26 j 
J o s 
cern, that Jofepli was no longer able to refrain from dif- 
coverino- himfelf to his brethren. Judah’s addrefs on this 
occafion’, and the manner of Jofeph’s difcovering who he 
was, are detailed with incomparable beauty and pathos in 
the facred writings. After Jofepli had diffipated the ap¬ 
prehensions which his brethren began to difcover upon 
hnding who the dreaded and powerful ruler of Egypt re¬ 
ally was, and recollecting their cruel ufage of him, he 
gave them all, particularly Benjamin, proofs of his tender 
affection, and then went and acquainted Pharaoh with 
their arrival, and the fituation of his father’s family. 
Upon this Pharaoh told Jofeph, that he might fend for 
his father and all his family into Egypt, and fix them in 
the richeft part of the country, where they fhould expe¬ 
rience the teflimonies of his royal favour. 
In the life of Jacob we have already mentioned all 
the particulars which are recorded relative to Jofeph, 
from the time when Pharaoh gratified his pious wifhes 
by defiring him to fend for his father, to the fettlement 
of the venerable patriarch and his fons in the land of 
Gofhen. There they were fupplied with all neceffary 
provifion, while the Egyptians were reduced to the 
greateft diftrefs by the famine. Owing to the long con¬ 
tinuance of that calamity, the purchafe of corn drained 
the people of all their money, which filled the king’s trea- 
fury ; and afterwards they were obliged to part with their 
cattle, their houfes, their land, and, at length, with their 
perfonal freedom, for fubfiftence. By this means the whole 
kingdom of Egypt became the demefne of the crown, ex¬ 
cepting the lands of the priefts, who were furnifhed with 
what provifion they wanted out of the royal (tores, with¬ 
out being at any expence ; and all the people were re¬ 
duced to the fituation of bondfmen to the king. That 
they might forget their former property in the lands which 
they had fold, and be precluded from forming combina¬ 
tions to regain them, the old owners were feparated from 
one another, and tranfplanted to diftant places, through¬ 
out the whole kingdom. In purfuing this line of policy, 
Jofeph appears to have been carried by his zeal for the 
king’s intereil beyond the bounds of true wifdom and 
prudence; for it contributed to the eftablifhment of that 
abfolute defpotifm, under which his own defcendants, in 
common with the reft of the Ifraelites, were afterwards fo 
cruelly haraffed. When the laft year of the famine was 
come, Jofeph acquainted the Egyptians that they might 
expeft a crop of corn the following year, and that he 
would enable them to refurne their agricultural employ¬ 
ments, by diftributing frefh lands, cattle, and corn, among 
them; but upon this condition, that from that time for¬ 
ward the fifth part of all the products of their lands 
fhould go to the king, and the remainder be their own. 
To this propofal, in their prefent diftreffed circumftances, 
they gladly conlented ; and thenceforth it paffed into a 
law, which continued in force for feveral centuries, that 
the fifth part of the produft of the whole kingdom of 
Egypt, excepting the lands of the priefts, fhould belong 
to the crown. 
In the mean time the family of Jacob increafed in num¬ 
bers and wealth at Gofhen, till that patriarch, fenfible from 
his increafing feeblenefs that his end was approaching, 
fent for all his fons to receive his laft bleffing, and to hear 
his predictions of what fhould happen to their feveral de¬ 
fcendants in future times. In the bleffing which he pro¬ 
nounced on Jofeph, after adverting to his paft hiftory, he 
predicted that he fhould have a numerous pofterity, which 
fhould be fettled in a fertile country, and abound in the 
riches of the paftoral life; and he concluded it with a 
prayer, that all the bleffings promifed to him, and to his 
forefathers, might be doubled on the head of his molt be¬ 
loved fon. After the death of Jacob, and the return of his 
fons to Egypt from Canaan, where they had been to pay the 
laft tribute of refpeCt to his remains, Jofeph’s brethren, 
apprehenfive that he might now be dil’pofed to refent their 
former cruel ufage of him, fent a meffenger to inform 
him, that it was his father’s earneft requeft that he would 
Vol.XI. No. 751. 
E p ir„ 
forgive their paft injuries, and ftill continue them under 
his protection. Greatly aftefted at the fufpicion and con¬ 
cern which they betrayed, Jofeph fent for them, received 
them in the fame kind manner as when their father was 
alive, and gave them the ftrongeft affurances of his un¬ 
abated love and zealous care for their welfare. He (ur- 
vived his father about fixty years; and, when he found 
hisend approaching, he fent for his brethren, and prediCled 
that God would, according to his promife, bring their 
pofterity out of Egypt to the Land of Canaan ; he there¬ 
fore made them fwear that they would not bury him in 
the country in which they then were, but, after caufing 
his body to be embalmed, depofit it in fome fecure place 
until the departure of the Ifraelites towards the promifed 
land, when it fhould be carried to that country, and bu¬ 
ried with his anceftors. Jofeph died in the year 1635 
B.C. at the age of no, having continued viceroy of Egypt 
till his death, and filled that poft under fix fucceffive fo- 
vereigns. The Egyptians bitterly lamented the lot's of 
this great patriarch; and, according to fome writers, fo 
high was the fenfe which they entertained of the fervices 
rendered by him to their country, that after-ages wor- 
ffiipped him as a god. When the Ifraelites took their de¬ 
parture from Egypt, they punctually fulfilled his injunc¬ 
tion concerning the removal of his body; and we are in¬ 
formed in Joffiua xxiv. 32. that it was buried at Shechem, 
in the field which Jacob bought of Hamor. St. Jerome 
fays, that the Ifraelites railed there a noble monument to 
his memory, which was ftill to be feen in his time. The 
Talmudifts, and other rabbies, have added a vaft number 
of abfurd tales to the life of Jofeph, which are not wor¬ 
thy of being repeated ; and Mahomet, in the xiith chap¬ 
ter of his Koran, has given a long hiftory of this pa¬ 
triarch, intermixed with a variety of fabulous circum¬ 
ftances, to which his followers afterwards made abundant 
additions of the fame kind. In D’Herbelot’s Biblio- 
theque Oricntale, under the word Joufouph, the curious 
reader may meet with feveral fpecimens of thefe legen¬ 
dary ftories. See Genelis xxx.— 1 . 
JO'SEPH, fon of Jacob, and grandfon of Matthan',* the 
bleffed virgin’s fpoufe, and fofter-father of Jefus Chrift. 
Matth. i. 15, 16. His age and the other circumftances of 
his life, excepting what is related in the Gofpel, are un¬ 
certain. Many of the ancients believed that before his 
marriage with the virgin he had a wife named Efcha, or 
Mary, by whom he had James the Lefs, and others who 
are called in Scripture the brethren of Jefus Chrift. But 
this opinion is not maintainable, fince Mary the mother 
of James was living at the time of our Saviour’s paffion; 
unlefs it be faid that ffie had been divorced by Jofeph, 
in order to marry the bleffed virgin ; or that he was mar¬ 
ried at the fame time to two filters; which is contrary to 
the law, as dated in Lev. xviii. 18. The apocryphal gof¬ 
pel of the virgin’s birth, followed by Epiphanius and 
others, imports, that Jofeph was old when he married the 
virgin. Epiphanius lays he was above fourfcore, and had 
fix children by a former wife; that he married the bleffed 
virgin not out of choice, but by lot; to be guardian of 
her virginity. Others think that he was obliged to marry 
her, as being the neareft relation. But thefe vague opi¬ 
nions are hardly worth notice. 
Jofeph, fays the Gofpel, Matth. i. 19. was a juft man ; 
this is the greateft encomium, fince juftice comprehends 
all virtues. He married the bleffed virgin ; his ordinary 
abode was at Nazareth, particularly after his marriage ; 
for fome believe that the place of his birth was Caper¬ 
naum, while others fay Bethlehem. He lived by labour, 
and worked at a trade, though at what trade is not agreed. 
(Matth. xiii. 55. ovx tstos s-w 0 in rixlovos viofj) Some fay 
a carpenter; others a lockimith; others a mafon. Juftin 
the Martyr fays (Diolog. cumTryphon. p. 306.) he made 
yokes and ploughs. The apocryphal book Of the In¬ 
fancy of Jefus, which is of great antiquity, relates a mi¬ 
racle wrought by our "Saviour in his father’s (hop, who was 
a carpenter. St. Ambrofe (in Lucam, lib. 3.) fays he was 
3 Y employed 
