The final chapter in the book of Genesis details the death of the patriarch Jacob in Egypt, the period of national mourning that ensues, and his eventual burial in the ancestral tomb in Hebron. Upon their return to Egypt from the funeral, the brothers, still fearful of Joseph's retaliation despite their recent reconciliation, address him as follows:

"Your father gave instructions before his death . . . . Say thus to Joseph: please forgive the grievous crime of your brothers who treated you poorly" (50:16–17).

All well and good, save for one key detail: there is no textual evidence to confirm the brothers' assertion that Jacob had in fact left instructions for Joseph to ignore their early perfidy. Our choices as readers are stark. If the assertion is true, we are left to wonder why the Torah fails to mention it. If it is false, we must ponder both the implications of their mendacity and why Joseph, as the subsequent verses suggest, allowed himself to be manipulated.

A little literary perspective sheds a helpful light on the matter. As it happens, this is far from the only instance in which a biblical narrative appears to omit salient or even crucial bits of information. Take the episode in the portion of Vayishlah in which a much younger and very fearful Jacob has sent out messengers to ascertain his brother Esau's intentions toward him, instructing them to deliver a flowery speech of appeasement (32:4–6). When they return, they report on Esau's imminent arrival, but the text fails to inform us whether they carried out Jacob's instructions. This leads the medieval commentator Nahmanides (1194–1270) to observe: "The messengers fulfilled their mission; but Scripture makes no mention of it because doing so is superfluous."

The principle would seem to be that the Torah narrative, traditionally regarded as sparing, reserves itself for details that are not otherwise self-evident. To Saadyah Gaon (882–942), another paradigmatic illustration of this same principle is a passage in Exodus (2:20–21). There, after the young Moses rescues Jethro's daughters from the Midianite shepherds, Jethro instructs them to invite him to a meal. All the next verse says, however, is: "And Moses consented to reside with the man, who gave him his daughter Zipporah [in marriage]." To Saadyah, if Moses married one of the daughters, then it is superfluous to mention that they invited him for a meal and he accepted.

The easiest way out of our present quandary, then, would be to presume, in line with Saadyah and Nahmanides, that before his death Jacob had indeed entrusted the brothers with his instructions to Joseph, for they surely could not have expected to hoodwink Joseph in a matter of such delicacy and import. And yet, curiously, this is not the approach taken by the premier medieval exegete, Rashi (1040–1104). Instead, Rashi goes in a very different direction, rationalizing the brothers' assertion but assuming that there was, in fact, no truth to it at all: "They misrepresented the matter for the sake of peace. Jacob had left no such instructions because Joseph was never suspect in his eyes."

That such "misrepresentation" is not to be confused with crass deception is made clear by a talmudic discussion (Yevamot 65b) of an episode in the book of 1 Samuel. The prophet Samuel has been instructed by God to go to Bethlehem and crown there a son of Jesse—i.e., David—as  King Saul's successor. Fearful of the consequences, Samuel implores God: "How can I go? If Saul hears [of this], he will have me killed!" (16:2) At this juncture, we might have expected God to offer Samuel the same kind of reassurance he offered to Moses when the latter felt inadequate to the task of confronting Pharaoh, or to Gideon who voiced reservations over his ability to rescue Israel from the Midianites: something on the order of "Fear not, I shall be with you!" Instead, God simply instructs Samuel: "Take along a calf and say [if challenged], 'I have to come to make sacrifice to God.'" A prevarication, yes—but as long as Samuel actually offered the sacrifice, he would not be guilty of lying, and he would be excused on account of his motive, which was to keep the peace.

In our case, too, Rashi contends that Joseph's brothers were not intent on deceiving him. Rather, in order to preserve the fragile peace they have maintained with him since their reunion, they resort to a fabrication. Should Joseph need to justify to the Egyptians the clemency his brothers are asking him to extend them, they are offering him recourse to an ostensible act of filial piety. Since Joseph was unreservedly and demonstrably devoted to his father Jacob, no one would question his behavior if it were believed to be his dying father's testament.

And Joseph? Does he believe them? Moved to tears, he answers his brothers thus: "While you may have contemplated doing me evil, God considered it a favor, in order to bring this day to pass and give life to a great nation" (50: 19–20). Ultimately, Joseph, bent as always on his own trajectory, is able to reconcile with his brothers not necessarily because he believes that doing so is the express will of his father but because he sees their actions as part of the warp and woof of a divine plan at whose crux he has long been standing.

Moshe Sokolow is professor of Jewish education at the Azrieli Graduate School of Yeshiva University.