Genesis 40:14-15

"But have me in thy remembrance when it shall be well with thee, and show kindness, I pray thee, unto me, and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring me out of this house: for indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews: and here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon."

Joseph accurately discerned that this prospective contact with Pharaoh was providentially designed to trigger his release; and, the butler's tardy remembrance of Joseph indeed led to that very thing, but the providence of God would again intervene before it actually occurred. Otherwise, Joseph might have concluded that his release was due in a critical measure to his own actions. However, as it actually occurred, the hand of God Himself was unmistakably apparent in it. We cannot find fault with Joseph for making such a request of the butler.

"I was stolen away ..." What a nit-picking picayune criticism is it that makes this "contradict" the fact of Joseph's actually being "sold by his brothers? ... If a great injustice was done to me by selling me into slavery (and that at the paltry sum of twenty pieces of silver!) I am fully justified in referring to that as stealing me, for that is what it amounts to; and anyone should be able to see that."[13]

"Out of the land of the Hebrews ..." This cannot be viewed as an anachronism. Although it is true that Canaan, or Palestine, did not actually become the "land of the Hebrews," until centuries later, the promise to Abraham was already at this time centuries old, and the area was continuously claimed by the Hebrews dating from the times of Abraham. There is also the simple truth that Joseph himself was a Hebrew (Genesis 39:14), and that it was out of his homeland that he had been, in effect, stolen; and, therefore, no fault whatever can be alleged against this statement. In fact, there is marvelous thoughtfulness and restraint in Joseph's words here, in that he concealed the dastardly crimes of his brothers against his person. Peake remarked: "Observe the unsuitable designation of Palestine here as the land of the Hebrews."[14] Such criticisms are apparently blind to the fact that Joseph did not mention "Palestine" or "Canaan" either, but merely his homeland, from which indeed he had been removed, and he spoke in exactly the same terminology that any Hebrew would have used of his homeland. Additionally, as Leupold stated, "Hebrews were all the inhabitants of Palestine, of whatever race."[15]

The further critical allegation, based on those fantastic "sources," and placing Joseph, not as a prisoner, but as a slave, in Potiphar's house, are frustrated by Joseph's using in the same breath, "this house," and the "dungeon" interchangeably (Genesis 40:15). Thus, Joseph was both slave and a prisoner of Potiphar.