JOSEPH YOUR BROTHER
August 14, 2005
Texts – Genesis 45: 1-15
Matthew 15: 21-28
“I am Joseph, your brother,” our text from the book of Genesis says; “. . . but his brothers could not answer him, so dismayed were they at his presence.” [Genesis 45: 3]
How are you doing with your brother? Do you have one . . . biological or otherwise? I do. George is two and a half years my senior. Mom and Dad have assured both of us that we are in fact related (!), but you’d hardly know it from the outside looking in. We are as different from each other as different can be . . . at least, that’s what we both tell each other. He has dark hair and is short in stature. I, on the other hand, am wonderfully tall and strikingly fair haired ... okay, I used to be “strikingly fair haired!”
My brother is an accomplished scientist and entrepreneur. His doctorate is a Ph.D. in organic chemistry; mine is a doctor of divinity degree . . . a D.D. (and yes, that stands for “Donated Dignity”). On his most spiritual of days George claims to be a Unitarian, although the closest he admits to getting to church is the 13th green of the Maidstone Golf Course – evidently there’s a church steeple nearby which has a lovely carillon! Come to think of it, that is one of the things we do have in common – golf. It’s not unusual for my brother to shoot in the low to mid 80s for 18 holes; I frequently get the same score and only have to play 9!
Do you remember the 1988 movie, Twins, in which Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito played the role of twins? A fellow named William Cox, who is a prosecutor for the State Bar of California, wrote an opinion piece last month that I found on the web. He said: “Californians should dump Schwarzenegger and elect Danny DeVito, as Governor of California. He’s smarter, better looking, and we can understand (and believe) what he says.” The article was entitled: “Danny DeVito for Governor: Dump the Evil Twin!” George and I both know exactly how he feels!
“I am Joseph, your brother,” scripture says. “But his brothers could not answer him, so dismayed were they at his presence.” [Genesis 45: 3] How are you doing with your brother?
You know it’s really amazing to me how convoluted we can become in our thinking, to say nothing of our feeling or acting. George came to visit us for a couple of days last month. We had a wonderful time. The Spirit of the Lord must have been powerfully present because my golf game has never been as good as it was on the one day we played together. Mom and Dad played alongside us – and they’re 85 years old, mind you! I heard Mom say to Dad, “Who has taken over our second son’s body? Certainly Bobbie never plays this good!” (Yes, “Bobbie” . . . some things you never outgrow.)
But I watched my brother during his visit. The way he holds his head . . . that little laugh he has . . . his penchant to be just a little bit sarcastic sometimes. You know, it all seemed vaguely familiar somehow! And I thought – we grew up in the same home . . . we had many of the same
friends . . . we went to exactly the same schools, all the way through college. And now that his hair has started to thin out, why we’ve even started to sort of look alike. It’s spooky.
I’ve spent the last fifty eight years needing to be different from him, and he has spent exactly the same amount of time needing to be different from me. Now that we are different, and each of us is secure in our own ways, you’d think we’d be able to turn it around and start acknowledging the oh so many ways that we are the same.
“I am Joseph, your brother . . . But his brothers could not answer him, so dismayed were they at his presence.” It’s a powerful old story, isn’t it? Who knows how far back in time it goes? But it could have been written yesterday. How are you doing with your brother?
Quite apart from its literary and historical significance, this is a tale rich in psychological profundity. We could mine this story for hours and still just barely scratch the surface. Joseph is the younger brother, the “surprise child” who came along well after normal business hours. He became his father’s favorite, the one spoiled with attention and gifts. When you read it carefully, it’s clear he was a brat, self-important and precocious beyond bearing. His brothers resented and hated him for it. They, of course, don’t come across much better – trees don’t fall far from the nuts, as someone said. (At least I think that’s what they say!) And so they whisper and plot and conspire to commit mayhem and manslaughter and murder . . . boys will be boys. How’d you like to provide childcare for that family?!
At another level it’s a story about every child’s dream come true. “They don’t appreciate me.” Ever say that to yourself when you were twelve or thirteen? “Some day they’ll be sorry for the way they’ve treated me. Some day I’ll show them. Some day . . .” Sound familiar? And of course here in Genesis Joseph does get to show them all some day. He saves them all. They all bow down before him. How sweet it is!
“I am Joseph, your brother . . .”
Did you ever stop to think how universal this story is? We read it together and can easily imagine and see ourselves being described within it. I am Joseph . . . and Reuben . . . and Judah . . . and Simeon. Isn’t that what we say? And we can imagine our own biographies being woven into this fabric, and the tale taking place in Burlington or Shelburne. But you know they read this story in Teheran and it works the same way. They read it in Bagdad and Falujah, and in Southern India and the highlands of Haiti . . . and it still works exactly the same way. Muslim and Jew, Christian and Hindu. It even works on the 13th green of the Maidstone Golf Course.
“I am Joseph, your brother . . .” How are you doing with your brother? Still want to “dump the evil twin”?
“But his brothers could not answer him,” the story goes on, “so dismayed were they at his presence.” Dismayed . . . shocked, frightened, stunned . . . they are speechless when they recognize him. And some of that is because of their legitimate fear that this could become “pay back” time. They are, to say the least, extraordinarily vulnerable standing before this man who wields at his fingertips the world’s most advanced and devastating power. This is Pharaoh’s Number Two man. This is Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and John Negroponte all rolled into one. But more terrifying than even that, I think, is the fourth “specter of a deadly horseman” that they see alongside those three: it is nothing less than the image of their very own selves. It’s what I can see in my brother George when I am honest. It is what he can see when he looks clearly at me. “I am Joseph your brother” indeed . . . I am your twin.
This doesn’t have to do with biological brothers, does it? It’s not just about men or boys. It most certainly is not restricted to Middle Eastern nomads of the 15th century B.C.. “At what hour does the new day begin?” an old story says the student asked his Rabbi. “Is it when the sun first breasts the horizon, or is it when the dawn begins to chase away the darkness of the night?”
“Neither one is the boundary you seek,” the Rabbi replied. “The new day begins when you look into the face of your brother and are able to recognize yourself.”
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind; this is the first and greatest commandment,” Jesus said. “A second is like unto it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” [Matthew 22:37-39]
Ah but it’s hard, isn’t it? Hard to love this “Joseph my brother” because he does in so many, many ways reflect back to me all those character-flaws of my own which I have invested so much time and energy in disguising. He . . . Shall I switch genders and speak instead of ‘She’? Sure, why not . . . she is so preoccupied with her own petty agenda, isn’t she? She can be so spoiled, so mean-spirited, so greedy, so vain, so stupid. Isn’t that what we say? How we feel?
And so we lash out . . . or we run away . . . or we simply keep our distance. Joseph’s brothers beat him and then threw him into the bottom of a deep pit. But even that wasn’t enough and so they sold him into slavery and watched with relief as he was led far, far away.
It’s all a parable, isn’t it? A paradigm . . . a metaphor for what too many of us do, have done, and God forgive us, continue to do. And not, of course, to our brothers only – but to our sisters as well, and to our mothers and fathers, and our neighbors and co-workers, to those we know so well and even to those we know not at all.
“I am Joseph, your brother . . .” they all say. How are you doing with your brother?
Now I could stop here, I know . . . probably should as a matter of fact. It’s summer. It’s hot. Let’s go. But before we do, one last thing. It’s the most important thing, really. You see, when they told this story about Joseph so long ago, they weren’t mostly interested in it as a biographical narrative, nor did they much care about the psychological ramifications of it. No, what concerned them most, and what they were determined to pass on to succeeding generations, was the way God is able to take these petty and oh so human failings of ours and use them to bring about redemption and reconciliation.
“It was not you who sent me here, but God;” Joseph says to his brothers. [v. 8] “Do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life.” [v. 5] All of this petty competition between us when we were young . . . All of the shameful things we did to each other – my insufferable boasting and taunting . . . your spiteful bullying and tormenting . . . . It has all been used by God “to preserve life.” And note it well: It was not just Joseph’s life which was saved. And it was not just his brothers’ lives which were saved. Nor was it only the life of their extended family which was saved. No. The record book says that through them and their oh so human and pathetic squabbling and posturing and striving for parental love and approval . . . the lives of millions were saved from famine.
If God could do that for and with and through this family, the Bible says, what makes you think God cannot work through your own family’s dysfunctionality to preserve life and bring new hope and healing to the world?
“I am Joseph your brother” . . . and so are you . . . and so are we all to one another. Let us thank God for the gift we are to one another, and for the gifts which through us God seeks to give the world. Amen.