What Game is Joseph Playing?

What Game Is Joseph Playing?
Genesis 42:1-35

I arrived home late one evening, picked up the mail, and checked messages. When I was in charge of a seminary, I used to avoid reading messages just before bedtime in case it gave me things to worry about that kept me from sleeping, but I don’t usually need that rule now. On this occasion, however, a publisher had sent a clutch of reviews of something I had written, including a strangely negative one from another Old Testament professor. Usually negative reviews don’t bother me much. I can often see that the person simply has a different perspective from mine (or is young and keen to make a mark). This review didn’t convince me that I should have written a different book, but it did feel hurtful because the basis for the negativity seemed odd and I would have counted the reviewer a friend. Why was he being so harsh? Was he keen not to be influenced by our acquaintance? Had he had a bad day? What was going on in his life? What was his motivation for writing like that (other scholars have reviewed the book favorably)? Have I offended him in some way? Or was it simply that on this subject he had a different perspective from mine? Was it my problem? Am I too easily hurt? (Answer: yes. It’s a little like student evaluations. As one of my colleagues put it, if we read forty-nine positive evaluations and one negative evaluation, it is the negative one that sticks.) Maybe I should have called him, but I didn’t. So his words remain a mystery to me...