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<\/a><\/p>\nSynopsis.<\/b><\/i> Ghetmir, a member of the caravan that bought Joseph from his brothers, finds Joseph crying by his mother\u2019s grave. Ghetmir strikes him, and Jacob, sitting miles away, senses that something is wrong. Ghetmir is about to strike Joseph again when a pain shoots through his hand. That night, Ghetmir asks Ishtar to heal his arm, but he tosses his idol away when Joseph<\/i> heals his arm instead. Later, another sick member of the caravan is healed after Joseph spends time with him. After the caravan arrives in Egypt, another member of the caravan tells Joseph he wants to become a believer in Joseph\u2019s God, and Joseph replies that the man already is<\/i> a believer.<\/p>\n
As the tenth episode begins, Jacob is still at home, asking God to give him back his son. Meanwhile, in Egypt, Malek, the leader of the caravan, holds an auction and sells Joseph to Potiphar for a lot of money. Potiphar takes Joseph home and introduces him to his wife, Zuleikha. Meanwhile, Malek realizes that he may have made a mistake \u2014 that he may have sold an actual prophet<\/i> as a slave. Malek goes to Potiphar\u2019s palace and says he wants to cancel the deal, and Potiphar, enraged, is about to send Malek to prison when Joseph intervenes. Malek and his friend are tossed out of Potiphar\u2019s home, and Malek tells his friend he can\u2019t leave the city as long as Joseph is in there.<\/p>\n
Muslim tradition.<\/b><\/i> The Egyptian nobleman who buys Joseph is known in the Bible as Potiphar and in the Koran (12.30) as al-Aziz, and his wife is anonymous in the Bible but is known as Zuleikha in the Muslim tradition. This series uses the biblical name for the Egyptian nobleman and the Muslim name for his wife, and so will I.<\/p>\n
The Koran (12.21) says Potiphar told his wife they might be able to adopt Joseph as a son; the Potiphar of this series tells Zuleikha that, too. Some Muslim commentators have inferred from this<\/a> that Potiphar and Zuleikha were childless and, further, that Potiphar may have been a eunuch who could not satisfy his wife\u2019s sexual needs \u2014 thus explaining why she tries to seduce the adult Joseph at a later point in the story.1<\/sup><\/p>\n The Bible says Joseph was \u201cwell-built and handsome<\/a>,\u201d and the Muslim tradition agrees that his beauty was very distracting \u2014 and not only to women, apparently. In the tenth episode, when Joseph is put on the auction block, a massive bidding war ensues, partly because the men of Egypt are drawn to his beauty. And after Joseph is taken to Potiphar\u2019s house, the servants there marvel at his beauty, too.<\/p>\n Zuleikha, on meeting Joseph, says, \u201cHaven\u2019t I seen this kid before? In my dreams, maybe.\u201d The story of Joseph and Zuleikha has attracted a great deal of literary attention<\/a> in the Muslim tradition, and at least some versions of the story \u2014 such as the 15th-century poem by the Persian poet Jami available in this PDF file<\/a> \u2014 say Zuleikha had dreams about Joseph long before she met him. The 1995 TV-movie Slave of Dreams<\/a><\/i>, starring Sherilyn Fenn as Zuleikha, also explores this premise.<\/p>\n Pious Joseph.<\/b><\/i> Joseph is something of an evangelist for monotheism; he heals people, gives all the credit to God, and gently points people away from their idolatry.<\/p>\n He is also rather full of equanimity. Malek asks if Joseph hates Ghetmir for striking him, and Joseph replies that he hasn\u2019t been taught to hate. And when Malek discovers that he and Joseph are cousins \u2014 and that this means he has sold one of his own kinsmen into slavery \u2014 Joseph says it\u2019s okay, it was his destiny to be a slave in Egypt; he even thanks<\/i> Malek for selling him into slavery and supporting his destiny.<\/p>\n Potiphar also notices that Joseph never bows to him or his wife Zuleikha.<\/p>\n The supernatural.<\/b><\/i> At least two men are healed thanks to Joseph\u2019s intervention. It is also suggested that it starts raining at one point because of Joseph. Later, Joseph is visited again by the angel who met him in the well \u2014 once when Joseph is on the auction block, and once again after Joseph has arrived at Potiphar\u2019s house.<\/p>\n God versus the gods.<\/b><\/i> The first two episodes focused on a contest of sorts between Jacob\u2019s God and the Babylonian goddess Ishtar, prior to Joseph\u2019s birth. That theme returns here as we learn that several members of the caravan are followers of Ishtar \u2014 but a few of them reject their idols and decide to follow the God of Abraham when they see the wonders performed by Joseph. One of these converts even says he will go back to his village and teach his polytheist neighbours to follow the one true God.<\/p>\n Family dynamics.<\/b><\/i> Both of these episodes include brief scenes of Jacob\u2019s family in Canaan, even though Joseph has moved away from them permanently to Egypt. <\/p>\n Jacob tells his sons there will be no more blessings or grace for their tribe because of Joseph\u2019s disappearance, and both he and Leah hold Levi particularly responsible for the fact that Joseph is no longer with them. (They do not know that Levi cannot defend himself because Joseph made him promise not to tell them what happened.)<\/p>\n Jacob tells Leah they should try asking their sons what happened to Joseph again. In a voice-over, he says he wants his sons to admit their sin so that God can forgive them.<\/p>\n Other tribes.<\/b><\/i> These episodes clarify that Malek, the caravan leader who buys Joseph from the brothers and sells him to Potiphar, is a great-grandson of Ishmael and is thus a relative of Joseph (who is a grandson of Ishmael\u2019s half-brother Isaac) \u2014 but Malek does not learn that Joseph is his cousin until after he has sold him to Potiphar.<\/p>\n As the caravan approaches Egypt, Malek explains to Joseph that tribes like the Hejaz and the Balal don\u2019t have clear borders, but Egypt is a land of \u201cculture.\u201d<\/p>\n Egypt.<\/b><\/i> Malek introduces Joseph to various aspects of Egyptian culture as the caravan makes its way from the border to Thebes (a 129-hour non-stop walk south of Cairo<\/a>). Joseph is amazed by the abundance of sheep and cats, and Malek says Egypt is known as the land of snakes, and that the Egyptians believe a snake-dragon<\/a> protects the country. Joseph is also told it is a crime to believe in the one God in Egypt.<\/p>\n Malek says Thebes is known as \u201cthe city of a hundred gates<\/a>\u201d even though it actually has only ten gates. He also mentions that Thebes is the city of the god Amon<\/a>, and that the Pharaoh Amonhotep lives here. This raises interesting chronological issues.<\/p>\n There were four Pharaohs named Amenhotep, all of whom reigned between 1524 BC and 1334 BC as part of the Eighteenth Dynasty<\/a>. They all had Thebes as their capital city<\/a> \u2014 except for the final Amenhotep who renamed himself Akhenaten and moved his capital to Akhetaten<\/a> when he embraced a form of monotheistic sun-worship.<\/p>\n It would be reasonable to assume that the series is taking place during this period \u2014 and we might even speculate that, in future episodes, Joseph will play a role in Akhenaten\u2019s turn towards monotheism. The problem is, a subtitle in the first episode said it took place in 1160 BC, and roughly ten years have passed since then.<\/p>\n So these episodes are taking place at least two centuries too late. Though it is<\/i> possible the subtitle on that first episode was a mistranslation. Ah well, we\u2019ll see.<\/p>\n Visuals.<\/b><\/i> One member of the caravan has a dream that has a few visual effects.<\/p>\n The angel walks through the crowd towards Joseph prior to the auction; he is unseen by the crowd, and at one point his body passes through the bodies of two men.<\/p>\n Themes.<\/b><\/i> As noted above, the beauty of Joseph is a recurring theme here, and it leads to a remarkable conversation between Joseph and the angel when Joseph sees all the Egyptian men gathered before the auction block. The angel declares that Joseph\u2019s outward beauty is symbolic of the beauty within all human beings, and that these men, who lack the wisdom and innocence to see the beauty inside themselves<\/i>, find Joseph\u2019s physical beauty irresistible because it ultimately points towards Joseph\u2019s God.<\/p>\n \u2013<\/p>\n Episodes:<\/b> 1-2<\/a> | 3-4<\/a> | 5-6<\/a> | 7-8<\/a> | 9-10<\/b> | 11-12<\/a> | 13-14<\/a> | 15-16<\/a> | 17-18<\/a> | 19-20<\/a> | 21-22<\/a> | 23-24<\/a> | 25-26<\/a> | 27-28<\/a> | 29-30<\/a> | 31-32<\/a> | 33-34<\/a> | 35-36<\/a> | 37-38<\/a> | 39-40<\/a> | 41-42<\/a> | 43-45<\/a><\/p>\n \u2013<\/p>\n The subtitled version of these episodes runs from about 35:20 to 2:02:40 in this video:<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=PMLn_MdoJf8&t=35m21s<\/p>\n And here are the English-dubbed versions of these episodes:<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3Pww817AIpE<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=OI042C21aLM<\/p>\n \u2013<\/p>\n