Wow, has it really been half a year since I last blogged? At this rate, I'll be done with the Bible by the time I'm as old as Methuselah! (HAHAHAHA... Eh, sorry... Bible humor isn't always the funniest).
Even though my contributions to this blog aren't always frequent, it's never too far from my mind. And this Christmas, the best girlfriend in the world gave me The Book of Genesis Illustrated by R. Crumb (yes, that R. Crumb), which is what I'll be using for the remainder of my Genesis entries. I took it as a not-so-subtle hint from both her and the man upstairs that I should really get around to finishing this darned thing.
Okay, so let's dive in....
With the famine in full swing, Israel requests that his sons return to Egypt so that they can buy more food. The only caveat is that the brothers know that they will not be allowed back unless they bring their youngest brother Benjamin. As was the case in Genesis 42, Israel is not thrilled by this idea. But their situation is dire, and so Israel allows Benjamin to go too.
The brothers head to Egypt where they again meet with Joseph (remember that they don't know recognize him though). Joe is so overwhelmed by the sight of Benjamin that he runs off into his room and cries. Afterward, he regains his composure and treats his brother to food and wine, giving Benjamin five times as much to eat as the others.
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A couple of interesting things to note here:
1) I always get a kick out of the passages of the Bible that offer some random detail. In Gen 43, Israel tells his sons to bring Joseph "some balm and some honey, gum and ladanum, pistachio nuts and almonds." Evidently these were things that were fit to give one of the most powerful men in Egypt.
What the heck is ladanum? Wikipedia sez:
In ancient times, the resin was scraped from the fur of goats and sheep that had grazed on the cistus shrubs. It was collected by the shepherds and sold to coastal traders. The false beards worn by the pharaohs of ancient Egypt were actually the labdanum soaked hair of these goats. Later long poles with leather or cloth strips were used to sweep the shrubs and collect the resin which was later extracted. It was used to treat colds, coughs, menstrual problems and rheumatism.2) In his version of Gen 43, R. Crumb has opted to use the phrase "El Shaddai" instead of "God". This is actually much more accurate than using the word "God" - which is how the King James Version of the Bible has it written in Gen 43 - because El Shaddai is how the original Hebrew identifies God in this passage.
I think that I've covered this before, so forgive me if I have, but there are in fact many names that God goes by in the Bible. Me personally, I used to just think of "God" as "God", or maybe "The Lord", but I certainly didn't realize that in Hebrew, "God" actually goes by many names, and each of them have a different meaning, and thus, describe a different facet of God's nature.
Some of these names are: YHWH, Elohim, El, Adonai, Ba'ai, Ẓeba'ot, Shalom, and as we've already discussed, El Shaddai. I will hopefully explore all the names of God in future posts, but for the time being let's focus on El Shaddai, since that is the one used in Gen 43.
Simply put, "El" can be translated as "God" and "Shaddai" can be translated as "Almighty", so put together, "El Shaddai" literally means "God Almighty."
But let's dig a little deeper, shall we?
Shaddai is a word that may have derived from several other Hebrew words, the first of which is "shad." In Hebrew, "shad" means "breast", and one can see how this could make sense within the context of God being nourishing and parental. The second word is "sadu", meaning "mountain", suggesting strength, power, and enormous size. There is also at least one more possibility that the word comes from the root verb "shadad", which means to "overpower" or "destroy" - a distinctly different flavor from the kinder, gentler "shad".
Resources:
http://www.blueletterbible.org/study/misc/name_god.cfm#link2
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Shaddai
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=52&letter=N
http://www.hebrew4christians.com/Names_of_G-d/El/el.html
