The purpose here is to show how Joseph son of Jacob was such an excellent type or shadow, symbolic of Jesus the Christ. The fidelity with which he foreshadowed Jesus is astonishing. However, he is never cited in the New Testament as a type of the Christ.
Joseph reported on the bad conduct of his brothers
Joseph as a mere boy of seventeen was pasturing the sheep with his brothers, and he brought back to his father a bad report of the conduct of his brothers, Gen 37:2. Also Jesus reported on the bad conduct of his brothers to His Father.
“He came to his own, and those who
were his own didn’t receive him.”
Jn 1:11 WEB
In chapter after chapter Jesus testified against all the bad conduct of the Jews, but only some of the poor would repent. The leaders tried to prevent the repentance and change of anyone!
Joseph was loved above all of his brothers
“Now
Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was the
son of his old age, …”
Gen 37:3 WEB
We all know the story of the colored robe which his father made him. Similarly, Jesus was a special son of His Father, and who especially loved by Him. “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”Mtt 3:17 WEB
And God emphasized the same thing before the apostles in Mtt 17:5. And of the Son He says,
“You
have loved righteousness, and hated iniquity;
Therefore God,
your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your
fellows.”
Heb 1:9 WEB
Josephs brothers were jealous of him.
“And
the patriarchs, moved with envy, sold Joseph into Egypt: but God was
with him,”
Acts 7:9 KJV
So it was also with Jesus. Pilate “knew that because of envy they had delivered him up.” Mtt 27:18 WEB
Joseph brothers hated him.
“Joseph
dreamed a dream, and he told it to his brothers, and they hated
him all the more.”
Gen 37:5 WEB
And the Jews hated Jesus.
“The
world can’t hate you, but it hates me, because I testify
about it, that its works are evil.”
Jn 7:7
“If
I hadn’t done among them the works which no one else did, they
wouldn’t have had sin. But now have they seen and also hated
both me and my Father.”
Jn 15:24
Joseph was committed to the pit
His own brothers were going to kill Joseph. “Come now therefore, and let’s kill him, …” Gen 37:20 WEB. They did cast him into a pit, to let him suffer there.
Jesus in fact was murdered, and was put to suffer in what Rev 9:1 WEB calls “the pit of the abyss.” The KJV translates the Greek word abussos as bottomless in Rev 9:1, and as “deep” in Rom 10:7. This is the pit where Jesus went for you and me.
“Or,
Who shall descend into the abyss? (that is to bring up Christ again
from the dead.”
Rom 10:7 nf
KJV is the King James Version, 1611
WEB
is the World English Bible, a copyright free revision
of the
original ASV American Standard Version 1901
nf is my own translation based on the WEB