Then they sat down to eat. And looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh, on their way to carry it down to Egypt.
Open map →The road was already going where they needed him to goGenesis 37:25 · 1 place plottedThe brothers throw Joseph into a pit, then sit down to a meal. While they eat, a trading caravan comes into view on the road to Egypt. Commentators see two things here: the human heart at its coldest, and God's hidden plan starting to move.
A meal beside the pit
They ate while their brother lay in the pit. One writer sets that meal beside another meal, eaten by men who had just handed over an innocent victim.
Hamilton SmithHaving cast Joseph into the pit, his brothers "sat down to eat bread." Nor was it otherwise at the cross. The presence of Joseph only reveals the evil of his brothers. In the same way, the cross exposes how deep the corruption of man's heart goes. The leaders of Israel hand the true Passover Lamb over to death, and then calmly sit down to eat the Passover feast. They are an evil and adulterous generation, like the adulterous woman of Proverbs, of whom it is written, "she eats and wipes her mouth and says, 'I have done no wrong.'"
Nothing spoiled their appetite, and nothing troubled their conscience — for the time being. Another writer says a quiet conscience is not the end of the matter. God alone can wake it.
C. H. MackintoshNone can teach like God. He alone can give the conscience the true sense of sin. He alone brings the soul down into the deep places of its own condition in His presence. Men run on in their life of guilt, taking notice of nothing, until the arrow of the Almighty pierces their conscience... Joseph's brothers had no idea of all that was to flow to them from what they did to him. "They took him and cast him into a pit … and they sat down to eat bread." "Woe to those … who drink wine in bowls and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the ruin of Joseph." (Amos 6:6)
The caravan and its cargo
The camels carried the ordinary trade goods of the region. Balm came from Gilead, and it stood for more than its price.
Morrish Bible DictionaryThe gum of the balsam bush, of great medicinal value. Gilead was noted for producing it. It is used as a proverb to describe the healing God had for His people if they really turned to Him. Jer. 8:22; Jer. 46:11; Jer. 51:8. It was carried by the merchants into Egypt and elsewhere. Gen. 37:25; Ezek. 27:17.
One writer pictures Joseph travelling to Egypt among those same spices.
L. A. StasselMeanwhile Joseph had gone "wrapped" with the myrrh and spices of the Ishmaelites to Egypt. Was it his fragrance that attracted Potiphar to buy him?
Hatred looking for a profit
The sight of the traders changed the plan. Murder became business.
Hamilton SmithThe traders on their way to Egypt at once suggest to Judah a chance of making a profit out of their brother. Why not sell Joseph and make a little money? If they are not going to satisfy their hatred by killing Joseph, why not satisfy their greed by selling Joseph?... "Profit" is the word that governed the actions of Joseph's brothers. Judah asks the question of the greedy heart — not "Is it right?" or "Is it wrong?" but "What profit is it?"
The shadow of a greater Sufferer
One writer sees more here than family cruelty. Out of the crime he sees a figure of Christ rise.
William KellyYet in the middle of this heartlessness — toward the innocent sufferer, and toward the father who had sent him in love — a foreshadowing rises of Him who was to come. He is infinitely greater than Joseph. He too was the Beloved of His Father, and sent as Son of man in search of the lost. As the Faithful Witness, He drew out man's evil by divine good, and in everything He pleased God the Father.
The road they never meant to build
The caravan the brothers used to get rid of Joseph was the very transport God used to place him where He wanted him.
J. N. DarbyNotice what Joseph's trial did. God's ordering kept it from anything that would hinder it. It was meant to frustrate God's purpose, and it looked completely against it. Yet that trial, and his righteous suffering in Egypt, only brought about the very thing they seemed to frustrate. It was the Egypt his brothers sold him to, and the prison Potiphar put him in, that brought him to the butler and the baker. That is what made him governor over all the land of Egypt. We cannot put God out of His way. It is better to trust Him.
Summary
- The meal. Men can eat calmly beside a brother they have just destroyed. The pit shows what is really in the heart.
- The silence. Their consciences said nothing that day — but God alone gives the true sense of sin, and He gave it to them years later.
- The profit. The passing caravan turned hatred into a transaction; Judah's question was not "Is it right?" but "What profit is it?"
- The picture. Joseph is the beloved son, sent by his father in love and rejected by his brothers. He points to One infinitely greater, sent to seek the lost.
- The road. The traders who carried Joseph away were carrying him toward the throne. The plan meant to defeat God's purpose is the plan that fulfilled it.