On Joseph 67–85

And he ordered everyone to withdraw, so that he might make himself known to his brothers; for, as he himself says, he had come only to the sheep that were lost of the house of Israel. And raising his voice with weeping he said: 'I am Joseph; is my father still alive?' That is: he spread out his hands to an unbelieving and contradicting people, seeking no envoy or messenger, but the Lord himself wishing to save his people. 'I who spoke am here,' he says, 'and I was made manifest to those who did not seek me, I appeared to those who did not ask for me.' What else did he cry out then but: 'I am Jesus,' when, < tested > by the leaders of the Jews asking: 'Are you the Son of God?', he answered: 'You say that I am'; when he said to Pilate: 'You say that I am a king; for this I was born'; when to the high priest, who said: 'I adjure you by the living God to tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God,' he replied: 'You have said so. Truly I say to you, hereafter you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of power and coming with the clouds of heaven.' This, then, is what he says: 'I am Joseph,' I am of divine power. 'Is my father still alive?' That is: I do not deny my father, I acknowledge my brothers, if either you recognize your brother or the father his son. Does my people still live, then, from whose family I chose a brother for myself?

'Come near to me,' because I have come near to you, even so far as to make myself a sharer in your nature by taking on flesh. Do not flee even the partner of your fellowship, if you do not recognize the author of salvation.

'And they came near to him,' it says, 'and he said: I am Joseph your brother, whom you handed over into Egypt. Now, then, do not be sad, nor let it seem hard to you that you sold me here; for God sent me before you for life.' What brotherly love, what sweet kinship, that he even excused the fratricidal deed, saying that it was of divine providence, not of human ungodliness, since he was not offered to death by men but sent by the Lord for life! What else does that intercession of our Lord Jesus Christ have, who surpassed all brothers in love, as he hung on the cross, saying for the people: 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do'? What else that address of holiness in the midst of his disciples, saying: 'Peace to you; it is I, do not be afraid'? And when, troubled and terrified, they thought they saw a spirit, he said to them again: 'Why are you troubled, and why do thoughts arise in your heart? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Handle and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.' These mysteries, then, which were to come in later times, were revealed already then.

Indeed they are expressed in the very words, so that we may understand that it is he himself who spoke first in Joseph and afterward in his own body, since he did not even change the words. For he said then: 'Do not be sad,' and further on: 'Go up to my father and say to him: Thus says your son Joseph: God has made me lord of all the land of Egypt.' And in the gospel he says: 'Do not be afraid; go, tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.' And further on he says: 'All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth,' that is to say: this was of divine disposition, that I should receive power, not of human harshness. He who enumerates the reward does not reproach the crime.

And what it has in Genesis, 'For God sent me before you for life,' he renders in the gospel, saying: 'Teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit'; for this is the reward and life of the saints, that they have redeemed others too.

Notice also that it is not idly written in Genesis: 'And you shall be near me, you and your sons and your sons' sons'; for this is what he said in the gospel: 'Behold, I am with you all days until the end of the age.'

How evident too is that mystery, that, as though every command had been fulfilled, Joseph embraces his brother Benjamin and fell on his neck, as, when the gospel was fulfilled, Christ embraces Paul with the arms, as it were, of his mercy, so as to raise him, bowed down by inner conviction, from the neck, as it were, to heaven. Hence, raised up by Christ, he says: 'But our citizenship is in heaven.'

'And Pharaoh rejoiced that Joseph had recognized his brothers.' Hence the news was spread in Pharaoh's house, and he urged holy Joseph to invite his brothers to come with their father, and he orders their packs to be filled with wheat and wagons to be given them. Where did a barbarian get this kindness, unless a great mystery was being shown: that the church no longer envies when the Jews are redeemed, and the Christian people rejoices at this joining and helps with whatever support it can, and sends those who preach the kingdom of God, so that they may be called out the sooner? To them two robes are given.

And he sends Paul as his envoy when he sets forth his words, on whom three hundred gold pieces and five robes of various colors are conferred by Christ. He has three hundred gold pieces who preaches the cross of Christ, and therefore he says: 'For I decided to know nothing among you except Christ Jesus and him crucified.' And rightly he receives gold pieces, because he preached not in persuasive words of wisdom but in the demonstration of the Spirit. And he receives five robes, either the disciplines of manifold wisdom, or because, captured by no enticements of the bodily senses, he held victory where others had danger; he overcame all the pleasures of the flesh with singular continence and virtue; no weakness of the body dulled his talent and zeal; while he was in the body he did not know he had a body. Indeed, caught up into paradise, not knowing whether in the body or out of the body, he heard unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to speak; and finally he smelled of nothing earthly on earth, as he himself teaches, saying: 'For we are the good fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved.'

Paul, then, excels, and his portion overflows; yet the other preachers too have their grace. They receive two robes each. Which? Surely those about which you ought not to doubt, since you have read it said of Wisdom: 'She made double garments for her husband.' One is mystical, the other moral. But not all are apostles, not all prophets, not all pastors, not all workers of miracles; not all have the grace of healings, not all speak in tongues. Where there are different rewards, there are different merits.

And gifts are sent ahead to the father too. The son honors the father; Christ invites his people with promises, invites them with gifts. These gifts are carried by those asses, useless and toiling before, now useful; in the type of Christ they carry gifts, being about to carry the giver of gifts in the gospel.

'And he sent his brothers away, and they departed. And Joseph said to them: Do not be angry on the way.' How well he teaches that we must guard against anger, because it can separate even brothers who love one another, and that discord must be avoided especially on the way, where the very companionship of travel ought to have the fellowship of inviolable grace. And what else did our Lord Jesus say when about to depart from this body, when he sent away his disciples, but that they should not be angry on the way, saying: 'Peace I leave you, my peace I give you'? For where there is peace, anger has no place, discord is banished, dissension put to flight. This, then, is what he says: 'My peace I give you,' that is, do not be angry on the way. And see whether he does not mean 'on this way,' that is, in this course of the whole of life, indignation must be avoided, because anger often leads even the innocent into crime, since, while we are angry beyond what is just and wish to restrain another's sin, we commit graver sins. Therefore the apostle says: 'Do not avenge yourselves, beloved, but give place to wrath,' that is, let us avoid it, lest it seize us. Hence the Lord Jesus too, sending his disciples to preach the gospel, sent them without gold, without silver, without money, without a staff, that is, so as to take away both the incitements to strife and the instruments of revenge.

'And they went up out of Egypt,' it says, 'and came into the land of Canaan to Jacob their father, and told him, saying that Joseph your son is alive, and he is ruler of all the land of Egypt.' What is the land of Canaan? One that wavered. What, then, is so evident as that the times of the apostles are designated, when they went into the wavering synagogues of the Jews and preached the power of the Lord Jesus, as we have in the Acts of the Apostles, Peter saying: 'This Jesus, then, God raised up, of whom we are witnesses. Being exalted, then, by the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this gift which you see'? We certainly notice how he says both that he lives and that he is ruler of all the earth, who, opening the granaries of spiritual grace, gives abundance to all. This the apostles said, but the Jews did not believe; rather they laid hands on them and thrust the preachers of salvation into custody.

Hence it is written of Jacob too: 'He was stunned in mind, for he did not believe them.' He was stunned with the disposition of an unbelieving people; but after he learned the deeds of Christ, softened by such great kindnesses and works, he revived in spirit, saying: 'It is a great thing to me if my son Joseph is still alive. I will go and see him before I die.' The first and greatest foundation of faith is to believe in the resurrection of Christ. For whoever has believed that he was raised seeks him eagerly, approaches devoutly, and venerates God with inmost mind; for he believes that he himself does not die, if he believes in the author of the resurrection. 'And Israel set out and came to the well of the oath and offered a sacrifice to the God of his father Isaac.'

Rightly he is lifted up who hastens to Christ. Faith precedes devotion. First he lifted himself up, then he sacrificed; for he sacrifices well who has searched out the knowledge of the divinity.

'And God said to Israel in a vision by night, saying: Jacob, Jacob. And he said: What is it? Saying: I am the God of your fathers; do not be afraid, go down into Egypt, for I will make you a great nation there. I will go down with you into Egypt, and I will lead you forever.' How they do not understand what they themselves read, and deny Moses whom they praise, when they will not believe his writings! What is more evident than that in this place they are invited to pass over to the church of God, and that those who were before confined within the narrow borders of Judea should migrate to the people of God, which, gathered from the whole world, from all nations and peoples, has become a great nation? Indeed their sound went out into all the earth. Jacob, then, is called by his sons, that is, the people of the Jews is invited to grace by Peter, John, and Paul.

Our God himself also encourages him by his own oracle and promises him the progress of faith, the fruit of his gift, saying to him: 'Joseph will put his hand on your eyes.' Surely the holy patriarch was not anxious about who would close his eyes, though even by a simple understanding a moral affection is expressed. For if we desire often to embrace those we love, how much more, when about to depart from this body, do we delight in the last touch of our dear children and are soothed by this provision for the journey. Yet mystically we may understand that the people of the Jews would afterward come to know God. For this is the mystery: that the true Joseph will put his hands on its eyes, so that one who before did not see may now see. Come to the gospel, read how that blind man was healed on whom Jesus laid his hand and took away his blindness. For Christ lays his hand not on those about to die but on those who are to live; or if on those about to die, rightly so, because we first die in order to live again; for we cannot live to God unless we first die to sin.

Seventy-five souls, then, go down into Egypt, as it is written, and this mystically in the number of remission, because after such hardness, after so many sins, they would be held unworthy unless the remission of sins were granted them. Judah meets him, that is, the confession of error. This the people of the Jews, when it is to come, sends as its forerunner. Therefore the true Joseph too, that is, the judge and interpreter of the divinity, meets them, because confession now goes before those whom faithlessness formerly possessed. For Christ is the interpreter of the divinity, because no one has ever seen God except the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father; he has made him known. He will receive the people of the Jews, already of old age and weary, in the last times, not according to its merits but according to the election of his grace, and will lay his hand on its eyes to take away its blindness. He has postponed its healing so that it might believe last, which before did not think it should believe, and lose the prerogative of its earlier election. Hence the apostle too says that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the gentiles should come in, and so all Israel would be saved.

The deeds of the patriarchs, then, are mysteries of things to come. Indeed Jacob himself speaks thus to his sons: 'Gather together, that I may tell you what will befall you in the last days. Gather together and hear Israel your father.'