Although in each of the Biblical stories of Abraham’s descendants – Isaac and Jacob – there is a renewal of God’s covenant, none of the Patriarchs show any missionary fervour towards others, or even their own family. Jacob spent twenty years in Laban’s household, but he had not converted Laban, who still worships idols. Even within Jacob’s own family, Rachel hankers after idols and takes Laban’s gods with her when they leave.
The conclusion must be that the form of monotheism that the Patriarchs followed has not yet freed itself from the co-acceptance of idolatry, and that old or neighbouring cult influences were still very effective. Nor had monotheism and a rejection of idols spread among the Semitic tribes.
This attitude begins to change late in the time of Jacob, as can be seen from Genesis 35:2 and 4:
So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, ‘Rid yourselves of the alien gods in your midst, purify yourselves, and change your clothes.’…They gave to Jacob all the alien gods that they had, and the rings that were in their ears, and Jacob buried them under the terebinth*28 that was near Shechem.
After many adventures, including making peace with his brother Esau and losing Rachel giving birth to his twelfth son Benjamin, Jacob eventually returns to his father Isaac at Mamre in the vale of Hebron, shortly before Isaac’s death.
Of all Jacob’s sons, Joseph is his favourite. The other brothers become envious of this ‘dreamer’ who predicts that one day they will all do homage to him. The opportunity for retaliation comes when Joseph is sent out to where his brothers are tending their flocks, at Dothan. Reuben, the oldest, convinces his other brothers not to kill Joseph, but to throw him into a pit and to leave him in the wilderness. Fortunately for Joseph, a company of Midianite merchants pass by on their way to Egypt and, at Judah’s suggestion, the brothers sell Joseph to the merchants for twenty pieces of silver. Reuben, who was unaware of the sale, finds the blood-stained, distinctive ‘coat of many colours’ that Joseph was given by his father and is convinced Joseph is dead.
When Jacob sees the blood-stained coat, which the brothers had prepared, he too believes Joseph has been killed by a wild animal and ‘rent his clothes and put sackcloth upon his loins and mourned for his son many days’ (Genesis 37:34).
Meanwhile Joseph is on his way to fulfilling his ‘dream’ and has been resold to Potiphar, captain of the Egyptian pharaoh’s guard. Joseph prospers in the household and earns the trust of Potiphar. The story of Joseph’s attempted seduction by Potiphar’s wife, described in Genesis 39:7–20, initially follows the well-known Egyptian story of the ‘Two Brothers’.1 Joseph resists all advances, but ‘Heav’n has no rage, like love to hatred turn’d, Nor Hell a fury like a woman scorned’.2 She denounces him to her husband who has Joseph promptly imprisoned.
Even in prison, Joseph’s winning ways gain him the confidence of the prison governor; he is made a trustee or overseer of all the other prisoners, two of whom are Pharaoh’s head butler and head baker. Both had dreams that Joseph correctly interpreted as meaning that the former would be restored to his old position in the Palace, whilst the latter would be hanged.
Two years pass; Joseph is still in prison; whilst at the palace Pharaoh, who is a thinker and visionary, is having vivid, disturbing dreams. None of his wise counsellors or magicians can explain the dreams – of seven fat cows being eaten by seven lean cows, or seven healthy ears of corn being devoured by seven scraggy ears. Remembering Joseph, the head butler relates to Pharaoh how an Hebrew resolved his own mysterious dream. And so Joseph is summoned before Pharaoh.
JOSEPH AND PHARAOH
Previously I have provided a considerable amount of evidence that suggests that the likely dates of Joseph and the descent of Jacob and the Hebrews into Egypt was c.1350 BCE – the period when Pharaoh Amenhotep IV (Akhenaten) is on the throne – and it is this Pharaoh that, I believe, Joseph meets. There is corroborative evidence from Manetho,3 and the name associations of Joseph to Akhenaten’s capital, which back up this view (see below).
The first encounter of Joseph with Pharaoh Akhenaten is given in Genesis 41:14–44. Although the pharaoh Joseph meets is not named, I visualize the scene as follows:
Newly washed, shaved, and inclean clothes Joseph, a handsome dark-haired young man of thirty, is led into the throne room of Pharaoh Akhenaten. He is held by two guards and accompanied by an interpreter. The glistening white marble floor of the new palace echoes as his footsteps approach the throne. He is made to bow low before Pharaoh, and the courtiers that surround him.
‘Have you learned of my dreams?’ asks Pharaoh, in the clipped tones of the hieratic language, addressing the interpreter.
To his surprise Joseph, who has spent two years of prison life mixing with the lower and higher strains of the language, answers in perfect dialect: ‘I know of your dreams, O Pharaoh.’
‘Then what do you say is their meaning, my bright young Hebrew?’, says Pharaoh, this time looking straight at Joseph.
‘Not I! God will see to Pharaoh’s welfare’, replies Joseph. ‘Immediately ahead are seven years of great abundance in all the land of Egypt. After them will come seven years of famine, and all the abundance in the land of Egypt will be forgotten. The land will be ravaged by famine. As for Pharaoh having had the same dream twice, it means that the matter has been determined by God, and that God will soon carry it out.’
Pharaoh rises from his throne, hands raised with his palms faced inward. ‘It is as if you have lifted a great weight from my head. Your words ring true, and you speak of the God that I recognize. What does God say must be done?’
‘Accordingly, let Pharaoh find a man of discernment and wisdom, and set him over the land of Egypt. And let Pharaoh take steps to appoint overseers over the land, and organize the land of Egypt in the seven years of plenty. Let all the food of these good years that are coming be gathered, and let the grain be collected under Pharaoh’s authority as food to be stored in the cities. Let the food be a reserve for the land for the seven years of famine that will come upon the land of Egypt, so that the land may not perish in the famine.’
So taken was Pharaoh with Joseph’s astuteness and winning ways that he appointed him Vizier, in charge of administration over all Egypt, second only to himself.
Joseph, his father’s favourite, would have sat at Jacob’s feet and for seventeen years learned of the ideas that his ancestor Abraham had carried out of Egypt and passed to Isaac, and those ideas would have immediately been recognizable to him in the beliefs of Akhenaten.
It is during this period, of probably about fourteen years when Joseph was Vizier, that he must have became fully conversant with the God that Akhenaten worshipped and immersed himself in the rituals and traditions that stood behind their evolution. He took the name of ‘Zaphenath-paneah’ (God speaks, He lives) and Pharaoh gave him Asenath as his wife, the daughter of Potiphera, a priest of On (near modern Cairo). Asenath bore him two children, Manasseh and Ephraim.4
Joseph was now wealthy and, according to the Bible, the second most powerful person in the land. The sequence of events in his interpretation of Pharaoh’s dreams followed the script, and when the second tranche of seven years heralded a famine that spread well beyond Egypt, his wisdom and standing were confirmed.
One can imagine that Joseph was rewarded with a position of immense power and, as part of his role as husbander of the country’s produce, travelled extensively throughout the land. The most likely representation of his likeness, if any has survived at all, is to be seen on the east wall of the Tomb of Huya in the Northern Hills of El-Amarna. Here the King, Akhenaten, is seen walking with his mother, Tiyi, within the Great Temple walls. They are part of an extensive procession of courtiers, attendants, porters, civil servants and military men that has Huya, the Superintendent of the Treasury and of Queen Nefertiti’s household, near the front of the procession – the position of most importance, ahead of the King himself. But the leader of the entire procession is a mysterious, unnamed official.
This figure is clad in Egyptian dress but has a fillet around his bald head and a curiously plaited bandage on one leg. This puttee-like legging seems to be a decoration rather than an article of apparel, and is not known from any other ancient Egyptian scenes, but it may well just be a bandage. Although he is partly clad in conventional Egyptian dress, these strange accoutrements mark him out as a foreigner, not of Egyptian birth.5 There is one quite significant description of Joseph, that adds credence to the theory that this bandaged figure is indeed him. In Psalm 105 there is the following passage:
He sent a man before them,
Joseph, who was sold as a slave.
His feet were hurt with fetters,
his neck was put in a collar of iron
If my theories of time and place are correct then this pictorial representation on the wall of Huya’s Tomb is the Joseph of the Bible – whose likeness has never before been identified. When we come to consider the Exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt, in Chapter 13, there is another piece of evidence, related to the Merneptah stela, which reinforces the possibility that the figure in question is indeed that of an Hebrew.
There is an alternative historical person in Pharaoh’s Court who might be identifiable as Joseph, who might give an Egyptian name to our fettered friend – Panehesy.
In religious terms Panehesy was second only to the High Priest of the Temple – Meryra I. Panehesy’s titles were voluminous:
Second High Priest, Chief Servitor of Aten in the Temple, Chief Servitor, Superintendent of the Granary, Superintendent of the Oxen, Chancellor of the King of the North, Great favourite of the good King.6
As Meryra I’s duties were mainly Temple orientated, Panehesy would have been the most powerful secular administrator in the kingdom, in effect the ‘Vizier’ of Egypt. Panehesy’s name also has a direct link with Joseph, whom the Bible records is re-named by Pharaoh as Zaphenath-paneah (Genesis 41:45). The last syllable of the first part of his name, ‘…nat’, might well refer to his role as ‘Vizier’, for the Vizier at Akhetaten is none other than a person referred to as ‘Nakht’!7
Figure 6: The assumed figure of Joseph, carved on the east wall of the Tomb of Huya, in the northern hills of El-Amarna.
Panehesy’s titles of Superintendent of the Granary and the Oxen is exactly what we would expect as a title for Joseph in his role supervising arrangements for the expected seven-year famine. There are three other clues. Delving again into the Bible,
And removing his signet ring from his hand, Pharaoh put it on Joseph’s hand; and he had him dressed in robes of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck. He had him ride on the chariot of his second-in-command, and they cried before him, ‘Abrek!’ Thus he placed him over all the land of Egypt.
Genesis 41:42–43
With the gesture of giving Joseph his signet ring, Pharaoh implied that the Vizier was to be the ‘Seal Bearer of the King’. No inscription at Amarna specifically mentions any of Akhenaten’s officials as being his ‘Seal Bearer’, but the title ‘Chief Servitor’ indicates that Panehesy was in charge of administration and therefore empowered to look after documents, letters and seals. As mentioned previously, it was Akhenaten’s custom to lavish gold collars on those he favoured, so we have two good clues for equating Panehesy with Joseph from these Biblical verses.8
The third remaining clue concerns the word generally translated from the Hebrew as ‘Abrek’. It is thought to be an Egyptian or Assyrian title, but its meaning is unknown. I believe its origin and meaning is to be found in ‘The Shorter Hymn to Aten’, which appears inscribed on walls of the tombs of Apy, Any, Mahu, Tutu and Meryra – all officials at Akhenaten’s Court. An oft-repeated phrase, it is translated by de G. Davies as:
All that thou has made (done) leaps before thee…9
This phrase begins and is summarized in the hieroglyph that alliterates in English as ‘ary-ek’. What more appropriate phrase to shout as Joseph rides through the city in a procession of honour?
A SURFEIT – THEN FAMINE
Famine and/or flooding were constant cyclical threats to Egypt’s prosperity. If the annual inundation from the Blue Nile and River Atbara bringing waters from the Ethiopian plateau, which normally commenced in July and reached its height in September, did not cause the surging rise of waters, drought ensued. We know from evidence from inscriptions that a disastrous succession of low Nile levels hit the country during the twelfth century BCE. The national economy went into decline, evidenced by the soaring price of grain.10
In Canaan, at the beginning of the famine years, times were also hard and Jacob decided to send his sons to buy corn in Egypt. Joseph learns of their presence and they were brought before him. His brothers who had sold him into slavery do not recognize him. Hardly able to keep back his tears, Joseph enquires of his father. Eventually Joseph reveals himself to his brothers, gives them food and valuables and entreats them to bring Jacob to Egypt as there are still five more years of famine to come. Jacob, overwhelmed when he hears Joseph is still alive, gathers up his family and possessions and travels by way of Beersheba to Egypt.
It is in this part of the Old Testament that Jacob is first referred to by the alternative name of ‘Israel’. No particular reason is given for the change, but it is not inconsistent with the theory that it is in Egypt that his destiny is fulfilled.
Jacob and his family are, according to the Bible, settled at Goshen, and prosper under Joseph’s filial care. Most authorities state that Goshen was somewhere in the Delta region of northern Egypt. This area was relatively unpopulated but was the traditional land for migrant people who sojourned briefly in Egypt.
But I believe that the initial place the Hebrews settled was further south, although still not far from the Delta region. The place I have in mind was not too distant from Akhetaten, where Amenhotep IV established his capital. One reason I have for this belief is that immediately prior to Akhenaten’s reign, the capital was at Thebes; and immediately after his reign, which lasted only about seventeen years,11 the capital reverted back to Thebes. If Joseph was Amenhotep IV’s Vizier, and therefore had the power to decide where his family could best be settled, surely he would have chosen a location as near as possible to the new capital, in a place with good soil near to water. The place I believe the Hebrews settled, today in the region known as Faiyum, was about 125 miles (200km) from Akhetaten, whereas the distance from Thebes would have been about 250 miles (500km).
Confirmatory evidence can be found by flying over the area. From the air there appears a westward depression some 25km west of the Nile, extending over 4,500 square km, which formed Lake Moeris in ancient times. To the north-west corner of this area lies the modern-day Lake Qarun. The tributary that feeds this lake leaves the main river at Assiut, just south of Amarna (ancient Akhetaten), and is called…Bahr Yusuf – ‘Joseph’s River’.
Figure 7: Akhenaten with his family handing out gold collars to members of his faithful retinue. From an inscription on a tomb wall found at El-Amarna.
If we put ourselves in Joseph’s shoes, bearing in mind that he had been given carte blanche by Pharaoh to settle his family anywhere he wished, he would have looked to settle them in a location not too distant from Akhetaten, today’s Amarna, if possible accessible by boat, in a place where traditionally foreigners might not cause too much resentment; a region that is agriculturally desirable and able to support cattle, and if he had foresight, which Joseph certainly did, a place able to support a large number of Jacob’s descendants.
What would be more convenient than that Joseph should have located his family near a lake that was connected by a river that led from the Nile within a few miles of Akhetaten? An area rich in vineyards and fruit trees – ‘one of the most agreeable spots in Egypt’.12 Quite consistent with the instruction Pharaoh gives to Joseph:
The land of Egypt is open before you: settle your father and your brothers in the best part of the land; let them stay in the region of Goshen. And if you know any capable men amo
ng them, put them in charge of my livestock.
Genesis 47:6
According to the Old Testament, the Hebrews numbered 600,000 when they departed from Egypt – an enormous figure in ancient population terms (and in view of the original seventy who comprised Jacob’s family). The total population of Egypt is estimated to have been 870,000 in 3000 BCE and only 2.6 million in 1250 BCE. Even allowing for some exaggeration we should expect to find traces of a large settlement in the area of Faiyum.
There is evidence that after the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE the Israelites were dispersed and some settled in the Faiyum, in Egypt. But this settlement is at a far later date than Joseph’s time.13 Archaeological evidence shows that by the time of the New Kingdom (thirteenth century BCE) the population density in the Faiyum region was higher than in the Nile Valley, lending proportionality truth to the Biblical Exodus number.
However, the total figure of 600,000 must be viewed with scepticism in view of the known estimates for the total population of Egypt at the time.
Further corroboration that the ‘Goshen’ of the Bible may not have been the initial place where Jacob and his family were settled can be found from the residual monuments to Ramses II, traditionally held as the Pharaoh who put the Hebrews through the harshest rigours of bondage and who presided over the Exodus period. At ancient Hermopolis (now called Ashmunein) in the region of Faiyum, two colossal seated figures of Ramses II sit before a ruined temple. The Hebrews already settled in the Faiyum area may have been put to work on this project, before being moved further north to a Delta region Goshen.
JACOB IS WELCOMED BY AKHENATEN
In Genesis 47:7, Joseph brings Jacob to meet Pharaoh and by all accounts they formed a mutual respect, empathy and friendship. This respect Jacob earns is honoured at his death in Egypt, when he is treated like a national celebrity.
The Mystery of the Copper Scroll of Qumran Page 13