Old Testament Hero

Anuradha Singh
Theology
Fall 2014
Old Testament Hero
In the Old Testament there are two heroes that are an inspiration to most people, who are Abraham, Moses, Jacob, Joseph, and Jeremiah. The person I picked was Joseph. Joseph had different traits than the other heroes, which were, being faithful, interpretations of dreams, and being a leader throughout his time in Egypt. Joseph was faithful to not only God, but that he will soon return to his family and his father. With him putting his trust in God, Joseph was not treated as a normal slave. His interpretation of dreams caused him trouble but it also benefitted him when it came to the Pharaoh of Egypt. He used his interpretation of dreams to be some kind of leader in the Pharaoh’s kingdom.

His leadership in Egypt was due to his way of distributing the grain and water needed to the people. Plus the people of Egypt were very pleased with the way he was fair with the rations. Joseph’s human nature is totally different from his grandfather and his father. He was not weak nor was he a trickster, but he did have times where he conniving. When I say conniving, I mean what he did to his brothers before revealing to them that he was their brother. Joseph really inspired me though because, he had faith that one day he would be reunited with his family and he didn’t keep a grudge for what they did to him. Joseph has his strengths in his story and one weakness that almost ruin him, which is his pride.
Gen 37:5-11
In this chapter and following verses, Joseph’s weakness sets up the problems that he was going to be in after he explains his dreams.

Joseph’s weakness is his pride from being able to interpret the dreams he has. The first dream Joseph had, he told his brothers that he would rule over them and the brothers would bow down to him. Of course this made the brothers jealous, but also made his brothers hate him more. Joseph didn’t have any qualms of making his brothers upset. The reason is because he knew/believed his dreams would come true, since God was by his side and showed him the way to interpret the dreams. In verse 9, Joseph has another dream of “the sun, the moon, and eleven stars bowing before him.” The sun represented his father, the moon represented his mother, and the eleven stars represented his eleven brothers. At this point, Joseph’s father, Jacob starts to question the dream that Joseph had. Jacob might have seen Joseph’s pride, but till Jacob pondered the dream, while his eleven sons became highly jealous. In the next verses, Joseph’s weakness brought him to the problems that would change his life. Joseph was thrown into a pit by his brothers and was then sold as a slave. Since his brothers couldn’t go back home without Joseph, they took the robe of many colors splattering sheep’s blood on it. When they took it back home, Jacob presumed his favorite son to be dead, while Joseph is taken to Egypt. This passage really describes the reason why Joseph had a weakness

above all his strengths and that it would come and haunt him in a way.
Gen 41:1-57
In this chapter and the following verses, Joseph’s strength is shown to overpower his weakness of his dreams. Joseph’s strengths as told before is his faith, his interpretations of dreams, and being a leader to the people. Joseph goes through ups and downs in Egypt. He was treated well by his master, an officer of the Pharaoh since God was with Joseph. God blessed the Egyptians through the treatment of Joseph. As always though, there is always something bad that ruins the good. The officer’s wife tried to seduce Joseph, which he refused and ran away. She then ripped a piece of his tunic off, telling her husband that Joseph seduced her. Resulting in Joseph being thrown into jail on a false accusation. While in jail, Joseph interpreted the dreams of two prisoners, which came true, thus one prisoner go his job back as the other died.
Two years later the Pharaoh had a puzzling dream, and Joseph was brought in to interpret the dream.

Which were seven years of great prosperity and seven years of famine that will spread all across the land. The pharaoh realized that God was with Joseph, so the Pharaoh put him in charge of gathering food and water, also with distributing it when the time came. Joseph had faith in God, so God was with them through the seven years of famine. Joseph had kids with an Egyptian woman, which he named after what God did for him. His leadership went on to make people happy due to his fairness and God’s presence. The faith in God helped Joseph and the people survive through the difficult times, while the interpretation of dreams made it easy for Joseph to have a good life without having to deal with what his brothers put him

through.
Between all the heroes of the Old Testament, I learned more from Joseph as a hero. He taught me a practical and religious lesson for life. I personally had an issue with pride and it put me in some bad places, which I didn’t want to be in. I did of course learn to control that pride, which helped me out a lot because I finally started having a better outcome of life. With the religious lesson, I learned that I do need to have faith in my religion because it eases whatever problems I have. This hero helped me see why I was having problems, but also a way to fix those problems.