~ Joseph Begins His Journey to Egypt ~

Joseph, a young man of seventeen,
was tending the flocks with his brothers,
the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah,
his father's wives,
and he brought their father a bad report about them.

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons,
because he had been born to him in his old age;
and he made a richly ornamented robe for him.
When his brothers saw that their father loved him
more than any of them,
they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.

. . . Now his brothers had gone to graze
their father's flocks near Shechem,
and Israel said to Joseph, "As you know,
your brothers are grazing the flocks near Shechem.
Come, I am going to send you to them."

"Very well," he replied.

So he said to him, "Go and see
if all is well with your brothers and with the flocks,
and bring word back to me."
Then he sent him off from the Valley of Hebron.

. . . So when Joseph came to his brothers,
they stripped him of his robe --
the richly ornamented robe he was wearing --
and they took him and threw him into the cistern.
Now the cistern was empty;
there was no water in it.

. . . Judah said to his brothers,
"What will we gain if we kill our brother
and cover up his blood?"
Come, let's sell him to the Ishmaelites
and not lay our hands on him;
after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood."
His brothers agreed.

So when the Midianite merchants came by,
his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern
and sold him for twenty shekels of silver
to the Ishmaelites,
who took him to Egypt.

(Genesis 37: 2.5-4, 12-14, 23-24, 26-28)
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AC 4756

'And men passed by, Midianites, who were traders'
(Genesis 37:28)
means those who are in the truth of this good,
is evident from the representation of the Midianites,
as being those who are in the truth of simple good;
and from the meaning of 'traders'
as those who possess knowledges of good and truth,
for such knowledges are meant by
riches, wealth, and wares in the spiritual sense,
and therefore 'trading' means acquiring
and communicating these knowledges.
Here not knowledges of good but those of truth are meant,
for, as stated above,
'Midianites' means those in whom
the truth that partners simple good is present.
For the same reason they are called 'men',
since the expression 'men'
is used of those who possess truth.
From the historical chain of events described here
it is plain that Joseph was sold to Ishmaelites,
but that he was drawn out of the pit by Midianites
and was also sold by the Midianites to Potiphar in Egypt;
for it is said in the final verse of this chapter,
'And the Midianites sold him into Egypt
to Potiphar, Pharaoh's bedchamber-servant'.
One would think that
because Joseph was sold to the Ishmaelites
that these, not the Midianites,
would be the ones to sell him in Egypt.
But things happened the way they did
for the sake of the representation
of what is contained in the internal sense.
'Joseph', that is, Divine Truth,
cannot be sold by those governed by good,
only by those governed by the truth partnering that good.