bad as it could have been, all of them were surprised at the unfairness of the treatment.

The favoritism had to have been carried out in different aspects of their lives in order for it to be important enough to be mentioned in the Bible.  Joseph probably got away with more than his brothers and possibly even contributed to the punishments of others by getting them in trouble for things that they hadn’t done.  It probably was a bit of surprise at first until it became the norm and was expected.  Joseph may even have taken advantage and got his brothers in trouble on purpose.

As a result of my beliefs, I often worked harder than my brothers on trying to keep on my parent’s good side.  I got really good at remembering my chores even when my brothers didn’t.  But one time, I came home and my mom was complaining about something not being done.  When I told her that it was Matthew’s chore, my older brother, she asked me why I didn’t get him to do it.  My mouth dropped open in surprise as this seemed to feed all of my insecurities.  Didn’t she know how hard it was to get Matthew to stop his games long enough to do his chores?  Didn’t she know that he yelled at me every time that I annoyed him at all over not doing his chores?  I went upstairs into my room and realized that my best would never be good enough for my mom, however inaccurate that statement actually was.

It wasn’t like all of a sudden, Jacob ignored the rest of his sons for Joseph.  It was slowly.  It took a while for Reuben to realize that when Jacob loves, he loves passionately to the exclusion of everything else.  That was what happened with his mother and Rachel, and that was what was happening with Joseph and the rest of them.  At first, Joseph still ran to him with all of his problems and questions.  Many of the questions were about why their father was acting so differently.  Reuben also had been the one that Joseph ran to while crying for his mother.  But slowly, Joseph started turning to their father for things like that.  The others also turned to their father less for things like that.  While Joseph would get a reply and a hug, the others were more often be brushed off or sent to Reuben.

Reuben remembered the time that Uncle Esau visited and they found out that he was the older brother.  Joseph had been maybe ten at the time and Reuben about sixteen.  When the accidently found out that Uncle Esau was older, Joseph had asked the question they all had been thinking.  “So why did Dad inherit everything as firstborn?”  After telling the story about how their father had tricked Uncle Esau, their father left with Esau to discuss trading some animals.  The rest of the boys there, except for Benjamin who was too young to understand, had looked between Joseph and Reuben a few times, clearly seeing the parallels and drawing the conclusions that he had.  Joseph looked a bit too thoughtful when he ran after their father and all the other boys looked at Reuben to see his reaction.  Reuben knew then, that if his father had his own way, he would never get his birthright but that Joseph would.  His father never had followed tradition. 

Without a word, Reuben tightened his jaw and stormed away.  That was the first time that he actually hated his brother.

We don’t really know what made Joseph be hated by his brothers or when it started.  We know that he was their father’s favorite but what did that mean for them?  I imagine that they were worried about their inheritances.  Is Joseph going to be given the birthright?  If not, is his inheritance going to be larger than theirs?  I imagine that he was spoiled by his father.  I also imagine that the story about how their father tricked his way into his inheritance worried them to no end.

My parents never spoiled any of us.  But I was jealous of when my little brother had birthday parties that I never got because I never asked for them.  I understood even then why I wasn’t getting parties, but I never managed to get rid of my guilt over possibly costing my parents money over a party so to ask them for one.  Even when I tried to explain my thoughts to them, I don’t think that they fully understood what was going on in my mind.  They didn’t understand because I didn’t even yet fully understand.

Whenever Dinah, their only sister, was raped, all of them were infuriated by their father’s lack of action.  By that point they were already furious at their father’s indifference to all but Joseph and this only exacerbated their anger against him.  Zebulun had overheard Hamor and Shechem asking for Dinah to marry Shechem and had come running to them with the news.  How could their father even consider allowing her to marry that rapist?  Simeon and Levi quickly came up with the plan of circumcising the entire town as a condition to marry her.  None of them ever thought that they would agree.  But they did.

Three days later, while the rest of them were still planning their next move, Simeon and Levi had snuck out without Reuben noticing.  By the time that he did notice, they were already avenging their sister.  When they realized what their brothers were doing they all grabbed their own weapons and hurried out after them.  Reuben wasn’t entirely sure what he was planning on doing, whether he was going to join in or stop them.  He wasn’t even sure what his other brothers were planning on doing either.  Only Joseph and Benjamin were not with them as they ran out.

The village was eerily silent as he ran in with his brothers.  The amount of red he saw everywhere was astounding.  It reminded him of a village nearby that had gotten hit by raiders.  No one in that village had been left alive.  In the house of Hamor, they could see the outlines of the women and children as they cowered.  They could only hope that they would become slaves rather than being killed for the sins of Shechem.  All of them stood there for a while, looking around, wondering what to do next.  Simeon and Levi had frozen near the well as the rinsed the blood off of their arms.  “What are we going to do?” Asher asked tremulously, as he stared in wide eyed shock at all the blood.  That’s right, he had been sick when they had come upon that village so hadn’t been with them.

After a moment of thought, Reuben said, “We loot it.  There should be enough to care for Dinah to be able to provide for herself until she dies.  We will still watch her, but she will never be a burden.  The survivors can be her slaves.”  The others nodded and began to take everything.  From clothes to jewelry to cattle.  Nothing was left for anyone who may have escaped.

When they returned and Jacob realized what they had done, he was furious and spent a long time just yelling at them for what they did while Joseph watched.  He could no longer cane them, but he did tell them that they would have to find their own food for the night.  None of them cared.  If he wasn’t going to take care of Dinah, they would.

I imagine that they believed that they were in the right when the killed all of the men in that village.  Maybe they believed that they should have done something to save their sister.  Maybe they believed that they should have punished Shechem themselves for the rape.  If it had been me, my brothers probably would have wanted to do the same thing, especially if they knew who it was and no justice was being done.  This probably further isolated them from Jacob and even Joseph.  With Joseph being hated, I can’t imagine him coming with them on this trip or even agreeing with him.  He was a daddy’s boy through and through.  After this, the brothers probably began to look for things to hate about Joseph and began to isolate themselves from him.

It’s amazing how much people can isolate themselves over a misconception!  I know that’s what I did.  My room became my haven and I stopped being with my family almost at all except for meals.  Even my favorite tv shows I would only sometimes remember to watch with them.  Eventually I realized how isolated I actually was and it was only much later that I realized that it was my own fault.  How could I expect them to make time for me when I wouldn’t make time for them?

First the coat, then the dreams, Joseph seemed to believe that he was better than the rest of them.  Almost every time he started talking to them, the dreams or his coat were mentioned somehow.  Not to mention he wore the coat everywhere despite the fact it was obviously meant for special occasions.  Ever since he saw them get in trouble over how Levi and Simeon killed the men of that village, Joseph had been looking for other reasons to get them in trouble over.  Like when he told their father how Dan, Naphtali, Asher, and Gad were messing around while working.  It wasn’t like they left the cattle and went running off.  They were just doing something to try to pass the time while watching.  But sure enough perfect Joseph told father and they got in trouble for it.

Then they were sent to Shechem without Joseph because may it be forbidden that Joseph is ever gone a while out of their father’s sight.  When they saw Joseph coming, they knew that he was going to find something wrong to tell their father.  The others wanted to kill him but Reuben still saw a bit of the little boy who ran to him over his mother’s death and tried to convince them not to and made plans to save him once he was thrown, screaming and fighting, into a dry well.  Then he left them for a while to find some rope to pull him out with and to check up with the other shepherds.  But when he came back, Joseph was gone.  They had sold him.  They would probably never see him again.  He allowed himself to mourn his brother for a minute before he made plans to protect the brothers that he still had left.  They killed a goat that Reuben found injured on his quest for rope and dipped the robe in the blood after they tore it to shreds.  Now they just had to tell their father.

I can’t imagine what pushed brothers to do something like this to their own brother.  But it was probably anger and hurt and hate and longing and jealousy along with a whole other slew of emotions that made them do it.  They wanted their father to live them, I think, above all just as much as he had loved Joseph.  Favoritism, even falsely perceived favoritism can really mess up a person’s mind.

I was almost cruel in my thoughts to many of my friends and family in my beliefs of being the least favorite.  It may not have been to the level of murder or trying to get rid of them, but I didn’t truly trust anyone for years because I believed that eventually they would leave me for others or were just barely standing me.  I diagnosed myself with little sister syndrome.  They all loved me, really, but I was the annoying kid sister that they only hung out with because mom said.  Any time anyone said that they missed talking to me or seeing me, I doubted what they were saying.  Or if I did believe them, I was super surprised.  People who had always been kind to me, I acted wary as if they had been mean.  It was unfair to them.

After their father finally removed his sack cloth for mourning for his favorite son, he clung to Benjamin.  Benjamin seemed a bit confused and even embarrassed by all the attention that he had never gotten before.  Reuben didn’t envy him for it was almost stifling how their father treated him.  Soon, it was business as usual . . . only . . . not.  They never realized just how helpful Joseph was with making sure that they had enough supplies on their trips with the cattle until he wasn’t there double checking their packs.  It seemed that Gad and Issachar always forgot at least one thing, if not more, before they had to start double and triple checking their own packs. 

Though Joseph’s dreams were annoying, they missed his stories sitting around the campfire at night while watching the sheep.  Soon, some of them were having nightmares of Joseph living or dying, healthy or beaten, slave or free.  It was keeping all of them awake.  Slowly, one by one, they all succumbed to the guilt they felt over what they did wrong.  Their father was still inconsolable at times over Joseph and refused to accept their help.  It was slow, but as the years passed, they came into a deeper understanding of their wrong doings and felt genuine remorse.  But it was not until a famine and a man whose face seemed so familiar and so unfamiliar at the same time did they begin to heal over their mistakes.

There had never been any doubt in my mind that it took them a while to feel genuine remorse over their actions towards their brother.  It may have even been after they had families of their own did they begin to understand the scope of their crimes.  Either way, by the time that they met up with Joseph again in Egypt, they knew that they had done wrong and were expecting retribution of some sort.

For me, it wasn’t until my senior year in high school that I began to realize how messed up my beliefs were.  It also wasn’t until I left home for college that I began to see the full scope of my actions.  I don’t remember when I stopped counting presents to see who the “favorite” was.  It was probably about the same time that I realized that I was my grandma’s favorite since I’m her only granddaughter by blood.  That was also about the time that I saw that my brother’s knew that and were okay with it and I wondered why I couldn’t do the same.  Though it still isn’t perfect, I can honestly look back and realized how very wrong I was in some of the things that I believed.  I will never be able to apologize to some of the people that I believed the worst of.  But now I can believe the best of people and know that very few are actually trying to hurt me.  When people have to compare themselves to someone in the Bible, it is often one of the heroes of the Bible or at least someone that did some good somehow.  I, on the other hand, liken myself to Joseph’s brothers.  I grew up jealous of them.  Though I didn’t take it to the extreme that they did, they are still some of the people most like me in the Bible.