Genesis 40:5 And they dreamed a dream both of them, each man his dream in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream… He very naturally throws in a request on behalf of himself. There is no symptom of impatience in this; but patience itself may consist with the use of all lawful means to obtain deliverance. The terms in which this request are made are modest, and exceedingly impressive. He might have asked for a place under the chief butler, or some other post of honour or profit: but he requests only to be delivered from this house. He might have reminded him how much he owed to his sympathetic and kind treatment; but he left these things to speak for themselves. In pleading the exalted station in which the chief butler was about to be reinstated, he gently intimates the obligations which people in prosperous circumstances are under, to think of the poor and afflicted; and Christians may still farther improve the principle, not to be unmindful of such cases in their approaches to the King of kings. This plea may also direct us to make use of His name and interest, who is exalted at the right hand of the speak lies in the name of God. He professed to have his knowledge from above, and faithfully delivered to the two prisoners what he had received from the Lord. 2. But there was another reason why Joseph declared plainly what he had learned from God. He wished to have it known amongst the Egyptians that interpretations belonged to the God of the Hebrews, and that he alone could show things that were to come to pass. Joseph afterwards received the name of Zaphnath-paaneah, the revealer of secrets; but it was his desire to have it known that his God was the fountain of all his knowledge, and that confidence in any other God, or in any other way of coming to the knowledge of futurity, but by revelation from Him was vanity and the work of error. (G. Lawson, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And they dreamed a dream both of them, each man his dream in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream, the butler and the baker of the king of Egypt, which were bound in the prison. |
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