t12papocrypha
Testament of Benjamin 2
Benjamin recounts to Joseph the deception practiced on Jacob — the blood-daubed coat — and Joseph in turn supplies what Benjamin did not witness: an Ishmaelite stripped the coat, beat Joseph, commanded him to run, then was slain by a lion before he could hide it, so that his companions, seized with fear, sold Joseph onward. The coat that covered the birthright son is stripped by violence; a lion-judgment falls on the one who attempts to conceal the evidence. The hidden providence behind the selling-away is already visible in the mechanism: no human scheme fully governs the path of the one foreordained to be raised up.
1
When therefore I went into Egypt, and Joseph my brother recognised me, he said unto me, What did they tell my father in that they sold me? And I said unto him, They dabbled thy coat with blood and sent it, and said, Look if this is the coat of thy son. And he said to me, Even so, brother; for when the Ishmaelites took me, one of them stripped off my coat, and gave me a girdle, and scourged me, and bade me run. And as he went away to hide my garment, a lion met him, and slew him; and so his fellows were afraid, and sold me to their companions.
