Let Us Kill Him and Cast Him Into a Pit

Joseph's brothers plan his murder casually - 'let us kill him.' They're enraged by his dreams and his favored status. They want him dead.

I work with youth offenders, and I see how quickly violence can move from fantasy to action when the conditions are right. The brothers were hot with resentment, and killing seemed like a solution. Reuben talks them down to throwing him in a pit instead, and then they sell him into slavery.

The point is how thin the line is between thought and action, between sibling rivalry and murder. The passage doesn't soften what almost happened. It also doesn't soften what did happen - slavery - as if that's acceptable because it's not murder.

For my kids, I talk about Joseph as a way to show how quickly we can go from anger to harm. How we need to interrupt that cycle.