Yosef began to appreciate the advantage of his prominent stature in Egypt over his compromised position back home – and this was his mistake.
We find in the Midrashim several different reasons for why God subjected Yosef to the test of Potifar’s wife, who unrelentingly attempted to seduce Yosef during the time he worked as her husband’s servant. According to one Midrashic passage (Bereishit Rabba 87), the test came as a punishment for Yosef’s attitude toward his situation in Egypt:
Yosef was thinking to himself and saying, “When I was in my father’s home, my father would see some nice portion and give it to me, and my brothers would then inject the evil eye within me. Now that I am here, I thank You that I am comfortable.”
The Almighty said to him, “… By your life, I will instigate the bear [Potifar’s wife] to come after you.”
According to this view, the test of Potifar’s wife came in response to Yosef’s sense of comfort and ease in Potifar’s home. He reflected on the difference between his childhood, when he endured the envy and “dirty looks” of his brothers as he enjoyed his father’s preferential treatment, and his current condition, where he was treated honorably by Potifar without being the target of ill will. God disapproved of Yosef’s perspective on his condition, and promptly subjected him to the lure of Potifar’s wife.
The question arises as to why Yosef’s thoughts were deemed improper. Yosef, as the Midrash describes, made a point of thanking the Almighty for the comfort he enjoyed in Potifar’s home. He did not take for it granted; to the contrary, he acknowledged the blessings in his life and expressed his gratitude for them to God. In fact, Yosef’s comments seemingly reveal an admirable and even inspirational quality – recognizing one’s blessings even under adverse conditions. Sold as a slave by his brothers to a foreign country, forgotten and forlorn, Yosef was still able to express his appreciation and thank God for the benefits he enjoyed. Is this not an admirable trait from which we all have much to learn? Should Yosef be criticized for recognizing and being thankful for the silver lining he detected within the dark clouds hovering over his life?
Rav Yehuda Leib Ginsburg, in his Yalkut Yehuda, explains the Midrash’s comments by drawing a contrast between the depiction of Yosef in this passage and the opposite depictions of two other Biblical characters. In Bereishit Rabba (42), the Midrash relates that Hagar, Sara’s maidservant, had been Pharaoh’s daughter. But once Pharaoh saw the miracles God performed for Sara, he decided it would be preferable for his daughter to be a maidservant in the home of Avraham and Sara rather than grow as a princess in the Egyptian royal palace. Similarly, the Gemara in Masekhet Sanhedrin (99b) writes that Timna, the concubine of Esav’s son, Elifaz, had been a princess, but preferred marrying as a concubine into the family of Avraham and Yitzchak rather than retain her royal stature in another nation.
Off the backdrop of these stories of Hagar and Timna, the Yalkut Yehuda suggests, we can perhaps understand God’s disapproval of Yosef’s perspective on his condition in Egypt. Yosef began to appreciate the advantage of his prominent stature in Egypt over his compromised position back home – and this was his mistake. From the perspective of the Midrash, there can never be any advantage to living among Egyptian idolaters over living with Yaakov Avinu. Hagar and Timna chose to sacrifice their stature of royalty for the sake of associating with people of spiritual greatness; Yosef, conversely, began to appreciate the comforts of royalty which were not available to him in his father’s home. The Midrash thus seeks to remind us that when evaluating our condition in life, our material position should not be a leading factor in our assessment. The comforts Yosef enjoyed in Potifar’s home should not have provided any comfort over his forced exile from Yaakov’s home, because the spiritual benefits of living with Yaakov can never be substituted with the material comforts offered by Potifar.