Backdrop

While Genesis is largely a story about a single family, their nomadic lives put them in contact with many other peoples, who play a role in what unfolds. Having sought his brothers where they were pasturing in Shechem and then Dothan, Joseph finds them none to happy to see him or hear about his dreams in which they all bow down to him. Instead of welcoming Joseph, they sell him to a caravan of Midianite traders who take him to Egypt as a slave. In this week's portion, Joseph has risen to a position of great power in Egypt and has helped the Egyptians to prepare for the famine that grips the entire region for seven years. Joseph’s brothers, also suffering from hunger in Canaan, must go down into Egypt to secure food. Their father sends them with “an offering—a bit of balm, a bit of honey, some labdanum, mastic, pistachios, and almonds” (Genesis 43:11). The brothers do not recognize Joseph.

In the distance, there is always a caravan
cutting like a periodic sentence
through the declarations of our tale.
The traders who bought Joseph—another item
to load across their long-suffering donkeys—
were on to Egypt and the return prizes:
Pelusian linen, papyrus, and barley beer.
Now to entice the man they do not know
is still their father’s favorite, finely robed
in the embroidered coat of the vizier,
the brothers, who sold him into slavery,
sojourn into Egypt bearing balm.
For the barley, they barter labdanum,
bled from the fragile stems of rock roses,
and precious mastic, the resin of embalming.
So the story we’d imagined—its reasons
belonging only to us—comes embedded
in the desires of other peoples’ hearts.