Posts by Julia Blum

Recalculating Today I am starting something that I’ve wanted to do for a long time. For a very long time, I have wanted to go through the Book of Acts together with my readers. Too often, this particular book is perceived as a demarcation line, as a declaration of separation from anything Jewish. Something has […]

Those who have been following this blog for some time would know already that I am very attentive and sensitive to all the “coincidences”, especially when it comes to timing. That’s why the fact that this post – the final post of the Joseph series – is published just a few days before Tisha B’Av, […]

The cup in the sack Last time, we watched as Joseph was overcome with tears of love for his brother Benjamin in the inner room. Of course, the brothers knew nothing about it. Next day, “as soon as the morning dawned, the men were sent away, they and their donkeys“.[1] I guess their hearts were […]

His Heart Yearned For His Brother Last time, we saw that together with Benjamin the brothers had returned to Egypt. They were apprehensive of being accused of stealing the silver they had found in their sacks; they didn’t know whether they would find Simeon alive and whether he would be returned to them; and most […]

They “trembled to one another” Last time, we were watching the brothers during their first meeting with Joseph. We saw that right away they felt the connection between this meeting and the crime that they had been hiding all these years. Somehow, they knew it was all about their long-ago sold brother, however, they still […]

The Long-Awaited Meeting    We continue our journey through this gripping and passionate Bible story: the story of Joseph and his brothers. The day has finally come, the long-awaited moment has arrived when Joseph’s brothers come to Egypt and stand before him – the ten brothers who had nearly murdered him but took enough pity […]

Two Years of Days The next section of Joseph’s saga begins at the end of two full years – when Pharaoh dreamed. However, there is a slight difference when read in Hebrew: Miketz Shnataim Yamim (מִקֵּץ שְׁנָתַיִם יָמִים ) – at the end of “two years of days”. The word yamim, days, doesn’t occur in […]

His Master Saw…  We are back to Joseph’s saga. “The Lord was with Joseph” – these words are the key to the developing drama that now takes up the thread dropped for a while because of the Judah and Tamar interlude. God’s presence is constantly in the background, both when Joseph is in trouble and […]

The Opening of the Eyes We are still in Genesis 38, in this strange and unexpected interruption to the narrative, in the story of Judah and Tamar. We are entering the most interesting part of the story, the “action” of the story, which according to the text happens “a long time afterward”—a long time after […]

The Burden of Leadership We would be back to the story of Joseph now if the Torah itself had not interrupted it! But in Genesis 38, right after the sale of Joseph by his brothers in Genesis 37, we read the unexpected story of Judah and Tamar. This story, in fact, breaks the flow of […]