DREAM INTERPRETATION
Beginning with Genesis 37, dreams play an
important role in the narrative. Scripture records the content and meaning of
the dreams of Joseph, the two officers of Pharaoh in jail, and Pharaoh. Throughout
the Bible, dreams are a vehicle by which God communicates with humans, and thus
were taken seriously. This belief was held throughout the Ancient Near East.
Dream interpretation, therefore, was very important. An actual dream
interpretation manual was discovered in Egypt and now resides in the British
Museum. Dreams are divided into two categories: those which have good results
and those with bad. Here is an example of each:
‘If a man sees himself in a dream at night tying
up someone else in order to harm him, good.
It is a sign of destroying his enemy’s power of speech and conquering him.’
‘If a man sees himself in a dream turning his face
to the ground, bad.
It is a sign that something might be required of him by death.’
Apparently a person who had had a dream would
consult the priests for an interpretation. They would then confer with the
manual to find a similar dream or precedent for the inquirer. In Genesis 40,
Pharaoh’s two officials had dreams in prison. They were upset because ‘we both had
dreams’ . . . ‘but there is no one to interpret then’ (Genesis 40:8). Obviously,
in prison they did not have access to the priests and the dream interpretation
manuals, but they realized that their dreams had potentially significant
meanings. In the case of these officers, one interpretation was positive – the cupbearer
was restored to his position; the other was negative – the baker was put to
death.
In Genesis 41, Pharaoh has his dream of seven
sleek cows coming out of the Nile, followed by seven gaunt and sickly cows that
devour the healthy seven. In the morning he sent for ‘the magicians and wise
men of Egypt’ to interpret the dream. It is worth noting that the Hebrew word
translated as ‘magicians’ is ḥartummim, which derives from a conflation
of the Egyptian expression ḥry-tp h ry- ḥb, meaning ‘chief lector
priest’. A priest of this title typically read and handled liturgical and
magical texts.
An inscription has survived from the Hellenistic
period in Egypt that recalls a period of seven years of famine which took place
in the days of Pharaoh. Djoser (c. 2700 BC), builder of the first (stepped)
pyramid. While this event, if a historical memory, would have occurred nearly a
thousand years before the period of Joseph, it illustrates the unpredictability
of the Nile, the lifeline of Egypt. (James K. Hoffmeier, The Archaeology of
the Bible [Oxford: Lion Hudson, 2008], 47-48)
