Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs
Anonymous
Book Testament of Joseph · Chapter 11
About this work
A collection of farewell discourses attributed to the twelve sons of Jacob, combining ethical exhortation, autobiographical retelling, and eschatological material. The transmitted text preserves Jewish traditions alongside Christian material or interpolation, and its compositional history remains debated.
- Author
- Anonymous
- Date
- Second Temple Jewish material; transmitted form includes later Christian elements.
- Origin
- Unknown
- Genre
- Testamentary Literature / Pseudepigrapha
- Textual language
- Greek textual tradition; earlier sources and layers are debated.
- Translator
- R. H. Charles
- Translation / Edition
- R. H. Charles translation, first published 1908.
Do ye also, my children, have the fear of God in all your works before your eyes, and honour your brethren. For every one who doeth the law of the Lord shall be loved by Him.
And when I came to the Indocolpitae with the Ishmaelites, they asked me, saying: Art thou a slave? And I said that I was a home-born slave, that I might not put my brethren to shame.
And the eldest of them said unto me: Thou art not a slave, for even thy appearance doth make it manifest. But I said that I was their slave.
Now when we came into Egypt they strove concerning me, which of them should buy me and take me.
Therefore it seemed good to all that I should remain in Egypt with the merchant of their trade, until they should return bringing merchandise.
And the Lord gave me favour in the eyes of the merchant, and he entrusted unto me his house.