Captain of the Guard\u2014Gen_39:1<\/p>\n
If the reader looks to the marginal reading of his English Bible, he will see that the office of Joseph\u2019s master, which is described in the text as that of \u201ccaptain of the guard,\u201d is indicated as being more literally \u201cchief of the slaughtermen;\u201d a dreadful and sanguinary title, calculated to give an unpleasant idea of the nature of Joseph\u2019s employments. We are afraid to say how much has been written upon the simple question\u2014What was the real character of the office thus described? If this personage was \u201cchief of the slaughtermen,\u201d what did his men slaughter\u2014men or beasts? The title is certainly very equivocal, and its meaning is only to be gathered from analogical researches. The inquiry is not only interesting in itself, as showing under what circumstances Joseph spent many years of his life, but as bringing some curious old customs under view.<\/p>\n
The Greek translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint) having been made in Egypt, is thought to have a peculiar value for the elucidation of the passages of Scripture which relate to that country. The title these translators give him is Archimagiros. Now as to the magiri, of whom he is here said to be chief, they are found to have been of two sorts\u2014those who provided the meat, and those who prepared or dressed at home the meat thus provided. The standing of the latter was much higher and more honorable than of the former\u2014and if Joseph\u2019s master belonged to this class, he would be master-cook, or intendant of the royal kitchen\u2014an officer of no mean importance in ancient times. In the curious work of Athen\u00e6us, of which we trust the English reader will not much longer lack a translation, a person of this class is introduced as enforcing the consideration due to his place and station, by urging that he had served Seleucus, king of Syria, in the quality of clerk of the kitchen. Hence some have supposed that the Seventy intended to represent Potiphar either as having the chief direction or prefecture of the royal kitchen, or else as presiding over all the inferior officers and men who belonged to the king\u2019s slaughterhouse. But it is now generally conceived that this was not the office of Potiphar; nor is it now universally supposed that the Seventy meant by the term they employed to allege that it was such.<\/p>\n
It is seen, from the intimations respecting the nature of his office, that Potiphar was really, as in the text of his authorized version, the \u201ccaptain of the guard\u201d\u2014that is, of the military force especially employed in the service of the court. Why such an officer should be called \u201cchief of the slaughtermen,\u201d or \u201cexecutioners,\u201d must be explained by reference to the fact that in ancient times all penal inflictions commanded by the king\u2014from scourging to death\u2014were executed by the soldiers forming the royal guard, under the orders of their chief. In his house was also the prison, in which accused persons were confined till their cases should be determined; and this military custody was a high and responsible function, belonging only to an officer of the highest rank. There are several incidents in Scripture which throw light upon the nature and functions of this office.<\/p>\n
The prophet Micaiah, having displeased king Ahab by his boldness, is sent to Amon, the governor of the city, and to Joash, the king\u2019s son, to be put under confinement, 1Ki_22:26-27; showing that Amon\u2019s post and authority in the matter was subordinate to that of the prince-royal; and from this it appears that the administration of the military custody was a very distinguishing trust of honor and power, which the nearest branches of the royal family did not regard as beneath them. Jehu\u2019s commission to the fourscore men, called \u201cthe guard and the captains,\u201d for slaying the worshippers of Baal, Note: 2Ki_10:24-25.] gave them the same kind of authority and commission that we have in view as possessed by the guard. A more striking instance we have in Solomon\u2019s sending the illustrious Benaiah, the chief captain of the guard, to put to death Joab and Adonijah. Note: 1 Kings 2.] Nebuzaradan, who held this post under the king of Babylon, actually commanded the army by which the temple and city of Jerusalem were destroyed. Note: 2 Kings 25.] In Herod\u2019s massacre of the infants at Bethlehem, a body of military men, probably of the royal guard, was engaged. Of the same class was the executioner sent by Herod the tetrarch to behead John the Baptist in prison; Note: Mar_6:27.] as well as those who were employed in imprisoning, scourging, and putting to death our Lord and his apostles. Note: Matthew 27; Act_16:27; Act_22:24; Act_27:1; Act_28:16; Act_12:6.]<\/p>\n
Many instances to the same effect might be produced from the profane historians; and from all this it clearly enough appears that the administration of the penal law, in all its forms, belonged to military men, and in particular to the guard immediately about the person of the king, whose chief might, therefore, well be called the chief of the executioners. The custom, no doubt, arose from the judicial and executive powers possessed by the kings, whereby they were in the constant habit of ordering the infliction of summary and capital punishments, for the execration of which the military guard, always present, were the most efficient and readiest instruments. Besides, men whose trade lay in the shedding of blood, always seemed the fittest, by their acquired indifference to human suffering, to be the agents of corporeal punishments; and in ancient times, as still in the East, nearly all punishments were corporeal\u2014and, therefore, barbarous, in the view of modern and European civilization, although by summary inflictions all the difficult and complicated questions respecting imprisonment and transportation, which perplex the minds of modern statesmen, were avoided. However, between beheadings, cutting off feet, hands, noses, and ears, plucking out tongues and eyes, and inflicting the bastinado\u2014the men of the royal ancient guards had enough savage work to go through, and were subject to a kind of hardening discipline, which scarcely prepares us for the apparently mild and forbearing character which Potiphar exhibits.<\/p>\n
What was Joseph\u2019s first employment we do not exactly know, further than that it was about the house, not away in the fields. The Orientals, who are greatly taken with the history of Joseph, and repeat it in tale and song, with ample embellishments and numerous variations, give us to understand that Potiphar, who was childless, bought the Hebrew lad with the intention of adopting him for a son, and that he was employed in the garden, where he had a separate lodge for his abode. This is probably because that, with their present habits, which are much less free with regard to women than were those of the ancient Egyptians\u2014of whom they knew nothing\u2014they find themselves unable to account in any other way for the evidently easy access to his mistress which he enjoyed. This mistress makes no mean figure in the Eastern poems founded on this history, in which she bears the name of Zuleekah; and concerning her many particulars are recorded which are quite new to plain readers of the Bible.<\/p>\n
It is interesting to observe to what consideration a purchased slave might in a short time rise in ancient Egypt. Joseph must soon, although still so young, have evinced to his master those engaging qualities, and high intelligence in the conduct of affairs, which marked his illustrious career. Potiphar learned to like him, and to repose the utmost confidence in him, eventually making him steward of his household, and leaving all his affairs in his hands. This was the Lord\u2019s doing; for it was the consequence of its being seen that everything prospered to which he put his hand, that he obtained advancement and consideration. If he had begun to despair, in his affliction, of the fulfillment of those hopes <\/p>\n
which his dreams had awakened, this must have strengthened his heart, by the assurance that he was not forgotten. There is nothing in the East that tends more to one\u2019s advancement than the opinion that he is a man in whose hands all business prospers; hence the emphasis with which it is declared that his master discerned Joseph to be \u201ca prosperous man,\u201d or, in the more homely but not less exact language of the elder versions, \u201cThe Lord was with Joseph, and he was a luckie felowe;\u201d Note: Roger\u2019s Version.] or, as another\u2014\u201cbecame a luckie man.\u201d Note: Bishop\u2019s Bible.] The reputation of being \u201clucky,\u201d arising from the observation that matters habitually go right in a man\u2019s hands, will in the East, and perhaps in the West, make any man\u2019s fortune, apart from any considerations of goodness or rectitude; but when, as in the case of Joseph, this reputation is enjoyed by one of irreproachable manners and unsuspected conduct, the claim to consideration becomes invincible. Potiphar had some reason to think the purchase of that Hebrew slave the best bargain he ever made.<\/p>\n
Autor: JOHN KITTO<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Captain of the Guard\u2014Gen_39:1 If the reader looks to the marginal reading of his English Bible, he will see that the office of Joseph\u2019s master, which is described in the text as that of \u201ccaptain of the guard,\u201d is indicated as being more literally \u201cchief of the slaughtermen;\u201d a dreadful and sanguinary title, calculated to … Continue reading ““087. CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD\u2014GENESIS 39:1””<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16439\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}