A Reflection for Wednesday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Find today’s readings here.
On the third day Joseph said to his brothers: “
Do this, and you shall live; for I am a God-fearing man.
If you have been honest,
only one of your brothers need be confined in this prison,
while the rest of you may go and take home provisions for your starving families.
But you must come back to me with your youngest brother.
Your words will thus be verified, and you will not die.”
To this they agreed.
To one another, however, they said:
“Alas, we are being punished because of our brother.
We saw the anguish of his heart when he pleaded with us,
yet we paid no heed;
that is why this anguish has now come upon us.”
Reuben broke in,
“Did I not tell you not to do wrong to the boy?
But you would not listen!
Now comes the reckoning for his blood.”
The brothers did not know, of course,
that Joseph understood what they said,
since he spoke with them through an interpreter.
But turning away from them, he wept. (Gen 41:18-23)
“I know it was you, Fredo.”
Michael Corleone’s cri di coeur to his older brother in “The Godfather: Part II” is justifiably iconic in movie lore, coming as a crucial denouement in the collapse of Michael’s dreams for himself and his family. As the Cuban society Michael hoped to exploit is collapsing all around them soon after he discovers that Fredo has betrayed him to his enemies, Michael grabs his brother by the neck and kisses him hard on the mouth. “I know it was you, Fredo. You broke my heart. You broke my heart.”
The viewer at this point suspects that Fredo isn’t long for this world: Michael Corleone is nothing if not ruthless—just read the papers, read the papers. And Fredo isn’t all that sympathetic a character. He’s dim-witted, weak, jealous, dishonest, willing to betray his own family to get “something in it for me, on my own.” (I have two brothers myself; all three of us are always ready to assure the other two that one or the other is the Keane version of Fredo.) But by the movie’s conclusion, one does perhaps begin to feel sorry for Fredo. Does he really deserve the unforgiving hatred of his own kin? Can’t Michael find it in his heart to forgive him?
It’s complicated. Just look at today’s first reading from Genesis. Joseph has a legit beef with his brothers. They did, after all, sell him into slavery and tell their father he was dead. One can’t really blame him for feeling somewhat less than charitable when the same fellows show up years later looking for a handout. But they have no idea it is him they are talking to. As far as they are concerned, they are simply dealing with an Egyptian bureaucrat who has no particular interest in their past—or future.
Talking among themselves, the brothers understand the harsh but unassailable logic behind their predicament: Having ignored their own brother’s anguish, they will now see their own anguish ignored in turn. Either they bring to Joseph their father’s last son, or everybody starves. To quote a different “Godfather” film, “blood calls for blood,” and they know it. It’s a just punishment, an eye for an eye, the lex talionis of the ancient Near East in full effect.
But Joseph—the one who was wronged—turns away and weeps. The logic of blood for blood, of a cycle of recycled revenge, doesn’t hold up against his affection for his brothers. We don’t see it in today’s readings, but we see in the coming days that he forsakes his vengeance, chooses against the justice that by every right is his. Like Michael Corleone, he had his heart broken; unlike Michael, he lets close to a dozen feckless Fredos live.
“I know it was you.” Joseph could have said that to his brothers. Why doesn’t he? Because of his compassion, and his recognition that even those who deserve his vengeance are still his brothers. It’s a lesson Jesus will teach in a different way in his parables of the Prodigal Son, of the Good Samaritan. No one is simply a stranger to you; everyone is your brother.
Those are hard words to follow most of the time. But think of it this way: Would you rather end up like Michael Corleone?
