Marc Chagall

Jacob Blessing Joseph’s Children, from The Bible, 1931, Etching, 440 x 327 mm (sheet), The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Larry Aldrich Fund, 571.1954, ©️ 2024 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris; Photo: Digital Image ©️ The Museum of Modern Art / Licensed by SCALA / Art Resource, NY

Joseph’s Perplexity

Commentary by David Brown

Cite Share

Marc Chagall was born in Belarus (then the Russian Empire) to Jewish parents but lived most of his life in France, where he painted, and designed stained glass for Christian as well as Jewish clients.

This particular work showing Jacob blessing Manasseh and Ephraim is part of a series he executed on biblical themes in the course of an extended visit to Palestine in the early 1930s. Its character is unusual in that most artists who have worked on the subject have chosen to make the relation between the two children and Jacob central. Here, by contrast, Chagall draws our attention first to Joseph’s reaction: his dismay as his father Jacob switches hands and gives the blessing of his right hand to the younger of Joseph’s two sons, Ephraim. The older Manasseh now receives the lesser blessing from his left hand.

Inevitably, Joseph’s central positioning forces viewers to reflect on whether he really has so much to regret. After all, what in effect is taking place here is the adoption of the two boys into Jacob’s own family, whose twelve sons or tribes will eventually constitute the future Israel. Indeed, so important a role did Ephraim’s descendants play in the life of what was to become the northern kingdom that the land was often named directly after him (e.g. Isaiah 7:2–17; Jeremiah 31:9–20; Ezekiel 37:16–19). While Manasseh secured no comparable status, it was within that tribe’s territory that several of the northern capitals were situated (Shechem, Tirzah, and Samaria), with even an allusion to Shechem (‘portion’ or ‘mountain-slope’) in our present text (48:22).

So, it is perhaps not altogether surprising that, in modern Judaism, a blessing is quite often given on the sabbath evening which looks beyond any potential divisions: ‘May God make you like Ephraim and Manasseh’ (a quotation from 48:20). That same positive estimate was even the focus in the very first visual representation of this scene in Jewish art, in the third-century synagogue at Dura Europos. That mural has none of Joseph’s dismay, so vividly rendered here by Chagall. It is likewise with the text: we are told the two boys will alike multiply and flourish, and Joseph live to see great-grandchildren by them both (50.23).

 

References

Sonne, Isaiah. 1947.‘The Paintings of the Dura Synagogue’, in Hebrew Union College Annual 20: 255–362, esp. 349

See full exhibition for Genesis 48

Genesis 48

Revised Standard Version

48 After this Joseph was told, “Behold, your father is ill”; so he took with him his two sons, Manasʹseh and Eʹphraim. 2And it was told to Jacob, “Your son Joseph has come to you”; then Israel summoned his strength, and sat up in bed. 3And Jacob said to Joseph, “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me, 4and said to me, ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful, and multiply you, and I will make of you a company of peoples, and will give this land to your descendants after you for an everlasting possession.’ 5And now your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine; Eʹphraim and Manasʹseh shall be mine, as Reuben and Simeon are. 6And the offspring born to you after them shall be yours; they shall be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance. 7For when I came from Paddan, Rachel to my sorrow died in the land of Canaan on the way, when there was still some distance to go to Ephrath; and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).”

8 When Israel saw Joseph’s sons, he said, “Who are these?” 9Joseph said to his father, “They are my sons, whom God has given me here.” And he said, “Bring them to me, I pray you, that I may bless them.” 10Now the eyes of Israel were dim with age, so that he could not see. So Joseph brought them near him; and he kissed them and embraced them. 11And Israel said to Joseph, “I had not thought to see your face; and lo, God has let me see your children also.” 12Then Joseph removed them from his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth. 13And Joseph took them both, Eʹphraim in his right hand toward Israel’s left hand, and Manasʹseh in his left hand toward Israel’s right hand, and brought them near him. 14And Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it upon the head of Eʹphraim, who was the younger, and his left hand upon the head of Manasʹseh, crossing his hands, for Manasʹseh was the first-born. 15And he blessed Joseph, and said,

“The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked,

the God who has led me all my life long to this day,

16the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads;

and in them let my name be perpetuated, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac;

and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.”

17 When Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand upon the head of Eʹphraim, it displeased him; and he took his father’s hand, to remove it from Eʹphraim’s head to Manasʹseh’s head. 18And Joseph said to his father, “Not so, my father; for this one is the first-born; put your right hand upon his head.” 19But his father refused, and said, “I know, my son, I know; he also shall become a people, and he also shall be great; nevertheless his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his descendants shall become a multitude of nations.” 20So he blessed them that day, saying,

“By you Israel will pronounce blessings, saying,

‘God make you as Eʹphraim and as Manasʹseh’ ”;

and thus he put Eʹphraim before Manasʹseh. 21Then Israel said to Joseph, “Behold, I am about to die, but God will be with you, and will bring you again to the land of your fathers. 22Moreover I have given to you rather than to your brothers one mountain slope which I took from the hand of the Amorites with my sword and with my bow.”

More Exhibitions