NOTES for Gen 45:1-28
Today's reading tells us about Joseph's long-awaited meeting with his brothers. Of course, formally this meeting happened much earlier, but in fact it took place only now, when not only did Joseph recognize his brothers, but they also recognized him. And now, at this meeting, Joseph was able to tell them what he may have delayed the meeting for so long in order to say, having made his brothers walk a long road of repentance. It is no surprise that the brothers were dismayed when they recognized Joseph (v. 3): they had already had time to feel and realize the full depth of their guilt. And precisely for that reason Joseph could now tell them something very important: it turns out that it was not they, his brothers, who sold him into Egypt; it was God who sent him there in order through him to save both Jacob and all his kinsmen (vv. 4-8). It turns out that whatever a person may intend, what is carried out is still not the person's plan, but God's plan. But in that case, is there a place in this plan for human freedom? Or is a person's free choice only an illusion, especially when his plans contradict God's providence? No, human freedom is not illusory after all. Rather, the illusion is the possibility of a full human life in a world separated from God, cut off from God's larger world. Meanwhile fallen humanity strives to live exactly like that, in its own small, limited world, separate from God's larger world, whose only illusory advantage is that here a person can be his own little god. Then God leaves a person to live as he wants. And a person, living in his little world and managing it, often drives out or kills the one he does not want to see near him. And here, in his little world, he often triumphs, sure that he has won. It is no surprise: in a world where there is no place for God, only one plan triumphs: the plan of the person who created that little world. But sooner or later the moment inevitably comes when the boundaries of this little, human-made world collapse, and then its creator learns with amazement, and often with fear, that in the larger world, where God acts, His plan is being carried out, and what in the little separate world seemed to be triumph has turned out to be defeat in God's larger world. God truly leaves a person his freedom, and it depends only on the person what that freedom will become for him: joy or punishment.