Joseph and his brothers, p.154
Joseph and His Brothers, page 154
In fact and in reality the prophesied seven looked more like five. But versatile life committed itself unconditionally to neither the one nor the other, since, you see, the years of plenty and scarcity did not arise from time's womb with the same accuracy, did not offset one
another with the same incontestable precision, as the fat and lean cows in Pharaoh's dream. The years of plenty and scarcity that did come were, like life itself, not equally fat and lean. Among the fat ones were one or two that one certainly could not call lean, but, if one were critically inclined, might possibly have been termed no more than middling fat. The lean ones were indeed all lean enough, five of them certainly, if not seven; but among them were a couple that did not reach the ultimate degree of misery, but came halfway close to being tolerable, so that, had it not been for the prophecy, one might not have recognized them as years of chaff and curse. But in this case, out of goodwill, they were included.
Does all this then speak against the prophecy's fulfillment? It does not. The fulfillment is unimpeachable, for the facts lie before us—the facts of our story that make up our story, without which our story would never be in this world and without which the carrying-off and the raising-up would never have been followed by the send-ing-for-others-to-follow. Things were certainly fat and lean enough in the land of Egypt and adjoining regions—years of plenty and years of more or less scarcity; and Joseph had ample opportunity to discipline the plenty and to distribute to the egregious scarcity and proved himself to be Utnapishtim-Atrahasis, to be Noah, that arch-clever man of foresight and precaution, whose ark rocks gently upon the waves of the Flood. Joseph did all this as a faithful servant of the Most High, as its minister, and his enterprise enriched Pharaoh with gold heaped upon gold.
The Golden Ceremony
First, however, he himself was enriched with gold, for "to become a man of gold" was a phrase the children of Egypt had for exactly what now happened to him when, obeying Pharaoh's beautiful command and joining the god, his Great Mother, the Sweet Consort, and the princesses Nezemmut and Baketaton, on the royal barque Star of the Two Lands, he had made the return journey upstream—amid jubilation from both banks of the river—to Wase, the capital city, where together with the sun's family he had entered Merima't, the Palace of the West, set amidst gardens and beside the lake of its gardens at the foot of the colorful desert cliffs. There he was given
chambers, servants, raiment, and every amenity, and already on his second day there the ceremony of gold was held, though only after Pharaoh had solemnly driven forth in the company of his court, with the purchased slave indeed riding in Pharaoh's second chariot, right behind the king himself, surrounded by the same Syrian and Nubian bodyguards and fan-bearers and separated from the god's vehicle only by a troop of runners who cried "Abrek! Pay heed!" and "Grand Vizier!" and, "Behold, the Father of the Land!"—so that the people in the streets might have some notion of what was happening before their eyes, of who that was in the second chariot. And they saw and understood that at the least Pharaoh had made someone very great, for which he surely had his reasons, even if they were only those of his own beautiful mood and whim—that sufficed entirely. But since such an elevation and golden investiture also somehow always carried with it the idea that a new age was beginning, that all things would now be better, Wase's population cheered lustily from the rooftops and hopped on one leg along the avenues. They shouted, "Pharaoh! Pharaoh!" and "Neb-nef-nezem!" and "Great is the Aton!" and, upon closer hearing, many of them were calling out that name with a softer consonant, saying "Adon, Adon!" which was doubtless intended for Joseph. For it had surely leaked out that he was of Asian origins, and so it was thought fitting—particularly the women thought it fitting—to call out to him the name of the Syrian "lord" and bridegroom, especially since this man who had been raised up was so beautiful and young. It should also be added here that this same name would, among all his titles, be the one that stuck to him in particular, and throughout Egypt for the rest of his life, whether people spoke of him or to him, he was called Adon.
After this beautiful procession, they were ferried across the river and now returned to the western shore and the palace, where the ceremony of gold—a wonderful ritual, and on this occasion particularly irresistible to eye and heart—took place. It unfolded more or less as follows. Pharaoh and She Who Filled the Palace with Love, Queen Nefernefruaton, appeared at the so-called Window of Presentation, which in fact was not a window at all, but a kind of balcony that adjoined the Great Reception Hall and looked out on the palace's interior courtyard—a columned gallery of lapis and malachite richly ornamented with bronze cobras, it was extended at the
front by a set of charming lotus pillars that were flagged with pennants and connected by a colorfully upholstered balustrade. It was on this that Their Majesties braced themselves as they tossed gifts of gold—which came in every form and were handed to them by treasury officials—to the recipient who stood beneath the balcony, in this case Jacob's son. With all its frills and furbelows, it was a scene that remained unforgettable to anyone who ever attended it. Everything was bathed in color and splendor, in a most generous bounty and pious rapture. The openwork magnificence of the architecture, the enchantingly gilded and brightly painted pillars with their pennants fluttering in the wind beneath a sunny sky; the courtyard filled with ranking officials clad in billowing skirts and bearing large and small fans in blue and red, who bowed low, shouted jubilant greetings, adored; women tapping tambourines and boys with the special braid of childhood, who were brought here for the sole purpose of turning ceaseless cartwheels; the host of scribes who stood in a demure posture and registered everything with their reeds; the view through the three open gates into the outer courtyard filled with chariots and prancing horses, heads held high and sporting colorful plumes, behind whom their drivers likewise lifted arms high while bowing low with respect in the direction of the ceremony; gazing down on all this, the red and yellow cliffs of Thebes, their rocky clefts lost in dark blue and violet shadows; and there on the raised glorious platform, the divine pair, their heads adorned with high caplike crowns with cloths that fell down over their necks, smiling tenderly and gazing ahead with languid superiority, dipping with visible delight into a never-ending wealth of riches and showering precious blessings on their favorite: necklaces of linked beads of gold, gold in the shape of lions, golden bracelets, golden daggers, headbands, collars, scepters, vases, and axes, all of purest gold, which the recipient could not catch all by himself, of course, and so had been given a pair of slaves who did it for him and heaped the hoard of gold, flashing in the radiant sun, on the pavement before him, to the crowd s cries of wonder—it was the prettiest scene one could ever behold, and if it were not for the implacable law of deletion, there would now follow a still more detailed description of the event.
While serving the devil Laban, Jacob had once assembled riches in the Land of No Return; and that is also what his darling did on this day, in the happy land of death, down into which he had been
sold and there had died. For, to be sure, only in the underworld is there so much gold, and, simply from this golden tribute, Joseph became a wealthy man on the spot. Foreign kings who approached Pharaoh to trade for gold were accustomed to say that it was well known that in the land of Egypt this metal was no more precious than the dust of its roads. But it is indeed an economic error to believe that gold can ever exist in such great quantities as to decrease its value.
Yes, it was a day of beautiful significance, full of worldly blessing for him who had been carried off, separated from his family; and one could only have wished that Jacob, his old father, could have observed it all—though to be sure with a mixture of reservation and pride, in which surely pride would have prevailed. Joseph wished that as well; for later he would say "Tell my father of my glory!" He also received a letter from Pharaoh, which the latter of course had not written himself, but had dictated to his True Scribe, his Secretary of the Privy Cabinet, and though somewhat stiff in expression, it was very gracious in content and as a calligraphic product absolutely exquisite. It read:
Decree of the King to Osarsiph, Overseer of All That Heaven Gives, That Earth Yields, and That the Nile Brings Forth, Overseer of Everything in All the Land, and True Overseer of Pharaoh's Orders. My Majesty was very glad to hear the words that you spoke a few days before today in a conversation it pleased the King to hold with you at On in Lower Egypt. On that beautiful day you truly delighted the heart of Nefer-kheperu-Re with such things as he truly loves. My Majesty was extraordinarily glad to hear the words you spoke, for in them you joined the heavenly with the earthly, thereby showing not only your concern for the latter but your great concern for the former as well and contributing moreover to an improvement in the doctrine of My Father in Heaven. Verily, you understand to say those things of which My Majesty is exceptionally fond, and what you say makes My Heart laugh. My Majesty also knows that you say all such things of which My Majesty is fond. O Usarsiph, I say to you, times without number: Beloved of His Lord! Rewarded by His Lord! Darling and Initiate of
His Lord! Verily, the Lord of the Aton loves me, for he has given you to me. As surely as Nefer-kheperu-Re lives eternally: whenever you express a wish, be it in writing or orally, to My Majesty, it shall be granted by My Majesty upon the
And in anticipation of one such wish, the most urgent possible wish as people in the Two Lands saw things, the letter concluded with the announcement that Pharaoh had given instructions for the excavation and architectural and decorative ornamentation of Joseph's eternal dwelling—which is to say, work on a tomb for Joseph in the western cliffs was to begin at once.
After the man who had been raised up had read this letter, the court then assembled in the great columned hall that lay behind the Window of Presentation for the grand formalities of his investiture, during which Pharaoh—in addition to the ring of authority he had already bestowed on him and all the gold he had just showered on him—draped an especially heavy gold necklace of favor over Joseph's immaculate court raiment, which of course was not of silk, as someone ignorant of the situation might brag, but rather of finest royal linen; and then Pharaoh had his Vizier of the South read the prodigious list of titles that he had established for Joseph and under which his name of death would henceforth be concealed. We know most of these gilded phrases from Pharaoh's own expressly announced intentions and from the formal letter he had written, making official those such as Overseer of All That Heaven Gives, etc. Among the others, surely the most impressive were Spender of Shade to the King, Friend of the God's Harvest, and Food of Egypt— Ka-ne-Keme in the language of the realm. Grand Vizier, although unprecedented, and Unique Friend of the King—in contradistinction to Sole Friend—seemed almost pallid by comparison. But that did not end the matter, for Pharaoh wished to exaggerate. Joseph was called Adon of the Royal House and Adon over All the Land of Egypt. He was named Supreme Mouth, Prince of Mediation, Augmenter of Doctrine, Good Shepherd of the People, the King's Double, and Vice-Horus. There had never been anything whatever like it before, nor did the future ever repeat it—surely it could only have happened during the reign of such an impulsive young ruler with a penchant for visionary pronouncements. There
was yet one more title, though it was more a personal name, whose purpose was not so much to conceal Joseph's name of death as to replace it. Posterity has speculated much over it, and even the most venerable tradition supplies an inadequate, indeed erroneous translation. It says that Pharaoh called Joseph his Privy Councilor. That is an uninformed transcription. In our alphabet the name would have been spelled something like Dje-p-nute-ef-6nkh, which the nimble mouths of the children of Egypt would have pronounced as "Djep-nuteefonekh," with a guttural kh sound at the end. The most prominent component of this grouping is "onkh" or "onekh," the word whose icon is the looped or ansate cross, which signifies "life" and which the gods held under the noses of human beings, especially their sons, the kings, so that they might have breath. The name that Joseph received along with his titles was a name of life. It meant "The god"—Aton, one did not have to name the name—"speaks: 'May life be with you!'" Even that was not yet its complete meaning. Every ear that heard it in those days took this to signify not only "May you yourself live," but also "May you be a bringer of life, may you spread life and provide life's nourishment to the many." In a word, it was a name of satiety and sufficiency; for above all else, Joseph was raised up to be the Lord of Fullness. All his titles and names, to the extent that they did not refer directly to his personal relationship with Pharaoh, contained in one form or another this notion of the preservation of life, of feeding the Two Lands, and all of them, including this much disputed and excellent personal name, could be summarized in a single title: the Provider.
The Sunken Treasure
After Jacob's son had been draped with this garland of names, he was at once surrounded, of course, and we shall leave it to you to imagine just how saccharine the congratulatory adulation of these sycophants was. Human beings have a tendency to wax enthusiastic, indeed ecstatic, over the whims of arbitrary power and incomprehensible election, over the monstrous "I favor whom I favor" that is totally exempt from all accountability and that even undoes envy and actually lends sincerity to toadying. As to Pharaoh's reasons for this stupendous raising up and investiture of this young foreigner,
no one had any real insight into that, but all were happy to abandon any effort to gain it. To be sure, the art of prophecy was held in honor, and some things were explained by Joseph's having been lucky enough to excel and defeat the best domestic efforts in this field. Moreover, people knew Pharaoh's weakness for those who "hearkened to his words," which is to say, who were happy to entertain his theological ideas and knew to show themselves receptive to his "doctrine"—it was common knowledge that Pharaoh always responded with tenderest gratitude toward such understanding, feigned or not. And in that regard as well this boy wonder must have been lucky enough to have had the benefit of some inherited wisdom and previous schooling. But one way or the other, it was clear that above all else he must have kept his wits about him when dealing with their lord in order to soar right past them all in an instant; and people bowed low before such successful shrewdness, not to mention great arbitrary power; and as they encircled Joseph, they toadied and courted, kissed hands, scraped feet, fawned, and flattered to a fare-thee-well. A poet among the king's friends had even written a hymn of praise in his honor, which he recited to the soft accompaniment of a harp; and it went like this:
"You live, you are hale, you are healthy. You are not poor, you are not wretched. You endure like the hours of the day. Your plans endure, your life is long. Your words are well chosen. Your eyes see what is good. You hear what is pleasant. You see the good, you hear the pleasant. You are praised among the councilors. You stand firm and your foe falls. Whoever speaks against you is no more."
We find this mediocre stuff. But as the achievement of one of their own, the courtiers found it quite good.
Joseph accepted all this as someone who is not surprised by any elevation, responding with an earnest cordiality that was just distracted enough to be slightly embarrassing. For his thoughts were not here in Pharaoh's great hall. They were on distant heights, in a tent made of felt, in the nearby grove of the Lord, with his little
brother in his helmet of hair, his nearest and truest brother, to whom he told his dreams; they wandered to a harvest field, to companions resting beneath the shade of an awning, to whom he had also related the dreams he had dreamt; and to the valley of Dothan and a well and a landing that was anything but gentle. In his distraction he almost failed to notice the flash of an eye, a wink, directed at him from out of the encirclement—and had he avoided it, it would have caused the man offering it great anxiety.
Among the congratulants, in fact, was Nefer-em-Wese—who had once been named just the opposite—the Master of the Vine. One can sympathize with this fat man in his bewilderment and confusion at the tricks life plays even as, under incredibly altered circumstances, he now found himself congratulating his young attendant from those terrible days. He had reason to hope that the new favorite would be well disposed toward him and not "speak against him," since it was he, Nefer, whom he had to thank for his being summoned and given this great opportunity. But this hope was somewhat qualified by his awareness that he had pointed a very belated finger at him and, just as Joseph had prophesied, had thought of him only when he had bumped his nose against the memory of him. Besides, he was not certain whether this man might not be as loath to be reminded of prison as he himself was; and so along with his congratulations he confined himself to a wink of cautious intimacy that could have meant almost anything—and was gratified to see this Adon wink back.
Here now, on the occasion of an encounter that might lead one to think of another potential and indeed more highly charged meeting, one can only confirm and declare as fully justified a silence that not every version and account of Joseph's story has been wise enough to maintain. We are speaking here of Potiphar or Putiphera, or more correctly Petepre, the great eunuch, Joseph's former owner, the lord and judge who magnanimously cast him into prison. Was he also present for this golden investiture, at this encirclement, and did he, too, pay homage to Joseph at court—perhaps by expressing to him the respects of a man who, lacking command of a thing himself, knows the value of its having been renounced by someone who might very well have commanded it? It would be fascinating to describe such an encounter; but there is nothing to describe here, for nothing of the sort took place. The agonizingly beautiful motif of
