Genesis 39, 40

The Only Likable Character Gets Royally Fucked

Joseph proves quite capable as a slave and is promoted to head of household after beating the other contestants at a grueling game of Jarts. The pharaoh recognizes that the Lord is with Joseph--but not with him enough to help him avoid slavery, which is just the right amount of "with him" for pharaoh's tastes--and puts Joseph in charge of everything. Joseph takes his responsibilities seriously and works like a...well, like a slave...and as a result, the land prospers, everyone is happy, and, best of all, the pharaoh is pleased. And with the Pyramid Construction Authority's mandatory work program in full swing, unemployment is at an all-time low, and deaths caused by being crushed under 3 ton blocks of sandstone are at an all-time high.

But the pharaoh's wife isn't so pleased. In bed. If you know what I mean. She has never been with a cut guy before, so she corners Joseph one day and proposes a little hanky panky. Joseph, demonstrating why he is the only honorable and trustworthy person to show up the Bible so far, refuses.

"There is none greater in this house than I," Joseph says, arguing why he won't sleep with his boss's wife by citing the reason most men would give for doing so. "Neither hath [the pharaoh] kept back any thing from me but thee, because thou art his wife: how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" Joseph escapes with his honor intact, a state of being that, I'm sure you know, will not go unpunished.

Rebuffed but not deterred, pharaoh's wife later catches Joseph by his cloak and pulls him near. Joseph struggles against her, and she tears a piece of his clothing off. He runs away, but the pharaoh's wife begins to scream. She tells the housemen who arrive that Joseph tried to attack her and she tore off a piece of his clothing as they fought. When the men tell the pharaoh he is righteously pissed. Here he had trusted Joseph with everything in his house except his wife and what did he do? Acted like that no good bum Abraham, that's what. Pharaoh throws Joseph in prison.

In the clink, Joseph finds favor with the head guard, who recognizes that the lord is with him--but not with him enough to avoid being unjustly accused of a sex crime and thrown in jail. That and Joseph offers to toss the guard's salad every day in exchange for cigarettes.

Pleased with the barter, the jailer puts his new bitch in charge of all the prisoners, freeing himself up to play Minesweeper all day. Under Joseph's rule, the prison prospers. How exactly a prison prospers isn't discussed. I would assume that a prosperous prison would be a bad thing, since it would mean more prisoners within its walls. By that definition, things are going great, because soon enough the chief of the bakers and the chief of the butlers find themselves the under Joseph's command.

Interpreter of Calamities

Because Egyptian prisons are hotter than Abraham's wife Sarah in a Catholic school girl outfit sucking on a Blow Pop, the chiefs start having crazy fever dreams. Joseph, being a kind and thoughtful person utterly undeserving of even being in the Bible let alone in prison, notices that his charges are upset and asks them if he can help. They spill the crazy beans.

The chief butler says he dreamed of a vine with 3 branches clustered with ripe grapes. In the dream, he presses the grapes into the pharaoh's cup and delivers it to his former boss's hand.

"And?" Joseph asks.

"And what?" The chief butler asks.

"Nothing," Joseph says, and whips out his Magic 8 Ball to interpret the dream. The 3 branches, Joseph says, are 3 days, and 3 days from now the pharaoh will free the chief of the butlers from prison and restore him to his position as grape presser and cup hander overer. The butler chief is overjoyed--who wouldn't be?--and agrees to Joseph's demand that he talk up Joseph to the pharaoh. "For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews," Joseph says. "And here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon."

"Suuuuure," the chief says. "I'm innocent, too."

Also overjoyed is the chief of the bakers, who had a similar dream. In his dream, he had 3 white baskets stacked on his head. In the uppermost basket were bake meats for the pharaoh, but a flock of birds attacked him and ate everything. Smiling, the bakers asks, "So? Am I getting my job back, too?"

Joseph smiles thinly. "Well, the good news is that, like the butler, you will also be released in 3 days," Joseph says. "The bad news is that the pharaoh will hang you and birds will peck at your corpse." The baker is, of course, devastated.

"I hate to ask you this," Joseph asks the stunned baker, "but don't mention my name to the pharaoh, okay? You're kind of damaged goods."

Three days later, the predictions come to pass: the butler is again butlering and the baker is baking in the sun with birds pecking at his eyeballs.

But the butler, once again enjoying the high life, forgets his promise to Joseph. Really, what does he owe to Joseph? Predictions only describe what's going to happen, they don't make it happen.

Or do they?