Genesis 40:8
They answered: We have dreamed a dream, and there is nobody to interpret it to us. And Joseph said to them: Doth not interpretation belong to God? Tell me what you have dreamed.
The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Qui responderunt : Somnium vidimus, et non est qui interpretetur nobis. Dixitque ad eos Joseph : Numquid non Dei est interpretatio ? referte mihi quid videritis.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- οἱ δὲ εἶπαν αὐτῷ Ἐνύπνιον ἴδομεν, καὶ ὁ συγκρίνων αὐτὸ οὐκ ἔστιν. εἶπεν δὲ αὐτοῖς Ἰωσήφ Οὐχὶ διὰ τοῦ θεοῦ ἡ διασάφησις αὐτῶν ἐστίν; διηγήσασθε οὖν μοι.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיֹּאמְר֣וּ אֵלָ֔יו חֲל֣וֹם חָלַ֔מְנוּ וּפֹתֵ֖ר אֵ֣ין אֹת֑וֹ וַיֹּ֨אמֶר אֲלֵהֶ֜ם יוֹסֵ֗ף הֲל֤וֹא לֵֽאלֹהִים֙ פִּתְרֹנִ֔ים סַפְּרוּ נָ֖א לִֽי
Haydock's commentary
Doth not interpretation belong to God? When dreams are from God, as these were, the interpretation of them is a gift of God. But the generality of dreams are not of this sort; but either proceed from the natural complexions and dispositions of persons, or the roving of their imaginations in the day on such objects as they are much affected with, or from their mind being disturbed with cares and troubles, and oppressed with bodily infirmities: or they are suggested by evil spirits, to flatter, or to terrify weak minds; in order to gain belief, and so draw them into error or superstition; or at least to trouble them in their sleep, whom they cannot move while they are awake: so that the general rule, with regard to dreams, is not to observe them, nor to give any credit to them. (Challoner)
Physicians indeed, sometimes form some judgment of the nature of a distemper from dreams; on which subject, Hippocrates and Galen have written. But to pretend to discover by them the future actions of free agents, would be superstitious, Deuteronomy xviii. 10. (Tirinus)
Justin (xxxvi. 2,) says, "Joseph was the first interpreter of dreams, and often gave proofs of his knowledge," &c.
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Irenaeus Against Heresies: Book II, Chapter XXVIII. Perfect knowledge
7. But we shall not be wrong if we affirm the same thing also concerning the substance of matter, that God produced it. For we have learned from the Scriptures that God holds the supremacy over all things. But whence or in what way He produced it, neither has Scripture anywhere declared; nor does it become us to conjecture, so as, in accordance with our own opinions, to form endless conjectures concerning God, but we should leave such knowledge in the hands of God Himself. …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom, Matthew XVIII. 7
And if He saith “by whom,”marvel not. For not as though another were bringing in it by him, doth He say this, but viewing him as himself causing the whole. For the Scripture is wont to say, “by whom,” for “of whom;”as when it saith, “I have gotten a man by God,”putting not the second cause, but the first; and again, “Is not the interpretation of them by God,”and, “God is faithful, by whom ye are called unto the fellowship of His Son.”
St Basil De Spiritu Sancto, That v: not found “of whom” in the case of the Son and of the Spirit
12. And it is not only in the case of the theology that the use of the terms varies, but whenever one of the terms takes the meaning of the other we find them frequently transferred from the one subject to the other. As, for instance, Adam says, “I have gotten a man through God,” meaning to say the same as from God; and in another passage “Moses commanded…Israel through the word of the Lord,” and, again, “Is not the interpretation through God?” Joseph, discoursing about dreams to the prisoners, instead of saying “ from God” says plainly “ through God.” Inversely Paul uses the term “ from whom” instead of “ through whom,” when he says “made from a woman” (A.V., “of” instead of “ through a woman”). …