Anat

In the Ezra thread Celsus pointed out the fact that ben-Sira does not mention Joseph and suggested the Joseph cycle was a late addition to the Patriarch cycles. And that the theme of the story - the success of a young Hebrew in a royal foreign court reflects a diaspora situation. I would like to expand the discussion on this story, the background for its composition and the messages in it.

One purpose for the Joseph story is to explain why and under what conditions the Israelites migrated to Egypt - connecting the patriarchs and the exodus - thus it must have been composed after both stories. Though of course, the minimum necessary for this purpose would be a short passage about a famine worse and longer than the one in Abraham's times, migration to Egypt and settlement in a suitable area there, maybe with some local conflicts that might serve as the background for the later enslavement.

Another theme in the Joseph cycle is the struggle over leadership and firstborn status between the brothers - continuing a theme found in many stories in Genesis. There is the one actually born first - Reuben, but anyone who had been paying attention to the previous cycles already expects him to lose out. The two competitors are Judah and Joseph. Judah finds an 'acceptable' way to get rid of Joseph, but Joseph not only survives, but achieves higher status than he could have ever hoped for and then plots back against his brothers in order to get them to bring benjamin to him. Judah establishes his leadership by taking personal responsibility for Benjamin. The drama reaches its peak in the confrontation between the two in chapter 44 and then is resolved when Joseph reveals his identity. Eventually Joseph obtains acknowledgement of his firstborn status: he is the one who makes arrangements for his family's settlement, he is the one Jacob commands to ensure his burial in the family tomb, he gets the firstborn's double share through the blessing of his two sons by Jacob. In Jacob's prophecy to his sons (chapter 49) both Judah (verses 8-10) and Joseph (verse 26) are given leadership over their brothers.

This seems to reflect the history of the divided monarchy - with Judah ruled by a Judahite dynasty and Israel whose capital is in the hills of Ephraim and which was founded by Jeroboam, an Ephraimite. Border trouble between the two by necessity took place in the land of Benjamin - for example the wars of Asa vs Baasa in 1Kings 15.

So why would a text from diasporic times deal with the conflicts of the 2 monarchies, long after the northern of the two is gone? Is there evidence for the existence of an older story about Joseph vs Judah conflict without the 'success at a foreign royal court' element? What about other stories about Jacob's sons - such as the Judah and Tamar story in chapter 38 or the destruction of Shechem by Simeon and Levi? What is their purpose and when did they originate?

andrewcriddle

Given its presence in the Masoretic Septuagint and Samaritan Pentateuch, I would have great difficulties with putting the story of Joseph so late as to be unknown to Ben Sira. (The story of Joseph is also part of Jubilees which probably dates from c 150 BCE and is found in several Genesis manuscripts from the DSS There is also a Joseph Apocryphon from the DSS the earliest manuscript probably about 100 BCE and thought by its editor IIUC to have been probably composed in the 3rd quarter of the 2nd century BCE.)

This wouldn't of course rule out a date of composition for such a story in the 4th or early 3rd century BCE, but it would make the silence of Ecclesiasticus doubtfully relevant.

IF, however, one accepts the traditional source analysis of the Pentateuch then Joseph occurs in J and E versions suggesting that it is part of the sources underlying the Pentateuch as we know it not a late addition.

Andrew Criddle

andrewcriddle

Given its presence in the Masoretic Septuagint and Samaritan Pentateuch, I would have great difficulties with putting the story of Joseph so late as to be unknown to Ben Sira. (The story of Joseph is also part of Jubilees which probably dates from c 150 BCE and is found in several Genesis manuscripts from the DSS There is also a Joseph Apocryphon from the DSS the earliest manuscript probably about 100 BCE and thought by its editor IIUC to have been probably composed in the 3rd quarter of the 2nd century BCE.)

This wouldn't of course rule out a date of composition for such a story in the 4th or early 3rd century BCE, but it would make the silence of Ecclesiasticus doubtfully relevant.

IF, however, one accepts the traditional source analysis of the Pentateuch then Joseph occurs in J and E versions suggesting that it is part of the sources underlying the Pentateuch as we know it not a late addition.

Andrew Criddle