Genesis 41:45 And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnathpaaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Potipherah priest of On… Besides other marks of honour, Joseph received a new name from the king — analogous to those which Daniel and his friends received, in a later age, from Nebuchadnezzar, and having some special appropriateness to the work which be was to perform. Different explanations have been given of its meaning. Some, like those who drew up the marginal readings of our Bible, understand by it "a revealer of secrets," but others, viewing the term as really an Egyptian word in Hebrew letters, have put it back again into its Egyptian form, getting, according to Brugsch, the meaning, "the governor of the abode of him who lives"; or, according to Canon Cooke, whose dissertation in the "Speaker's Commentary" on the Egyptian words in the Pentateuch is of very great value, "the food of life," or "the food of the living." I am, of course, incompetent to judge between these scholars, but I wish you to note, as a mark of the age of this history, that we have here imbedded in the Hebrew text Egyptian words in Hebrew letters, to which, in this ]ate day, our Egyptologists, who have learned the language from the inscriptions on the monuments, are able to give very definite and intelligible translations — a fact which scarcely comports with the notion now so popular with some, that this book is only a production of a very late date, composed, perhaps, eight hundred years after the events. But similar conformation of the age of this record may be found in the description of Joseph's investiture with office as compared with the representation of such ceremonies found upon the monuments. (W. M. Taylor, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnathpaaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Potipherah priest of On. And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. |
    |