Genesis 40 Series, Part 12, Verses 8-13
Hello, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis. Tonight is study #12 in Genesis 40, and we will read Genesis 40:8-13:
And they said unto him, We have dreamed a dream, and there is no interpreter of it. And Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God? tell me them, I pray you. And the chief butler told his dream to Joseph, and said to him, In my dream, behold, a vine was before me; And in the vine were three branches: and it was as though it budded, and her blossoms shot forth; and the clusters thereof brought forth ripe grapes: And Pharaoh's cup was in my hand: and I took the grapes, and pressed them into Pharaoh's cup, and I gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand. And Joseph said unto him, This is the interpretation of it: The three branches are three days: Yet within three days shall Pharaoh lift up thine head, and restore thee unto thy place: and thou shalt deliver Pharaoh's cup into his hand, after the former manner when thou wast his butler.
In our last study we continued to look at the word “dream” in the Old Testament. It appeared three times in the book of Jeremiah, in chapters 23, 27, and 29. We saw that God spoke of dreams in the context of prophecy. Prophets prophesied from dreams. The true prophets would prophesy of a dream just as God gave them the dream. And false prophets prophesied from dreams out of their own imagination, and not from God. It would have been very difficult to discern truth from lies but God would give His people discernment.
Now let us go to another place where we read of dreams and prophecy in Zechariah 10:2:
For the idols have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie, and have told false dreams; they comfort in vain: therefore they went their way as a flock, they were troubled, because there was no shepherd.
The account continues but we are interested in the word “dreams” here. We talked about this last time, but it is very comforting to hear, “God loves you, and He has a great plan for you!” Of course when they read the Bible, it is not very comforting to the wicked who remain in their sins to read that hell has opened her mouth and become enlarged. That is because the vast majority of people will go to “hell,” and the Bible defines “hell” as the grave. They will die and perish in their sins, and that death will end their existence. Finally on the last day when everything is burned up, they will be gone forever when they are annihilated.
Again, the diviners have seen a lie, and they have told false dreams. The diviners are divining by telling their dreams, which are false, just as the false prophets. Interestingly, we do not find the word “prophets” mentioned here. But I think this is the third time we have seen this word “diviners.” We saw it back in Jeremiah 27:9:
Therefore hearken not ye to your prophets, nor to your diviners, nor to your dreamers, nor to your enchanters, nor to your sorcerers, which speak unto you, saying, Ye shall not serve the king of Babylon:
So diviners, prophets, dreamers, enchanters, and sorcerers are all thrown together into that mix, which means they are synonymous, as they are all false. It is a different Hebrew word for “diviners,” and it is Strong’s #7080, and it is a different word than the word that will be used in referring to Joseph later in this account when his brethren come to Egypt looking for bread, and when Joseph was second in command under Pharaoh. He will try to orchestrate events to get his brethren to bring his brother Benjamin to Egypt because they had left him home with their father. He placed a cup in the pouch of one of his brothers, and then he arranged for them to be “caught” with it, and he used the language, “Wot ye not that such a man as I can certainly divine?” I think this particular word is basically the word that the nations would use for a prophet. Joseph was in Egypt, so he used a word that the Egyptians would probably use concerning someone who can “foretell,” in relationship to speaking forth the Word of God, and so forth.
This word “divine” is normally used in the context of false divining. There is one exception we will look at later, but right now let us go to 1Samuel 28 where Saul, King of Israel, had been abandoned by God, and God was not answering. It says in 1Samuel 28:6-8:
And when Saul enquired of JEHOVAH, JEHOVAH answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets. Then said Saul unto his servants, Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to her, and enquire of her. And his servants said to him, Behold, there is a woman that hath a familiar spirit at Endor. And Saul disguised himself, and put on other raiment, and he went, and two men with him, and they came to the woman by night: and he said, I pray thee, divine unto me by the familiar spirit, and bring me him up, whom I shall name unto thee.
This word is the same word used in Zechariah 10:2. So Saul went to this woman who had a reputation of “divining,” and this would have been very much against the commandment of God because she was not calling upon the Lord in order to foretell. She had a “familiar spirit,” so that is something completely depraved and wicked.
Of course many people in our modern world are very interested in the future, and they will read horoscopes, and they will go to “diviners,” such as a psychic, that supposedly can foretell the future. But only God and His Word, the Bible, are faithful and trustworthy when it comes to foretelling future events and circumstances, as we see in Genesis 40 when Joseph interpreted the dreams of the baker and the butler. But remember that Joseph said, “Do not interpretations belong to God?” It is really God’s dominion and completely under His control, and God knows the future, as the Bible declares that He knows the end from the beginning, according to Isaiah 46:10.
That ties in with what I mentioned in a previous study, but we never got back to discussing it. In Genesis 40:5 it said, “And they dreamed a dream both of them, each man his dream in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream…” What does that mean? It means that God has a predetermined “end” for his elect people, for example. We are predestinated to salvation. Everything is orchestrated according to the Lord’s working. Certain ones will hear the Gospel, and the Gospel will apply the blood, as it were, of the Lord Jesus that was shed for them at the foundation of the world. On the last day God will give His people new resurrected spiritual bodies and we will enter into the new heaven and new earth, which is all predetermined. What we are going to find is that “dreams” are equal to the Gospel in that way.
So God gave the butler and the baker dreams. That is obvious because it is written in the Bible and because God gave Joseph the ability to interpret the dreams. So God gave them the dreams, and there was a similarity in their dreams, even though they were two different individuals. So things in their dream, like the number “three,” were pointing to their individual situations, and they dreamed “according to the interpretation.” That is, the butler had a specific dream applied to him, and he will be lifted up and restored to his butlership. It was wonderful news for him, and he would once again serve the king. The baker dreamed “according to the interpretation,” but the interpretation for him was established by God – it was predestinated by God. The interpretation of his dream was very bad. It would be evil for him. In three days he would die by hanging. For one individual it was grace and deliverance, and for the other individual it was judgment and death. It is like the Gospel, the twoedged sword, as it says in 2Corinthians 2:14-16:
Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: To the one we are the savour of death unto death; and to the other the savour of life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things?
The people of God carry the Gospel. And what is the message of the Gospel? We do not know whom God will save, or not save? We do not tell people that, but the Word accomplishes that in the life of the hearers. Some reject it, and that is to be expected of those that are unregenerate and which God chose not to save. Others are drawn by the Gospel, and that is also to be expected because that is what God had determined for them.
You see, the “dream” is a picture of the Gospel that goes forth to all people. The butler and the baker are like Jacob and Esau in that they represent all the inhabitants of the earth. As the Gospel goes forth, each one “dreams,” as it were. You see, it is very personal. It is very much between God and that particular person. God gave each man that dream. God gave the Gospel, and the working of the Gospel is that twoedged sword of the Word of God, and which way it will “cut” was designed by God for that individual. So the individual dreamed a dream according to the interpretation, and the interpretation was of God according to man’s purpose. That is what the Gospel determines: “You will be lifted up, child of God who was predestinated to become saved,” or it says, “You will perish and die in your sins.”
By the way, the “three days” points to the time of judgment. Why would one be lifted up in the time of judgment? It is because that is God’s program. He sets the sheep on His right, and the goats on His left. He also uses various other pictures, like the parable of the talents where the one who does well is commended for multiplying his talents, and he was even given the talent of the one who did nothing with his one talent. That is in the Day of Judgment. It is the increasing of the elect’s understanding of the Gospel in the Day of Judgment, as the Lord has a program of revealing the revelation of His righteous judgment. We have experienced this already.
So that is something we can learn from Genesis 40:5 where it says, “each man according to the interpretation of his dream…” But getting back to the “diviner,” he is like a prophet in that there can be false prophets, and there can be false diviners. Let us go to Ezekiel 13, and I want to cover this because I do not think I have ever talked about this word “diviner,” and it actually comes up quite a bit. It says in Ezekiel 13:9:
And mine hand shall be upon the prophets that see vanity, and that divine lies: they shall not be in the assembly of my people, neither shall they be written in the writing of the house of Israel, neither shall they enter into the land of Israel; and ye shall know that I am the Lord JEHOVAH.
It is very evil to divine lies, of course. It speaks of prophets that see vanity and divine lies. Do you see how it is tied to prophecy? God says that they will not be written in the house of Isarel, meaning that their names will not be found in the Lamb’s Book of Life. They were not chosen to salvation. They are divining lies because they were never saved. Neither shall they enter into the land of Israel, and this is not referring to the physical land of Israel, but it is referring to the heavenly “Israel,” the kingdom of God.
Let us also go to Micah 3:6-7:
Therefore night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a vision; and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall not divine; and the sun shall go down over the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them. Then shall the seers be ashamed, and the diviners confounded: yea, they shall all cover their lips; for there is no answer of God.
This implies a little bit that it is just because it is the time of God’s judgment that the diviners are not able to divine, and there is no answer of God to the prophets or dreamers, we could say.
This word “diviner, ” Strong’s #7080, is also translated as “soothsayer,” concerning Joshua 13:22 where it speaks of Baalam the soothsayer, or diviner.
Another closely related word, Strong’s #7081, is found in Proverbs 16:10:
A divine sentence is in the lips of the king: his mouth transgresseth not in judgment.
You know, when reading of a “divine sentence,” we might think it has to do with the divinity of God but it is related to “divining,” or “prophesying.” A divine sentence is said to be in the lips of the king. Prophets speak. Diviners speak. Then it says that the king’s mouth transgresseth not in judgment, and this “king” would be God Himself, so it is a positive use of this word “divine.” And the same is true of prophesying, as there are true prophets that prophesy, and there could have been a true “diviner” that would divine, and that would be saying the same thing.
By the way, Strong’s #7081, is also translated as “witchcraft” one time, and it is used in 1Samuel 15:23 where it says, “Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.” When wicked men say, “Thus saith the Lord,” but the Lord has not said, then it is a sin of divining.
We are not going to get back to Genesis 40 at this point in our study, as we are running out of time. But in our next Bible study, we are going to look at dreams and how it definitely relates to the Gospel in a couple of scriptures. Then we will take that understanding back to Genesis 40 where these two men received dreams – they heard the Gospel. Also, the interpretation of the dream was provided by Joseph, a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. Just look at Luke 24:45: “Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures.”
:You see, we cannot of ourselves understand the scriptures, just like we have no understanding of dreams, especially dreams that come from God (which is not happening today). But at that time they could understand. That is a common element that we find in dreams. The baker and the butler did not understand their dreams and were troubled. Pharaoh had dreams, and he did not understand them and he was troubled. King Nebuchadnezzar had dreams and he was so troubled he was ready to kill all the wise men of Babylon because they could not interpret it. Another time he could not even remember his dream. A common element here is that people who have dreams in the Bible do not understand the dream until it is interpreted, and the interpretation belongs to God, and people like Joseph and Daniel were interpreters because they were picturing Christ who reveals the secret things of God.
Who can know the things of a man? Do you know what I am thinking? Do you know my dream, or can you interpret my dream? Of course not. And I have no clue what you are thinking, or what you are dreaming. But the Bible comes from the infinite mind of God, and who can know it? Only God Himself, or the Spirit of God.