Genesis 44:5

[Is] not this [it], in which my lord drinketh,.... Which was for his own particular use, and so the more ungrateful in them to take it, and whereby indeed he divineth?

Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and whereby indeed he divineth? ye have done evil in so doing. Is not this it - not only kept for the governor's personal use, but whereby he divineth.

Amongst the several kinds of divination in use among the Egyptians and other heathens, this was one, to do it by a cup or bason, which they filled with water, and put in them plates of silver, or precious stones, in which certain characters were engraven, by which, and some words they used, they called upon the devil, who gave them answer. Joseph did not use this course, nor was a diviner, but the people thought him such a one, and the steward might represent him as such, for the better covering or carrying on his design. But this sense agrees not with , Wot you not, & c. Which words show that he speaks of something which they all might easily know; but they did not know that Joseph was a diviner, much less that he divined by that cup, whereas that kind of divination was generally performed by a glass, not by a cup. Others observe, that the Hebrew word ofttimes signifies not to divine, but only to observe and discover a thing, as , and render the place thus, whereby he will certainly observe or discover, to wit, what you are and do. But this also seems not to consist with , and the supplement is too large and remote. The true sense then is this, the Hebrew bo is not to be rendered by which, but concerning which, as the particle beth is oft used, and it notes not the instrument whereby, but the object about which, he did divine, and the words must be rendered, concerning which he can or would certainly divine. And this agrees well with : q.d. Did you think you could deceive my master? Did not you and all others know that he could divine, and discover secret things, whence he had both his name and preferment? And this cup being much prized and used by him, you might easily judge that he would use his art to recover it. Ye have done evil, i.e. very evil, unjustly, unthankfully, and foolishly.

Genesis 44:5 [Is] not this [it] in which my lord drinketh, and whereby indeed he divineth? ye have done evil in so doing.Ver. 5. And whereby indeed he divineth.] Junius reads it thus - Et nonne ipse experimento certo didicerit per illum, quales sitls? q.d., Hath he not by this fact of yours, found out your fraud and false dealing; whereby ye have hitherto sought to delude him? Is it not plain ye are spies and naughty-packs? The Jerusalem Targum seemeth to tax Joseph here for a soothsayer; or, at least, a seeker to such; which God forbade. Calvin also thinks he did grievously offend in pretending to be such a one; and did impiously profane the gift of the Spirit in professing himself a magician. But, pace tanti viri, this is too heavy a censure, and a forcing of the text, saith Junius. All that Joseph did was to sift his brethren, and to try their affection to Benjamin. And if he took upon him to be a diviner, he did it not seriously; but made use of that conceit the vulgar had of him: like as St Paul made use of that superstitious custom among the Corinthians, of baptizing over the dead, to prove the resurrection. 1 Corinthians 15:29. Scalig. Not.

Verse 5. Whereby - he divineth?] Divination by cups has been from time immemorial prevalent among the Asiatics; and for want of knowing this, commentators have spent a profusion of learned labour upon these words, in order to reduce them to that kind of meaning which would at once be consistent with the scope and design of the history, and save Joseph from the impeachment of sorcery and divination. I take the word נחש nachash here in its general acceptation of to view attentively, to inquire. Now there has been in the east a tradition, the commencement of which is lost in immemorial time, that there was a CUP, which had passed successively into the hands of different potentates, which possessed the strange property of representing in it the whole world, and all the things which were then doing in it. The cup is called [Persian] jami Jemsheed, the cup of Jemsheed, a very ancient king of Persia, whom late historians and poets have confounded with Bacchus, Solomon, Alexander the Great, c. This CUP, filled with the elixir of immortality, they say was discovered when digging to lay the foundations of Persepolis. The Persian poets are full of allusions to this cup, which, from its property of representing the whole world and its transactions, is styled by them [Persian] jam jehan nima, "the cup showing the universe" and to the intelligence received by means of it they attribute the great prosperity of their ancient monarchs, as by it they understood all events, past, present, and to come. Many of the Mohammedan princes and governors affect still to have information of futurity by means of a cup. When Mr. Norden was at Derri in the farthest part of Egypt, in a very dangerous situation, an ill-natured and powerful Arab, in a threatening way, told one of their people whom they sent to him that "he knew what sort of people they were, for he had consulted his cup, and found by it that they were those of whom one of their prophets had said, that Franks (Europeans) would come in disguise; and, passing everywhere, examine the state of the country; and afterwards bring over a great number of other Franks, conquer the country, and exterminate all." By this we see that the tradition of the divining cup still exists, and in the very same country too in which Joseph formerly ruled. Now though it is not at all likely that Joseph practised any kind of divination, yet probably, according to the superstition of those times, (for I suppose the tradition to be even older than the time of Joseph), supernatural influence might be attributed to his cup; and as the whole transaction related here was merely intended to deceive his brethren for a short time, he might as well affect divination by his cup, as he affected to believe they had stolen it. The steward therefore uses the word נחש nachash in its proper meaning: Is not this it out of which my lord drinketh, and in which he inspecteth accurately?

5. whereby he indeed divineth] “Divineth,” Heb. naḥ ?ash: see Genesis 30:27; Deuteronomy 18:10, “useth divination”; 1 Kings 20:33 marg. The word shews that the silver cup was a sacred one, by means of which Joseph sought and obtained oracles. Some have inferred that he must have been admitted into the priests’ guild, in order to be able to practise divination. It appears that water having been poured into a vessel or cup, gold or silver or precious stones were thrown into it, and the oracle or divination was derived from the rings, ripples, or sparkles, which appeared. The name given to this class of magic was “hydromancy,” ὑδρομαντεία, or κυλικομαντεία (Jamblichus, De Myst. iii. 14; Varro in August., De Civ. Dei, vii. 35). LXX renders αὐτὸςδὲοἰωνισμῷοἰωνίζεταιἐναὐτῷ. Driver quotes from the Travels of Norden (circ. 1750 a.d.) a passage in which a Nubian Sheikh says: “I have consulted my cup, and I find that you are Franks in disguise, who have come to spy out the land.”