Joseph’s Dreams: The Hidden Truth That His Brothers Feared

Yosef (Joseph) dreams an extraordinary dream, and at first glance, it seems strange and exaggerated. However, when we look closely at how his family reacts, we discover two surprising insights.

The Torah tells us: “Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, ‘Behold, I have dreamed another dream: and behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.’ And he told it to his father and to his brothers, and his father rebuked him and said, ‘What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow down to you to the ground?’”

Yosef's dream implies that he will one day rule over his entire family. His father rebukes him, and it seems clear that Yaakov — and certainly the brothers, dismiss the whole thing as nonsense. But the Torah reveals something deeper: “And his brothers envied him, but his father kept the matter in mind.”

Yaakov, though he rebuked Yosef, and appeared to reject the dream, still “kept the matter” — meaning he wondered whether it might contain truth. And the brothers, though they mocked and rejected it, envied him.

Envy only exists for something that feels real — something someone else has that I lack. If the dream were pure fantasy, and even Yaakov had dismissed it, what was there to envy?

Even more striking is that the Torah describes the brothers’ jealousy before Yaakov's reaction, to show that they didn’t envy him because their father believed in the dream. Rather, deep down, they sensed that the dream might indeed hold truth.

Fighting What You Secretly Believe

People don’t fight against something they truly think is meaningless. If Yosef were truly “nothing” in their eyes, they wouldn’t have fought him so fiercely — they would have ignored him. The fact that they struggled against him so intensely, even selling him into slavery, shows that they felt a kernel of truth in his vision. It pierced them deeply.

Indeed, Yosef made mistakes and there were things he did that his brothers saw as arrogant or wrong. But their opposition came precisely because they sensed something real and powerful in his vision.

Even when they conspired to kill him, they said, “Here comes the dreamer.” It sounds mocking, but beneath the sarcasm was fear that his dreams would actually come true. That’s why they said, “Come, let us kill him.” They weren’t only destroying a person; they were trying to destroy the dream.

Judah’s Wisdom — Let the Dream Be Tested

Yehuda (Judah), however, responded with remarkable insight: “Come, let us sell him… and let not our hand be upon him.” If this dream is truly divine, we cannot stop it. Let it unfold on its own. Let Joseph be tested by life, by Egypt, by the full weight of the world’s power. If the dream is real, it will survive even there.

And so Yosef's brothers, consciously or not, gave the dream a “fair chance” — not as the favorite son of Yaakov, but as a slave and stranger in a pagan empire. “Go,” they seemed to say, “chase your dream. If it is truly yours, you’ll rise from the lowest depths.”

And indeed — that is exactly what happened.

History Repeats: From Yosef and Yehuda to Yeravam and Shlomo

Generations later, the descendants of Yehuda and Yosef faced the same test. King Shlomo, the son of Yehuda, ruled over all Israel. But Yeravam, a descendant of Yosef through Ephraim, received a prophecy from the prophet Achiya of Shiloh — that he would rule over part of the kingdom.

Shlomo could have accepted the prophecy and made space for it, trusting that God’s plan would unfold through both houses of Israel. Instead however, he sought to kill Yeravam — who fled to Egypt, just like his ancestor Yosef.

After Shlomo's death, his son Rechavam continued the same pattern, refusing to listen to the northern tribes or acknowledge their role in God’s plan. And Yeravam, in turn, stopped listening to Achiya the prophet and tried to seize everything by force.

Thus the kingdom of Israel was divided — Yehuda in the south, Ephraim in the north, because both sides repeated the same ancient mistake: the refusal to make room for another’s dream, even when it might be true.