He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?”
Joseph is a slave in a foreign house, trusted with everything his master owns and pressed day after day by his master's wife. His refusal names that trust first, and then it names God.
The trust he would not break
Joseph's answer starts with what his master had put in his hands, and the one thing kept out of them.
L. M. GrantShe tried many times to get Joseph to commit adultery with her (vv. 7-14). He refused every time. He told her that his master had trusted him with great responsibility in his house. He was not going to betray that trust by breaking the marriage between his master and his wife. Doing that, he tells her, would be great wickedness and a sin against the Lord.
Why "against God" is the deciding phrase
This act would have wronged several people. Joseph names only God, and that is what held him.
F. B. HoleYoung or old, as we pass through this world that stains us, we do well to keep this question always in our hearts: "How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?" If he had given in, he would have sinned against the woman, against Potiphar and against himself. But the thought that controlled him and saved him was "against God."
That instinct is not limited to this kind of sin. One writer draws the wider rule out of Joseph's words:
W. T. P. WolstonWhat was the secret that kept him? He says, "How can I … sin against God?" His eye is on God. He lives before God. Happy man! Before God he has a sense of what is right and what is wrong. He knows that every sin, whether it is "against his own body" (see 1 Cor. 6:18) or not, is a sin against God. His reply showed a godly state of mind and a tender conscience.
Kept by his daily walk with God
Joseph could ask that question at once because of how he lived before the test came. His service to a man and his fear of God were not two separate things.
Hamilton SmithHere is the secret of Joseph's steady life in front of his master. He served man faithfully because he walked always in the presence of God. Walking in the fear of God kept him in the hour of temptation. It is good for each one of us if the moment of fierce temptation finds us walking so close to God that we ask at once, "Can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?" To ask that question is to escape the trap. The only thing we really have to be afraid of is fearing anything, or anyone, more than God.
Asking the question, then running
Joseph did not only speak. He ran. One writer turns that escape into a rule, and adds that running away was not weakness:
F. W. GrantWhenever we can escape without being disloyal, we are to run from temptation rather than face it. Scripture says, "Flee youthful passions," and "abstain from the passions of the flesh" — hold off from them. Flee, as Joseph fled; and there was perhaps no bolder man.
What a clear conscience cost him
Refusing did not improve Joseph's situation. It wrecked it. The tempter turned into an accuser.
Hamilton SmithThe temptation came "day after day" (v. 10), and the attacks grew more persistent, until Joseph fled from it and the devil failed. Having failed as the tempter, he now becomes the persecutor (vv. 13-18)… So Joseph escapes from a bad woman and keeps a good conscience. But keeping a good conscience can cost a lot. Joseph has to trade the comfort of Potiphar's house for the hardship of Pharaoh's prison.
Not a weak man, but a strong one
People often picture Joseph as a soft young man. One writer answers that, and follows the one thought that runs through his whole life.
The Bible TreasuryMany people think Joseph was a good young man, but a rather soft one. Read his history carefully and you trace a character that is strong, wise, noble, generous and manly. Wherever he was, God was in all his thoughts. When he was tempted, he said, "How can I … sin against God?" When he stands before Pharaoh, his first words are, "God will give …" When he tells his brothers who he is, he says, "Do not be distressed or angry with yourselves … for God sent me before you." … He did not complain under that great disaster. He looks around to see what he can do to help others, even his jailers.
Summary
- Trust. Joseph held everything in the house except his master's wife. Taking her would have betrayed the man who trusted him.
- God. The sin would have wronged the woman, Potiphar and Joseph himself. Joseph names only God. That was the thought that controlled him and saved him.
- Habit. He could ask that question at once because he had walked in God's presence all along. To ask it is to escape the trap.
- Flight. Joseph answers with his feet. Where escape is possible, run — as Joseph ran, and there was perhaps no bolder man.
- Cost. A good conscience cost Joseph comfort and bought him prison. Even there, God was in all his thoughts.