In vain they who had inflicted the deep wound in a parent's heart, hypocritically attempted to heal it. His traitor sons "rose up to comfort him;" but Israel refused to be comforted. "And he said, For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him."
How bitterly the marred garment of many colours recalled to the mind of Jacob the joy and pride with which he had placed it on his favourite son—the son of his old age, whom he loved more than all his children! Joseph, beauteous in person, gifted in mind, virtuous in character, was well fitted to be the pride and delight of his parent. We marvel not that the son of the beloved Rachel—he who inherited his mother's outward attractions, with the piety of his father—should have been to the heart of Jacob peculiarly dear.
And yet, perhaps, the first thought which this part of Joseph's history suggests to the mind is, how great an evil is partiality shown by a parent! How it draws upon its object many dangers!—Envy, enmity from without, with the yet greater peril arising from fostered vanity and pride within. Had Joseph remained with his doting father, wearing the distinctive garment with which partial affection had robed him, his noble character might have been utterly marred. Presumption, self-righteousness, and vanity, might, and probably would, have sorely tempted his soul. Joseph's Heavenly Father loved him as tenderly as did his earthly father, but with a far wiser love. God gave the bitter antidote to the sweet poison bestowed by a parent's hand. Oh, that those whose blind and cruel partiality is sowing the seed of discord in their families, and that of pride in the hearts of their best beloved, would earnestly consider the history of Jacob and Joseph! How terrible were the trials which the old patriarch's partiality drew upon his boy! His weak affection tended to injure its object: God knew that, and divided—for how many long and bitter years divided—the father from the son!
Again, in yonder torn and bloody garment we see a terrible comment on the inspired declaration, "he that hateth his brother is a murderer." How many thoughts of envy, how many glances of malice, how many bitter words, must there have been in the family of Jacob, before hatred in Joseph's brethren ripened into the horrible crime which deprived a brother of his freedom, almost of his life, and nearly brought the gray hairs of a father with sorrow to the grave! Was there not a time when, if it could have been foretold to the elder sons of Jacob that they would sell their own brother into slavery, and then, by an acted lie of the most cruel kind, try to conceal their guilt by almost breaking their parent's heart—could this have been foretold to them, would not each have exclaimed, in the language of Hazael, "Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?"
Let us be watchful against the appearance of envy, even in its least startling form. If we see the crocodile's egg, let us crush it; nor let the destroyer come forth and gain strength, so that it get the mastery over us. The slightest stirring of ill-will towards one more favoured than ourselves, should place us at once on the watch. The humility that is content with a lowly place—the love that rejoices in the exaltation of a brother—these are the guardians of the soul against envy; and, where these are wanting, can the Spirit of God be said to dwell?
Once more, by Joseph's coat of many colours, rent and blood-stained, we are reminded of the marvellous way in which God's providence brings good out of evil, and makes the darkest events in His servants' lives links in a chain of mercies. The beautiful garment given by paternal love, and worn perhaps with some pride, was torn indeed from the persecuted Joseph—first to be replaced by the scanty apparel of a slave, then afterwards by the garb of a criminal in prison; but it was from wearing the dress of humiliation that Joseph was raised to power and honour. It was not the garment made by his father that he put off, in order to assume robes of high office in the court of King Pharaoh. Had Joseph remained in his home at Hebron, unharmed by malice, untouched by persecution, he would never have been the ruler in Egypt, the benefactor of a nation, the friend of a king, the earthly preserver of all Israel's race. It has been said that "evil is good in the making;" so, even from the malice of Joseph's brethren, the grief of his father, and his own anguish when "the iron entered into his soul," God brought forth blessings unnumbered to the man who feared and obeyed Him.
We cannot leave the stained vestment of the ancient patriarch without turning our thoughts to Him of whom it is written, that "He was clothed in a vesture dipped in blood: and His name is called The Word of God." In Joseph we see a remarkable type of our blessed Redeemer, sent by His Father to visit man, as Joseph was sent to his brethren in Shechem. "He came unto His own, and His own received Him not." For envy, the chief priests delivered Christ into the hands of the Gentiles; and the betrayer received money for Him whom the children of Israel did value, even as their fathers sold Joseph for twenty pieces of silver.
But it is in his subsequent exaltation to be a prince and deliverer—it is in his exercise of boundless liberality and free pardoning grace—that Joseph is especially a type of our Lord. "God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance," said the patriarch to his penitent brethren, who owed preservation from famine to him. And it was to those whom He deigned to call brethren that Christ addressed the gracious assurance, "I go to prepare a place for you."
To Him the sun, and the moon, and the stars pay homage; to Him all the world shall bow down; in His hands is the bread of life; and His word is still, "Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all ye ends of the earth." Once sinners parted Christ's garments amongst them, and upon His vesture did they cast lots; but the hour is approaching when they shall look upon Him whom they pierced, and behold His glory,—
"Whose native vesture bright,
Is the unapproached light,
The sandal of whose foot the rapid hurricane!"