Page:Keil and Delitzsch,Biblical commentary the old testament the pentateuch, trad James Martin, volume 1, 1885.djvu/332

 discourses the titles of God here mentioned were unquestionably more significant and impressive than the simple name Jehovah. and when Jacob speaks of Elohim only, not of Jehovah, in Gen 48:11, Gen 48:20-21, the Elohim in Gen 48:11 and Gen 48:21 may be easily explained from the antithesis of Jacob to both man and God, and in Gen 48:20 from the words themselves, which contain a common and, so to speak, a stereotyped saying. Wherever the thought required the name Jehovah as the only appropriate one, there Jacob used this name, as Gen 49:18 will prove. But that name would have been quit unsuitable in the mouth of Pharaoh in Gen 41:38-39, in the address of Joseph to the prisoners (Gen 40:8) and to Pharaoh (Gen 41:16, Gen 41:25, Gen 41:28, Gen 41:32), and in his conversation with his brethren before he made himself known (Gen 42:18; Gen 43:29), and also in the appeal of Judah to Joseph as an unknown Egyptian officer of state (Gen 44:16). In the meantime the brethren of Joseph also speak to one another of Elohim (Gen 43:28); and Joseph not only sees in the birth of his sons merely a gift of Elohim (Gen 41:51-52; Gen 48:9), but in the solemn moment in which he makes himself known to his brethren (Gen 45:5-9) he speaks of Elohim alone: “ Elohim did send me before you to preserve life” (Gen 41:5); and even upon his death-bed he says, “I die, and Elohim will surely visit you and bring you out of this land” (Gen 50:24-25). But the reason of this is not difficult to discover, and is no other than the following: Joseph, like his brethren, did not clearly discern the ways of the Lord in the wonderful changes of his life; and his brethren, though they felt that the trouble into which they were brought before the unknown ruler of Egypt was a just punishment from God for their crime against Joseph, did not perceive that by the sale of their brother they had sinned not only against Elohim (God the Creator and Judge of men), but against Jehovah the covenant God of their father. They had not only sold their brother, but in their brother they had cast out a member of the seed promised and given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, from the fellowship of the chosen family, and sinned against the God of salvation and His promises. But this aspect of their crime was still hidden from them, so that they could not speak of Jehovah. In the same way, Joseph regarded the wonderful course of his life as a divine arrangement for the preservation or rescue of his family, and he was so far acquainted with the promises of God, that he