Week 16 Psalm 105
Psalm 105 retells some of the stories from Israel’s past.
One of them is the story about Joseph being sold-down-the-river by his brothers.
I look back at the story in Genesis. It’s about 90 verses long. So the psalm-writer’s version – 5 verses – is a real whittled-down version:
(The Lord) had sent a man ahead of (Jacob’s family) – Joseph, who was sold as a slave.
They hurt his feet with shackles; his neck was put in an iron collar.
Until the time his prediction came true, the word of the Lord tested him.
The king sent for him and released him; the ruler of peoples set him free.
He made him master of his household, ruler over all his possessions.
The Genesis story of Joseph is one of the best stories in the bible and doesn’t need to condensed. But I guess the psalm writer had his reasons. And anyway the more important thing is that his short-version is an accurate rendition.
I remember reading a guy who had an explanation of Jesus walking across the Sea of Galilee. He figured there was weather anomaly in the eastern Mediterranean where the temperature plummeted and froze the lake. Jesus was walking on ice – not water! (We do that all the time in Alberta and so I know there’s no miracle there.)
Changing a story is okay. But an important rule is that when it gets changed it has to be approximately the same story.
Note: quote from Psalm 105:17-21 (CSB)