The Israelites’ Egyptian bondage was Joseph’s fault.
Ok, I admit, the Egyptians were directly to blame. But Joseph’s economic reforms laid the foundation for the enslavement.
Let me explain. After Jacob and his sons relocated to Egypt, the famine worsened. Joseph oversaw the collection of funds from the people of Egypt in return for rations from the royal storehouses. Once the people were bankrupt, Joseph took their livestock as payment. When they ran out of livestock, the people beseeched Joseph, “Take us and our land in exchange for bread, and we with our land will be avadim to Pharaoh” (Genesis 47:19). Desperate for bread, the people let Joseph take possession of them as indentured servants. Joseph obliged without hesitation, further consolidating Pharaoh’s dominion and elevating himself at the same time.
Too often, we gloss over this disturbing turn of events. We read this text superficially as a triumphant tale of Joseph’s victory for the children of Israel. I suppose it was a short-term win for Joseph and his tribe: Israel “acquired holdings and were fertile and increased greatly” (Genesis 47:27).
But look ahead to the book of Exodus, to the Pharaoh “who did not know Joseph” (Exodus 1:8), and the apparent triumph is revealed as a prelude to disaster. Joseph gained control over all the farm land of Egypt, and “he removed the population town by town” (Genesis 47:21) – he planted the seeds of totalitarianism that would bear bitter fruit for his own descendants. Joseph then declared to the people, “I have acquired you and your land today” (Genesis 47:23). In this light, translating avadim (verse 19) as “servants” or even “serfs,” as several translations do, does not capture the full resonance of the word – the same word found in the Passover Haggadah when we declare, “Avadim hayinu, ata b’nei chorin / We were slaves, now we are free.” If the Israelites’ Egyptian slavery was birthed by the new Pharaoh, it was conceived generations earlier by Joseph himself.
Joseph acted on behalf of his fellow Jews without regard for others. There are voices within our community today who want us to follow his lead. When I stand up in support of the rights of other groups, I often get critical responses wondering why I’m wasting my time speaking out for non-Jews.
This summer, I carried a Torah scroll on the NAACP’s Journey for Justice in support of racial and economic justice. On the Transgender Day of Remembrance, I invited a transgender congregant to light a memorial candle before the Mourner’s Kaddish; I applauded publicly the URJ’s sweepingly inclusive recent resolution on transgender people in our institutions. I’ve spoken up about the plight of Latino immigrants and families in our region, some of whom lack access to basic services and live in poverty. I was one of 1,000 rabbis to sign HIAS’s letter in support of welcoming refugees.
In each case, I heard from objectors who resented my concern for these other groups, as if it were threatening to Jews – as if humanitarian concern is some kind of zero-sum game. In reality, my future as a Jew and the future of the Jewish people are tied up in the future of our neighbors and fellow citizens. How can I ensure our equal place in society without supporting the same principle for others? The alternative is a hypocrisy that hurts our credibility and alienates our allies. There is no such thing as just caring about Jews; that kind of tunnel vision isn’t good for the Jews or anyone else.
I once heard a story from Ruth Messinger, director of American Jewish World Service (AJWS), that drove home this point. I’m paraphrasing: One evening, as she often did, she spoke at a synagogue about AJWS’s anti-poverty work throughout the developing world. After the lecture, a man in the audience asked, “Why do you devote so many resources to helping non-Jews, when there are so many Jews in need? Why don’t you just focus on helping our own?” Before Messinger could answer, a diminutive older woman marched up the aisle to the questioner. She addressed him directly, shaking her fist in his face: “I survived the Holocaust. But my entire family was murdered because of people who only cared to look after their own kind, people who told themselves it wasn’t their fight — people like you.”
Jews who object to other Jews’ universalist commitments should look carefully at the consequences of Joseph’s example. In the short term, his efforts were “good for the Jews”; in the long term, they were cataclysmic. Let us learn well from Joseph that we cannot ensure the welfare of Jews by disregarding the welfare of non-Jews. We cannot safeguard our own home if we care nothing for our neighbor’s.
Such neglect is not only self-defeating; it is morally bankrupt.
To examine Joseph’s economic reforms in greater depth, check out T’ruah’s text study on climate change and human rights.
Rabbi David Segal is the spiritual leader of the Aspen Jewish Congregation in the Roaring Fork Valley of Colorado. He was ordained at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York and is an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship.