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4th), one of the ancient capitals of Mi•tzᵊraꞋyim; ca. B.C.E. 1763
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 Ankh-Tawi (modern Memphis ), one of the ancient capitals of Mi•tzᵊraꞋyim |
Not long after Yo•seiphꞋ had been elevated to head trustee over his fellow inmates in jail, both the Minister of Palace Beverages and the Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs of the king of Mi•tzᵊraꞋyim were suspected of having misstepped in their duties. (In addition to acquisitions, preparations and serving their respective products, they were each required to personally sample all of the beverages and baked foods, for taste and poison, before serving them to their a•donꞋ.) So Par•ohꞋ Sa-hotep-ka-Ra En-yoteph 4th was foaming-furious with both of these palace eunuchs and ordered the Minister of Bâ•sârꞋ-Chefs to throw them into the pod of the palace jail designated for fired slaves for the customary three days, awaiting a verdict and sentencing. So the new jail inmates wound up under the authority of the inmate-trustee, Yo•seiphꞋ, the Hebrew.
Par•ohꞋ's Minister of PalaceBâ•sârꞋ-Chefs charged Yo•seiphꞋ with responsibility for the two imprisoned ministers. So Yo•seiphꞋ tended to them and they were in the pod together for a number of days. One night, each of the two fired ministers dreamed about the service they had rendered to the Par•ohꞋ and their impending fate.
The following morning, when Yo•seiphꞋ visited their cells, he saw that they were both enraged. Being responsible for them, he asked, "Why are your faces so wrong today?"
"We each dreamed a different dream and none of the other prisoners can figure out what either dream means," replied one of the jailed ministers.
"Doesn't ël•oh•imꞋ have all solutions?" Yo•seiphꞋ challenged. "Relate them to me, if you wish."
So the ex-Minister of Palace Beverages related his dream to Yo•seiphꞋ.
"In my dream, look, there was a grape vine in front of me, and the grapevine had 3 branches that were each budding. Each blossomed and produced clusters of ripe grapes. I had Par•ohꞋ's cup in my hand and I pressed the grapes into Par•ohꞋ's cup and gave it to Par•ohꞋ."
Then Yo•seiphꞋ said to him, "Here is the interpretation: the 3 branches symbolize 3 days. Within 3 days, Par•ohꞋ shall raise your bowed head and restore you to your position as Minister of Palace Beverages. You shall again hand Par•ohꞋ's cup to him as you did before – for if you remember me when things are going well for you again and do a khësꞋëd for me: remind Par•ohꞋ of what I've done for you and get me out of this jail. For I was kidnapped out of ërꞋëtz hâ-I•vᵊr•imꞋ; and I've done nothing criminal here in Ankh-Tawi that they should put me in jail."
When the other minister, the ex-Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs, saw that the interpretation was favorable, he related his dream to Yo•seiphꞋ for his interpretation:
"In my dream, I saw that I was carrying 3 baskets of loaves of fine flour stacked on my head. In the top basket were all kinds of baked goods for Par•ohꞋ. But "the bird" ate them out of the basket on my head."
Then Yo•seiphꞋ responded, "This is the interpretation of your dream: the 3 baskets symbolize 3 days. In another 3 days, Par•ohꞋ shall raise your bowed head from off your shoulders and hang you on a wooden stake; and "the bird" shall eat the flesh from off your corpse."
On the 3rd day, which was Par•ohꞋ Sa-hotep-ka-Ra En-yoteph 4th's birthday, he put on a sit-down banquet for all of his employees; and he raised, among his employees, the bowed head of his Minister of Palace Beverages and the bowed head of his Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs. And he returned the Minister of Palace Beverages to his beverages, who gave the cup into Par•ohꞋ's hand. But he hanged the Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs on a wooden stake, as Yo•seiphꞋ had interpreted the dream to them.
But the Minister of Palace Beverages didn't remember Yo•seiphꞋ. He forgot about him.
Optional parental preparation:
Dreams are the subconscious' (spirit's?), often enigmatically logical, process during sleep or deep tᵊphil•âhꞋ, of figuring out some of life's unknowns, which perplex conscious deliberation. In this process, related factors that have eluded the conscious deliberation are factored into consideration; many of which are factors that "mentalists" and phony fortune-tellers have learned to routinely observe and note, often contributing to seemingly eery insights. It's rare for a modern reader to factor in these kinds of routine knowledge into understanding this passage—and even rarer for a modern reader to dig out the routine knowledge of ancient Mi•tzᵊraꞋyim and a Par•ohꞋ to factor into understanding this passage.
 fish in a house cuneiform 70x40.jpg "Nineveh, cuneiform walled fish"){kind=small} |
| Nineveh (cuneiform) |
Perhaps it was customary (the law) to render a verdict 3 days after arrest and incarceration. A millennium later, Yon•âhꞋ ha-Nâ•viꞋ seems to have been incarcerated for 3 days and 3 nights in the dungeon-pits of Nineveh – "the Big Fish." (In the same metophoric tradition of today's "Big Apple" – NYC, Nineveh, apparently, was the "Big Fish" of the ancient Middle East.)
More than 7 centuries later, we find that 3 days and 3 nights are the customary duration for a person to be judged and, if sufficiently meritorious, resurrected (in the ancient frame of knowledge) after burial. We moderns understand this as someone comatose (not dead according to modern scientific measurements) reviving after having been buried. Though rare, this apparently happened often enough that the custom of checking the tomb after 3 days and 3 nights to be sure no one alive was imprisoned within had long ago become an ironclad practice.
Certainly, everyone around the palace, and probably most of the public in Mi•tzᵊraꞋyim, knew that Par•ohꞋ Sa-hotep-ka-Ra En-yoteph 4th's birthday was in 3 days. In any case, being life-or-death events for these two ministers, either the standard law or Par•ohꞋ's birthday, or both, would cause the number 3 in a dream, in that situation, to trigger the association in the mind of someone who had become attuned to be aware of such logical symbolisms by the subconscious. Thus, interpreting the 3, in each dream, to represent 3 days was, in the time and situation of those dreams, obvious.
Once Yo•seiphꞋ understood that they had both dreamed about their fate in 3 days, which hinged on their service to Par•ohꞋ, then it was obvious that producing grapes in the first instance was a positive symbol indicating the clear conscience of the Minister of Palace Beverages concerning his service to Par•ohꞋ. By contrast, the baked goods being pilfered and lost in the dream by the Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs was an obvious negative symbol, indicating the minister's concern about his apparent alibi that "lost" baked goods belonging to Par•ohꞋ had been pilfered by "the bird" (likely blame-shifting to one of the Mi•tzᵊraꞋyim bird-gods – HōrꞋus, IꞋsis or Tut. Easy conclusion: the Minister of Palace Beverages, with the clear conscience, would be cleared in 3 days while the Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs, with the guilty conscience, would be found guilty in 3 days and receive the standard punishment for the crime dictated by law: put to the stake.
Thus, it appears from all of the evidence that some of Par•ohꞋ's food had been discovered being sold on the black market; the money being pocketed by one of Par•ohꞋ's Ministers – embezzlement from Par•ohꞋ. How could Par•ohꞋ trust his life to a crook, to taste his food and protect his life from poisoning? Consequently, his Minister of Palace Beverages and Minister of the Palace Bakery-Chefs had come under suspicion, been indicted and remanded into the custody of the dungeon awaiting trial and sentencing—3 days later. This was all information known to much of the public (there being no mass media back then). 
Questions you might anticipate that your child might raise and be prepared to discuss:
What is a government minister?
What does beverage mean? (Note: in ancient times, this was principally beer–even for breakfast since water often made one ill and milk was hard to obtain for many–or wine.)
What does indict mean?
What is pressing grapes?
What does pilfer mean?
What is a metaphor? A symbol?
What is embezzlement?
What is comatose?
What is the black market?
What does incarcerate mean?
What is mass media?
What is a trial?
What is a dungeon?
What does remand mean?
What does put to the stake mean? (It was usually a stake with no crosspiece.)
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