The Story of Joseph and His Brethren/Part 2/Chapter 5
CHAPTER V.
WHEN Joseph was carried into Egypt, it was in order that his history might represent the Lord's acquisitions, and, after His, the acquisitions of the Christian disciple, as the means of growing in the divine and spiritual life; for we know that Jesus increased in wisdom, and, through that wisdom, in favour with God and man. But wisdom is not acquired without labour, nor even without tribulation. In the progress of the mind in wisdom, one must serve before he can rule, and he must be tried before he can be confirmed in goodness. Of this, Joseph, when in Egypt, had his full share. Our Lord Himself, we have seen, passed through severe trial and temptation, and these were so great that those which Joseph endured but faintly represented them. In some of the prophecies our Lord's sufferings are described symbolically by the very things that Joseph suffered. In the 53rd of Isaiah, where the Lord's great trials are described, it is said, "He was taken from prison and from judgment." Yet the Lord was never literally in prison; but He was in states of temptation, which are meant by being in prison, and being bound; for in temptation the soul is in terrible straitness or anguish; the thoughts and feelings seem as if they were imprisoned, and the powers of the mind seem as if they were bound, and deprived of all free and happy exercise. In His great temptation at Gethsemane our Lord declared that His soul was exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death. After His death, He was imprisoned in the grave, till He burst the bands of death, and rose triumphant over death and the grave. But between His death and resurrection we learn that He descended into the prison-house of the world of spirits, and there went and preached unto the spirits in prison (1 Peter iii. 19). This was not what is properly called hell, for preaching to those in that eternal prison could be of no avail; but it was in that intermediate or middle region where all, both the vile and the good, first enter after death, and where the good are separated from the evil by the judgment; and such a judgment was effected by the Lord at the end of the Jewish church. The good, who had been detained there as prisoners of hope, waiting for the Lord's redemption, are meant by the saints which slept, and arose at the time of our Lord's resurrection, and went into the holy city, that is, into heaven. We find, therefore, one of the works which the Messiah was to perform at His coming, as announced by the prophets, was bringing the prisoners out of the prison house. (Isaiah xlii. 7.) Joseph's good works in the prison may be considered as bearing some analogy to those of our Lord just mentioned. The good and evil spirits who were bound in prison in the spiritual world, were represented by the butler and the baker; and Joseph, in his interpretation of their dreams, preached hope and deliverance to the good servant of Pharaoh, but pronounced the awful doom of death to the evil one; and the result was that one was saved and the other was lost.
But the grand purpose of Divine Providence in conveying Joseph down into Egypt was, that he might be the honoured instrument of making such a provision during the years when the earth yielded abundance as might feed the famishing nations during the years of famine. In this he was peculiarly the type of the Lord as the Saviour.
As Joseph's detention in prison represented the Lord's trials and temptations, which ended with his death and burial, and his being three days in the heart of the earth; his being brought up out of the prison dungeon into the the palace and presence of the mighty and magnificent Pharaoh, represented the Lord's resurrection. When Joseph was out of his prison house, he shaved himself and changed his raiment. So when our blessed Lord rose from the dead. He left His garments in the tomb, and appeared to His disciples in new and heavenly robes. By this was represented that He put off in the tomb the remnant or residue of the frail humanity derived from his mother Mary, and rose with a humanity wholly derived from His Father, and therefore Divine.
In the Divine Word, where we find the Lord's divine work in the flesh represented in various forms, this change,—the putting off of the old, and putting on of the new, is also representatively described. In the prophecy of Zechariah, (chap, iii.) Joshua the high priest is presented before us as a type of the Lord Jesus, as the great high priest of his church. In that singular chapter of a singular prophecy, the prophet says, "And he (the angel) shewed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at His right hand. Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the angel. And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment." We must remark that this filthy garment does not apply to the whole human nature, but only to that part of it which was from the frail and finite human mother Mary, and that the iniquity which was to pass from him, was not active iniquity, for the Lord never had any actual sin, but only the hereditary tendencies to evil derived from His fallen human parent. All this garment of frailty and mortality the Lord put off, and put on as "change of raiment" a garment of infinite purity and immortality, such as that in which He appeared on the mount of transfiguration, when His raiment was white as the light. But Joseph not only changed his garment, but he shaved himself. And this part of his change was like that of the Nazarite when the days of his Nazariteship were ended; on which occasion he shaved his head. It was a law amongst the Israelites, also, that if any man desired to marry a beautiful captive who had been taken in war, she should shave her head and pair her nails, and put off the raiment of her captivity, after which they should be married. (Deut. xxi. 13.) In all these cases, shaving and changing the raiment was meant to be a sign of putting off what is old, and putting on what was new, and thus symbolizing a change of state.
It has been formerly remarked that Joseph, being made governor over all the land of Egypt, represented the exaltation of Jesus: and this was spoken of by the apostle Peter, when he bore his noble testimony before the Jewish council—"The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with His right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance unto Israel and forgiveness of sins." (Acts v. 30.) We shall not dwell on all the particulars that now follow in the history of Joseph; it will be enough to present some general outline.