HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Ch. xxxvii.-The representative man. Jacob may be said to fall into the back- ground from this time until his parting benediction. The kingdom of God is repre- sented in Joseph and his history. The main points in this chapter are- I. GoD's DISTINGUISHING GRACE TO JOSEPH, separating him from his brethren in character, in his father's affection, in the method of his life, in the communications of the Spirit. Joseph is the type of the believer, faithful to the covenant, amongst both the Canaaniti~h heathen nnd the unfaithful children of the covenant, the patriarchs. II. THE WORKING 01!' EVIL PASSIONS AND MORAL IMPURITY BROUGHT TO A CL!i\IAX THROUGH THE DEVELOPMENT 01!' GOD'S GRACE IN THE INDIVIDUAL. Joseph brought the evil report to Jacob. Joseph dreamed. Joseph was evidently both in himself supe- rior to his brethren and more favoured by God. That is the old story-the Cain spirit developed by contact with the Abel spirit. A time of special grace is always a time of special wickedness and judgment. Witness the advent of the Lord, the Reformation period, the revival of religion in the last century, leading on to the out- burst of both wickedness and judgment nt the end. Ill. THE DREAMS 01!' THE PIOUS LAD WERE THEllSELVES STEPS IN THE COURSE OF REVELATION. The dominion which was foreshadowed was that of the spiritual kingdom over the unspiritual. IV; THE PROVIDENTIAL FULFILMENT Oil' THE PROMISE. Partly through the personal character of Joseph, partly through the evil pnssions of his brethren, partly through the apparently casual incidents of the neighbourhood, partly through the Spirit of righteousness working in the henrt of Reuben, partly through the weakness o.ncl fondness of Jacob. How st.rangely "all things work together" in God's hands I He weaves the web composed of many single threads into one united, orderly pattern as o. whole in which we nre able to trace his own thought and purpose. V. Joseph in the pit while his brethren sit down to eat bread represents THE BELIEVER SUFFERING IN THE MIDST OF AN UNBELIEVING WORLD. A type of Jesus cast into the pit of his humiliation, while the Jewish people despised nnd rejected his claims, his prophetic words, his evident fo.vour with God, and by their trnnsactions with Gentiles, the Romans, gave him up to what seemed to them ruin, but what was the crowning of his head with glory. We begin to see nt this point that, as th:l Psalmist so.ng, "the word of the Lord tried him." VI. THE DELIVERANCE of Jo~eph and his transference to the sphere of hie future triumph are EFFECTED THROUGH JUDAH IMMEDIATELY, THROUGH THE OTHER BRETHREN' AND 1'HE ISHMAELITES OR MIDIANITES SECONDARILY. These names of Judah, Ishmael, Midian remind ua that the fleshly links which bind the descendants of Abraham to- gether are not lost sight of by God, are called in to serve the purposes of grace, but not to take the place of the true spiritual work, which goes on in its own appointed channel. So in the history of the Church, while there are many secondary influences at work, still there is a remnant according to the election of grace in which there is the real continuity of Divine dealings. VII. The genuine grief of Reuben, the barbarous inhumanity towards their father of the fallen sons, THE OVERWHELMING SORROW OF THE AGED, HEART-BROKEN JACOB, the rising up of all his sons and daughters to comfort him, are o.11 beautiful and signifi- cant touches of nature in this history, which remind us that we are not "following cunningly-devised fables," and that God's gracious kingdom of trnth and lovo does not annihilate the human in order to reveal the Divine, but puts its rainbow on the cloud. VIII. THE INTRODUCTION OF EGYPT again into the history. Egypt is the type of the wQrld, as built upon the foundation of fallen humanity alone, without the speci11l srnce of God, Into that l!ulk of the unrenewed race the leaven of the kingdom urn,l 4.32 THE BOOK OF GENESIS. [en. XXX\'11, 12--25.
he put.. The connection between the covenant family and Egypt, which we trace in the history of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as afterwards in their descendants, repre- sents at once (1) the thoroughly human character of the kingdom that God would set up in the earth, for the people of God found much in Egypt which they carried away ~l'ith them afterwards, and assimilated to their own specially-communicated faith; (2) the breadth of the promises of God-the separation of the one people was for the sake of all the families of the earth.-R.