Joseph in Love

This chapter treats the romance that we know of as Joseph and Aseneth, the earliest parts of which may be Hellenistic. It is an extraordinary sequel to the Potiphar’s wife story, in which Joseph marries a native Egyptian woman, who then converts to Judaism. The romance emerges as a complex meditation on the challenges of intermarriage, in the context of biblical prohibition (and, implicitly, the Egyptian practice of sibling marriage), but also as a text that itself sits between cultures, blending Jewish, Greek and Egyptian elements.