discernment of this in their countenances ally, and now) it was not you that sent me WBB the re11son why he BBked eo abruptly hither, but God-literally, f01' ehe Elohim a.fter Jacob. Doth my father yet live 1 It (sent me). Joseph's brethren sent him to be is not now" the old m11n of whom ye spake" a slave; God sent him to be a saviour (eh. xliii. 27) for whom Joseph inquires, but (Hughes). And he hatb made me a fe.ther to his own beloved and revered parent-" my Pharaob,-i. e. a wise an,! confidential friend father." "Before it was a question of and counsellor (Keil, Kalisch, 'Speaker's courtesy, but now of love" (Alford). And Commentary ; ' cf. 1 1Iacc. xi. 32). :Murphy his brethren could not answer him; for explains the term as signifying "a second they were troubled (or cast into II trepida- author of life," with obvious reference to the tion, hence terrified) 11t his presence-liter- interpretation of his dreams and the measures ally, be/O'l'e his fo,ee. Not only did his adopted to provide against the famine-and present greatness overawe them, but the lord of all his house, and a ruler through- reeol!ection of their former crimes against out all the land of Egypt (vide eh. xli. 40, 41). him filled them with alarm. Haste ye, and go up to my father, and say Vers. 4-13.-A.nd Joseph said unto his unto him, Thus saith thy son Joseph, God brethren, Come near to me, I pray you. It (Elohim) bath made me lord of all Egypt: is probable they had instinctively shrunk from come down unto me, tarry not: and thou his presence on learning the astounding fact she.It dwell in the land of Goshen. Goshen, that he was Joseph, but felt reassured by r,11iµ 'Apa/3iat (LXX. ), was a rei,rion on the the kwdly tone of Joseph's words. And east of the Pelusi.-ic branch of the :Nile, ex- they came near. And he said, I am Joseph tending as far as the wilderness of Arabia, a your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt. land of pastures (eh. xlvi. 34), exceedingly It was impossible to evade allusion to their fertile (eh. xlvii. 6), styled also the land of early wickedness, and this Joseph does in 11 Rameses (eh. xlvii. 11), and including the spirit not of angry upbraiding, but of elevated cities Pithon and Rameses (Exod. i. 11), and piety and tender charity. Now therefore be probably a.lso On, or Helio~olis (Josephus, not grieved, nor angry with yourselves • Ant.,'ii. 7, 6; Hcngstenberg s 'Egypto.nd the (literally, lee ie rwe burn in your eyes, as in Books of Moses,' p. 42; Gesenius, 'Lexicon,' p. eh. xxxi. 35), that ye sold me hither (their 183). And thou shalt be near unto me, thou, self-recriminations and heart upbraidings for and thychildren,and thy children's children, their former wickedness Joseph in all pro• and thy fiocks, and thy herds, and e.ll that bability saw depicted in their faces): for God thou hast: and there will I nourish thee (the (Elohim) did send me before you to preserve verb is the Pilpel of Si::i, to hold up, hence life (literally, for ehe preservaeion of life). to sustain); for yet there are five years of For these two years hath the famine been in famine ; lest thou, and thy honsehold, e.nd the land (literally, in ehe midse of ehe land): all that thou hast, come to poverty-liter- and yet th~re are five years, in the which ally, be robbed, from ~'J), to take possession there shall neither be earing nor harvest- literally, neieher ploughing nor 1·eaping, (Keil), or fall into slllvery, i. e. through the term ploughing, or earing, charish (cf. poverty (Knobel, Lange). And, behold, apo111c, araeio, .Anglo-Saxon, erian), being your eyes see, and the eyes of my brother derived from II root signifying to cut. And Benje.min, that it is my mouth that speaketh God (Elohim, the use of which here 11nd in unto you. And ye shall tell my father of ver. 5 instend of Jehovah is sufficiently (literally, ye shall relate•eo my faeher) all my explained by remembering that Joseph glory (cf. eh. xxxi. 1) in Egypt, and of e.Il simply desires to foint out the overruling (literally, all) that ye have seen; and ye providence of God m his early transportation shall he.ate and bring down my father hither. to Egypt) sent me before you to preserve Calvin thinks that Joseph would not have you a posterity in the earth (literally, to made such liberal promises to his brethren keep f 01' yOU, a remnane on the eareh, i. e. to without having previously obtl\ined Pha• preserve the fe.mily from extinction through raoh's consent, nisi regis permiss1t; but the fa.mine), and to se.ve your lives by a this does not a.ppear from the narrative. gree.t deliverance-literally, eo preserve life Vera. 14, 16.-A.nd he (i. e. Joseph) fell eo you eo a greae delivemnce, i. e. by 11 upon his brother Benjamin's neck, and providential rescue (Rosenmiillcr, Kalisch, wept; and Benjamin wept upon his neck. Murphy, 'Speaker's Commentary '), which "Benja.miu is the central P.oint whence le11ds is better them to a great nation or posterity, out the way to reconciliation" (Lange). " Here brotherly a.lfection is drawn out by ?~ 1"1~ 1 being understood, as in 2 Sam. xv. a.ffection, tea.r 11nswering tear" (Hughes ; 14 ; 2 Kings rix. 80, 31, to mean II remnant cf. eh. xxxiii. 4). Moreover he kissed all his escaped from slaughter (Bohlen), an inter- brethren,-" the seal of reco:rii tion, of recon- pn,tation which Rosenmiiller thinks admis• ciliation, nnd of salutution ' (L11nge)-and sible, but Ke.lisch disputes. So now (liter- wept upon them. It hns been thought that 49lJ THE BOOK OF GENESIS. [CH. XLV. 1-15.
Benjamin stood when Joseph embraced him, and that the two wept upon each other's I sion to be, "e.ndhewept upon them" (Le.nge), And after that hi1 brethren talked with neck, but that the brethre~ bowed them• him-feeling themselves ree.ssured by such selves at Joseph's feet, causmg the expres- demonstrations ofe.lfection,