True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.

― Timothy Keller

Scripture: Genesis 39.17-18

And she told [Potiphar] the same story, saying, “The Hebrew servant, whom you have brought among us, came in to me to laugh at me. But as soon as I lifted up my voice and cried, he left his garment beside me and fled out of the house.”

Reflection: Deepest Desire

The Park Forum

Every ancient culture had a standard for how to respond to adultery. Few of these standards were humane by any modern definition. The Babylonian Code of Hammurabi, one of the oldest legal writings in human history—and is the source for numerous cultures’ standards afterward—commands:

If a man’s wife should be seized lying with another male, they shall bind them and cast them into the water; if the wife’s master allows his wife to live, then the king shall allow his subject (i.e., the other male) to live.

This law is very similar to another in the Torah, as well as to how the Egyptian elite would have responded to Joseph’s alleged infidelity with Potiphar’s wife. From a legal perspective it is stunning he lived. From an emotional perspective it is more stunning he did not offer himself in response to a woman’s desire.

Centuries after Joseph, Ambrose of Milan would observe:

Though [Joseph] sprung from the noble family of the patriarchs, he was not ashamed of his base slavery; rather he adorned it with his ready service, and made it glorious by his virtues.

He knew how to be humble who had to go through the hands of both buyer and seller, and called them, Lord. Hear him as he humbles himself: “Because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge. He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?”

Full of humility are his words, full, too, of chastity. Of humility, for he was obedient to his Lord; of an honorable spirit, for he was grateful; full, also, of chastity, for he thought it a terrible sin to be defiled by so great a crime.

Chastity, in other words, was not Joseph’s chief virtue. Somewhere along the way Joseph had learned to see past himself—every decision he made was a derivative of his humility. Something other than personal satisfaction became Joseph’s deepest desire.

Prayer: The Morning Psalm

O Lord, my heart is not lifted up; my eyes are not raised too high; I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me. But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me. — Psalm 131:1–2

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phylis Tickle

Full prayer available online and in print.

Today’s Reading
Genesis 39 (Listen – 3:08)
Mark 9 (Listen – 6:16)

Correction: A previous version of this post attributed the leading quote on humility to C.S. Lewis.