Unrequited Lust: Potiphar’s Wife and Joseph—Examining Jewish and Christian Views

Abstract

precis: This essay discusses how the Potiphar’s wife/Joseph interactions described in Genesis 39 are dealt with by sources both within Jewish tradition and from a Christian viewpoint. The Jewish sources begin with examples from the Late Second Temple period and beyond, followed by illustrations from midrashim from the ancient world and commentaries through the present. The events in Genesis 39 are then explored by way of Christian sources from the Patristics (church Fathers) through examples from the sixteenth to the twenty-first centuries.