The life of the saints is a rule of living for the rest, and therefore we receive the more fully digested sequence of the Scriptures, so that while by reading we come to know Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the other righteous men, we may pursue with eager footsteps a certain path of innocence opened up for us by their virtue. Although I have often treated of these men, today the history of holy Joseph presents itself. In him, though there were very many kinds of virtues, yet above all the mark of chastity shone forth conspicuously. It is right, therefore, that, since in Abraham you have learned the unwearied devotion of faith, in Isaac the purity of a sincere mind, in Jacob the singular patience of soul and in labours, from that general view of the virtues you should direct your mind to the particular kinds of disciplines.
For although the former are more diffuse, yet the latter are more distinct, and penetrate the mind the more easily the more they are circumscribed and defined. Let holy Joseph, then, be set before us as a mirror of chastity. For in his character, in his deeds, modesty shines forth, and a certain brightness of grace, the companion of chastity, gleams. Hence too he was loved by his parents more than the other sons. But that very thing was an occasion of envy—which ought not to be passed over in silence. From this, then, the argument of the whole history proceeded, that at the same time we might learn that the perfect man is not moved by the wrong of an avenging grief, nor returns evil for evils. Whence also David says: 'If I have repaid those who requited me evil.'
But what was it whereby Joseph deserved to be preferred to the others, if he had either injured those who hurt him or loved only those who loved him? For this most people do. But that is the wonderful thing—if you love your enemy, which the Saviour teaches. Rightly, then, is he to be admired who did this before the Gospel: that when injured he spared, when assailed he forgave, when sold he did not requite the wrong, but rendered grace in return for insult—which after the Gospel we have all learned, and yet cannot keep. Let us, then, learn the envy directed even at the saints, that we may imitate their patience, and let us recognize that they were not of a more excellent nature, but of a watchful observance; that they were not ignorant of vices, but corrected them. But if envy scorched even the saints, how much more must we beware lest it inflame sinners?
We are taught, therefore, what ought to be the affection between parents and the grace of children. To love one's children is sweet, and to love them more dearly is most sweet; but often paternal love itself, unless it keeps moderation, harms the children—if it either dissolves the beloved by excessive indulgence, or by the preference of one turns the others away from the affection of brotherhood. More is acquired for the son for whom the love of his brothers is acquired. This is the more glorious bounty of fathers; this the richer inheritance of children. Let an equal grace join the children whom an equal nature has joined. Piety knows no gain of money where there is loss of piety. Why do you wonder if quarrels arise among brothers over a field or a house, when over a tunic envy blazed up among the sons of holy Jacob?
What then? Is Jacob to be blamed because he preferred one to the others? But we cannot take away from parents the liberty of loving more those whom they believe to deserve more; nor ought we to cut off from children the zeal of striving to please more. In short, Jacob loved that one the more, in whom he foresaw the greater marks of virtues, so that the father seems not so much to have preferred a son as the prophet a mystery; and deservedly he made him a coat of many colours, whereby he might signify that he was to be preferred to his brothers by the mantle of diverse virtues.
In short, while he was still a boy the divine grace shone forth in him, since he dreamed that, when he had bound—as it seemed to him in the vision—sheaves together with his brothers, his own sheaf rose up and stood erect, but the sheaves of his brothers, turning round, adored his sheaf. In this assuredly was revealed the future resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Whom also, when they had seen Him at Jerusalem, the eleven disciples adored, and all the saints, when they shall have risen again, shall adore Him, bringing forward the fruits of honourable works, as it is written: 'But coming they shall come with exultation, carrying their sheaves.' Whence the brothers, although through envy they disparaged the credit of the dream, yet, expressing its interpretation in their own words, answered him:
'Are you indeed to reign as king over us, or to lord it as master over us?' For that vision signified the King who was to come, before whom every flesh of the human race should adore with bended knee. And he saw another dream and told it to his father and his brothers, namely that the sun and the moon and eleven stars adored him. Whence his father rebuked him, saying: 'What then shall this be that you have dreamed? Shall we indeed, coming, I and your mother and your brothers, adore you upon the earth?' Who is He whom parents and brothers adored upon the earth, save Christ Jesus, when Joseph and His mother with the disciples adored Him, confessing the true God in that body, of whom alone it was said: 'Praise Him, sun and moon;'
'praise Him, all you stars and light.' But what does the rebuke of the father signify, except the hardness of the people of Israel, from whom Christ is according to the flesh, whom even to this day they do not believe to be God nor are willing to adore as Lord, because they know He was born from among themselves? And so they hear His answers, and do not understand; they themselves read that the sun and moon praise Him, but they will not believe that it was said of Christ. And so Jacob is deceived by another's figure, but is not deceived by his own love. Paternal piety in him does not go astray, but the affection of the people who were to err is expressed.
Not, therefore, did the patriarch fail to believe so great a dream—he who in a twofold oracle prophesied both things alike, so as to represent both the person of the righteous man and that of the people: namely, that the Son of God was to come upon the earth, who would both be loved by the righteous and denied by the perfidious. He saw, then, the mysteries of the future incarnation, who sent his son to his brothers to see whether the sheep were rightly faring. What sheep was God then already seeking in that zeal of the patriarch, save those of whom the Lord Jesus Himself said in the Gospel: 'I am not come save to the lost sheep of the house of Israel'?
'And he sent him,' it says, 'to Shechem,' which by interpretation is called 'shoulder' or 'back'—that is, to those who would not turn to the Lord, but fleeing from His face would turn themselves away, which is properly of a sinner; for Cain went out from the face of God, and the prophet says: 'You shall make them turn their back.' But the righteous man does not turn away from the Lord, but runs to meet Him, saying: 'My eyes are ever toward the Lord.' And Isaiah, when the Lord said, 'Whom shall I send?' offered himself of his own accord, saying: 'Behold, I.' And Simeon waited that he might see Christ the Lord, and after he had seen Him—since he had seen the Remitter of sins and the Redeemer of the whole world—as though relieved of sin, he begged to be released from the use of this flesh, saying:
'Now, Lord, let Your servant depart, for my eyes have seen Your salvation.' And Zacchaeus from this first found the prerogative of his own commendation, in that he climbed up into a tree to see Christ. So then Joseph was sent by his father to his brothers—by that greater Father, who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all; by that Father of whom it is written: 'God sending His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh.' 'And Joseph,' it says, 'was wandering, because he could not find his brothers.' Not without cause was he wandering, who sought those who were wandering; for the Lord knows those who are His own. In short, Jesus also, wearied from His journey, was sitting upon the well. He was wearied, who could not find the people of God whom He sought;
for it had gone out from the face of the Lord. For he who follows after fault goes out from Christ. The sinner goes out; the righteous man enters in. In short, Adam the sinner hid himself, but the righteous man says: 'Let my reasoning enter into Your sight.' But Joseph found his brothers in Dothan, which signifies 'defection.' For where is he, save in defection, who deserts God? Nor is it any wonder if those were failing who did not hear Him saying: 'Come to me, all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you.' Joseph, then, came into Dothan, and they saw him coming from afar, before he drew near to them. And they raged to kill him. Truly they were far off who were in defection, and therefore they raged, because Christ had not drawn near to them.
For if the type of Christ had drawn near to them, they would certainly have loved their brother; but they could not be near who were plotting fratricide. 'Behold,' it says, 'that dreamer comes. Now therefore come, let us kill him.' Did they not say these very words who were plotting a parricidal sacrilege, just as Solomon says of them: 'Let us take away the righteous man, because he is unprofitable to us'? And they added in Genesis: 'And we shall see what his dreams will be.' This was written of Joseph, fulfilled in Christ, when the Jews said in His passion: 'If He is the king of Israel, let Him now come down from the cross, and we will believe Him. He trusts in God: let Him now deliver Him, if He will have Him.' Were even those brothers themselves so impious as to kill their brother?
And whence the merits of so great patriarchs, that the Law should designate the tribes of the whole people by their names? How do the names of piety and the marks of crime agree? Thus these too were labouring under the type of the people, not under the vice of their own mind. Hence all the envy, hence the meditation of parricide: the envy was by figure, the piety by affection. In short, Reuben and Judah, keeping the holy rights of brotherhood, desired to free him from their hands; and deservedly Judah is preferred in the paternal blessing, when it is said to him: 'The sons of your father shall adore you. A lion's whelp is Judah,' and he himself 'the expectation of the nations.'
Which assuredly suits Christ alone, for whom it was reserved to be adored by His brothers and awaited by the nations, who washed His robe in wine by the passion of His own body, because He stained His own flesh with no spot of sin. Asher too—Asher did not believe it suited himself: 'his bread is fat, and Asher himself is with princes.' But what of Joseph himself, to whom it was said:
'My son Joseph is to be enlarged, my son to be enlarged, my envied son, my younger son: return to me'—against whom, taking counsel together, they spoke evil, in whom the blessing prevailed above the blessings of the abiding mountains and the desires of the everlasting hills—whom he understood to be signified in himself as none other than Him who, surpassing the merits of all, holds above the desires of all the saints the summit of immeasurable power, whom no one could equal in vow? In the patriarchs, then, envy is compensated by grace, who are both excused from fault and consecrated by the gift of revelation. For it is not so blameworthy to have spoken the things that are of the people, as it is blessed to have seen the things that are of Christ.
They took on the person of the sinful people, that they might receive the grace of the redeeming Lord. Certainly grace abolished the fault, and the fault did not lessen the grace. And that we may recognize all this to be a mystery concerning the people and the Lord Jesus, 'Come,' it says, 'let us sell Joseph to the Ishmaelites.' What interpretation has the name of Joseph, save that it signifies the divine grace and the manifestation of the Most High God? Who, then, is sold, save He who, when He was in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant? For neither should we have bought Him, had not His own men sold Him. They sold Him wickedly, they bought Him worse. They sold Him to the merchants; the buyers gained a good odour from the betrayers;
for Judas sold Him, the Ishmaelites bought Him—who are signified by the Latin interpretation as 'those who hate their God.' Therefore in one place we find Joseph bought for twenty, in another for twenty-five gold pieces, in another for thirty, because Christ is not worth to all the estimation of one price. To some less, to others more. The faith of the buyer is the increase of the merchandise. To the more religious God is more precious; to the sinner the Redeemer is more precious. He is worth more to him also who has more grace.
But also to him to whom much has been given He is worth more, because he to whom more is forgiven loves more, as the Lord Himself declared in the Gospel concerning that woman who poured ointment upon His feet and washed them with tears and wiped them with her hair and dried them with kisses, of whom He said to Simon: 'Wherefore I say to you: her many sins are forgiven her, because she loved much.' But to whom less is forgiven, he loves less. Sometimes the diversities of price have not only the expression of quantity, but also of number, as you have concerning the ointment which the Lord recorded was poured out for His burial, as it is written, Judas saying:
'This might have been sold for three hundred pence'—by which number not of quantity but the signification of the cross seems to be expressed. So here too the diversity, whether of twenty or of thirty, of gold pieces or of silver, has the token either of a twofold or of a threefold perfection. For the twenty-five gold pieces of the jubilee, which is the number of remission, signify the most precious portion. Here too, that you may observe the figure of the Lord's passion, Judah the patriarch says: 'Let us hand Joseph over to the Ishmaelites; but let not our hands be laid upon him.' And well had he said above: 'But lay not your hands upon him,' which the Jews said in the Lord's passion: 'It is not lawful for us to put any man to death,' that the word of Jesus might be fulfilled, signifying by what death He was to die.
Already then, therefore, the emblem of the cross to come was being prefigured; and at the same time, because he was stripped of his tunic, that is, of the flesh which he assumed, he was stripped also of the comely diversity of the virtues. Therefore his tunic, that is, his flesh, and not his divinity, was made bloody; and the garment of his flesh could not take away from him the immortality of his life. This tunic the Jewish beasts made bloody, those of whom he says: 'Behold, I send you forth as lambs among wolves.' But as for the cistern being dry, what wonder is it if the cistern of the Jews has no water, who forsook the fountain of living water and made for themselves broken cisterns? And that you may know this to be a true mystery, the Lord himself says concerning himself: 'They laid me in the lower pit, in darkness and in the shadow of death.'
They, therefore, buy Christ who bring sweet odors, the incense with which they perfume the altars of a devout mind; whence also David says in Greek: 'Let my prayer be set forth as incense in your sight.' They bring also resin, with which broken marbles are joined together. There is a spiritual resin which may make solid the fracture of your soul, and bind together what has been torn apart, and draw tight what has come loose. For this spiritual resin strengthens and sets in order certain shattered members of the soul, so that they may be joined together without injury. And so Jeremiah seeks it, that he might heal Babylon, if it could be done, saying: 'Take resin for her corruption, if perhaps she may be healed. We treated Babylon, and she was not healed.' The synagogue was not healed, because that resin has passed over to the Church.
For this reason the merchants came from Gilead, that is, from the possession or sojourn of testimony, transferring their wares to the Church, so that this resin might heal the sins of the nations. Of these it is said: 'Be strengthened, you slackened hands and feeble knees.' Sincere faith is resin. This Peter applied when he said to the lame man: 'In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise and walk.' And deservedly he rose and walked. This he had when he said to the paralytic: 'Aeneas, the Lord Jesus heals you: rise and make your bed.' And he rose and made his bed. This he had when he said to the dead woman: 'Rise in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.' And she who had died rose up.
By the tempering of this resin those stones, of which God is able to raise up sons of Abraham, are fitted together. By the remedy of this resin the lame man is set upright, the paralytic is restored, the dead woman is raised. That, too, in which they sprinkled his tunic with the blood of a kid seems to signify this: that by false testimonies, in their assault upon him, they brought into the odium of sin the one who forgives the sins of all. To us he is a lamb, to them a kid. To us the Lamb of God was slain, from whom he took away the sins of the world; to them a kid, whose errors he heaped up, whose offenses he piled high. And therefore he says:
'Fill up the measure of your fathers.' And deservedly Jacob, lamenting the losses of his posterity, wept as a father over a son he had lost, as a prophet mourned over the destruction of the Jews. Then he even rent his garment, which we read was done in the Passion of the Lord Jesus by the chief priest, in whom there was not a private person but the function of a public office. And the veil of the temple was rent, that it might be made manifest by such signs that the mysteries were profaned, the people stripped of their saving garments, the kingdom divided and destined to be destroyed; for every kingdom divided against itself will easily be destroyed. And truly divided, when that which was Christ's began now to be the devil's. For neither could they remain undivided who were separating the Son from the Father.
Joseph, therefore, was sold, led into Egypt, bought by the chief of the cooks. Not an idle figure is one who would cook the raw materials of food, so that minds might feast on the sweetness of faith; for no food is sweeter than knowledge and doctrine. Before this there was in Egypt a raw faithlessness, which no ardor of divine knowledge and no desire for true knowledge had softened, nor had the fiery words of the Lord boiled it down. And Joseph was sold into Egypt, because Christ was to come to those to whom it was said: 'You were sold for your sins'; and therefore by his own blood he redeemed those whom their own sins had sold. But Christ, sold by his taking on of our condition, not by the price of the guilt of sin, is not held bound, because he himself committed no sin.
Therefore by a price he contracted our debt, not his own; he took away the bond of indebtedness, removed the moneylender, freed the debtor: one paid off what was owed by all. It was not lawful for us to go out from servitude. He took this upon himself on our behalf, that he might drive back the servitude of the world, restore the liberty of paradise, and bestow a new grace by the honor of fellowship with himself. So much concerning the mystery.
For the rest, as it pertains to the moral sense: because the Lord our God wills that all be saved, he gave through Joseph also a consolation to those who are in servitude, and bestowed instruction, that they might learn that even in the lowest condition manners can be superior, and that no state is immune from virtue, if a man's spirit recognizes that of each one it is the flesh which is subject to servitude, not the mind; and that many a little slave is freer than his masters, if those placed in servitude reckon that they must abstain from servile deeds. Every sin is servile, innocence is free. Whence also the Lord says: 'Everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.' For how is not every miser a slave, who auctions off his very self for a paltry gain of money?
He who has heaped up what is not to be used fears everything, lest he lose what he has gathered, and must guard it with all the greater peril the greater the things he has sought. How is he not a beggar, to whom the things he possesses are small? For even if he seem rich to me, he is in want to himself, nor does he comfort his desires with any sure proof, who knows not how to trust in what he wishes for. And how, too, is not that man a slave who is subjected to lust? First he burns with his own fires and is consumed by the torches of his own breast. To these the prophet rightly says: 'Walk in the light of your fire and in the flame which you have kindled.' He takes on every fear, lies in wait for each man's sleep, that he may gain possession of the object of his desire for one thing; he becomes the slave of all. He serves, then, and a wretched servitude indeed, who makes masters for his own self, who himself wishes to have those whom he must fear;
for nothing is so peculiar to servitude as always to be afraid. But that man, in whatever condition of servitude, is ever free who is not captured by desire, who is not held by the chains of avarice, who is not bound by the fear of an accusation, who looks securely upon present things, whom things to come do not terrify. Does it not seem to you that this man lords it in servitude, while that other serves in liberty? Joseph was a slave, Pharaoh reigned: more blessed was the servitude of the one than the kingdom of the other. In the end all Egypt would have collapsed in famine, had it not subjected its own kingdom to the counsel of a little slave. So they who are slaves by origin have wherein to glory: Joseph too was a slave. They have wherein to console themselves who have come from freedom into servitude by some necessity.
They have something to imitate, that they may learn that they can change their condition but not their manners, and that there can be both liberty in home-born slaves and steadfastness in servitude. Masters too have reason to hope through good little slaves. Abraham found a wife for his son through a home-born servant. The Lord blessed the house of the Egyptian on account of Joseph, and the blessing of the Lord came upon all his substance, both in his house and in his fields. 'And he turned over,' it says, 'all things whatsoever he had into Joseph's hands.' We notice that the slaves governed those things which the masters could not govern. But why should I bring forward the dispositions of his master's private household by this little slave, who governed an empire?
Yet greater is the fact that he first governed himself; and though he was comely in appearance and exceedingly fair of face, he did not turn the loveliness of his countenance to another's injury, but kept it for his own grace, reckoning himself the more beautiful for this, if he should be proved more comely not by the loss of chastity but by the cultivation of modesty. That, he held, is true beauty which would not captivate others' eyes nor wound fragile minds, but would win the favorable judgment of all, being a snare to none, a credit to himself. And if any woman looked upon him with wanton eyes, the crime is hers alone who saw amiss, not his who would not be seen amiss; nor is there any fault in his being seen. It was not in the slave's power not to be seen: the husband ought to have guarded his wife's eyes.
If the husband feared nothing concerning his wife, Joseph reckoned this to be a testimony of his chastity, not a relaxation through carelessness. Yet let men too learn to guard the eyes of women; even those who do not wish to be loved are loved. And so Joseph was loved, who would scorn the one who loved him. And well did Scripture excuse him, saying: 'The wife of his master cast her eyes upon Joseph'; that is, he did not display himself nor catch her off her guard, but she cast her own nets and was caught in her own snare, spread her own toils and was held in her own bonds. And she said to him: 'Lie with me.' The eyes are the adulteress's first weapons, words the second; but he who is not captured by the eyes can resist a word. A defense is at hand while the affection is still free. Therefore it is written that he refused.
First, then, by the encounter of his mind he overcame, repelling, as with the shield of his soul, the one rushing upon him; then he brandished his word like a spear, that she might call herself back. 'And he said to the wife of his master.' Rightly is she called the wife of the master, not herself the mistress, who could not extort what she wished to obtain. For how could she be mistress who did not have the effect of ruling, who did not keep the discipline of a mistress, who furnished to slaves the incitements of lust? He was the master, who did not receive the torches of the woman who loved him, who did not feel the chains of her seduction, whom no dread of death utterly terrified, who chose rather to die free of crime than to choose partnership in a criminal power. He is free who held it base not to repay grace with grace.
In short, he does not make excuse like a fearful man, nor take precaution as one timid of danger, but as a debtor to his master's kindness and to his own innocence he flees the crime of ingratitude and the stain of sin, and as a just man shudders at the contagion of guilt. The adulteress brandished a third dart by the persistence of her solicitation. But Joseph did not listen to her. You have, after the first words, what you should beware of. Not only slippery, but also bold, importunate, and wanton is lust, nor does the adulteress have anything to revere. She who did not first grieve over the losses of her modesty lies in wait, that she may capture. At last, with her ushers and household removed, she seized him at the entrance of his office and entrusted duty, saying: 'Lie with me.'
Joseph is excused by the testimony of Scripture, because he could not desert the service entrusted to him by his master. For it is not enough that, secure of himself, he had entered the inner parts of the house as one who could not be caught: a just man ought to have provided that he might not give opportunity to one raging, and that she might perish by his sin. But he who saw his master's wife setting herself against him ought also to beware of offense against the master through neglected duty. At the same time he reckoned it still a matter of speech, not of seizure. He is excused for having entered, he is praised for having escaped, and he valued the garments of the body no more than the chastity of the mind. He left behind, as if not his own, the things the adulteress held in her hands, and judged to be another's the things that could be seized by the touch of an unchaste woman.
A great man, indeed, who, though sold into slavery, knew nothing of a servile nature; though loved, did not love in return; though entreated, did not yield; though seized, fled away; who, when he was assailed by his master's wife, could be held by his garment but could not be captured in mind; and who, not enduring even her words for long, judged it to be contagion if he should delay longer, lest through the hands of the adulteress the incitements of lust should pass over. And so he stripped off his garment, shook off the crime, and, leaving behind the spoils by which he was held, he fled away despoiled indeed, yet not naked, because he was the more covered by the garment of modesty; for no one is naked save him whom guilt has stripped. So in earlier passages we have that Adam, after he deserted the commandments of God by his transgression and contracted the debt of grievous sin, was naked. Whence he himself says:
'I heard your voice in paradise and I was afraid, because I am naked, and I hid myself.' For he understood that he was naked, who had lost the bands of divine protection. And therefore he lay hidden, because he did not have the garment of faith, which indeed he laid aside by transgressing. You see a great thing. He was naked who did not lose his tunic; this one was not naked who stripped himself of the garments which he left in the hands of the adulteress. The same Scripture has asserted the one to be naked, and has denied it of the other. And therefore this one rather despoiled himself than stripped himself bare, who kept the uncorrupted garments of the virtues, stripping off the old man with his deeds, that he might put on the new, who according to the image of the Creator is renewed in knowledge: