Genesis 40:1-3

"And it came to pass after these things, that the butler of the king of Egypt and his baker offended their lord the king of Egypt. And Pharaoh was wroth against his two officers, against the chief of the butlers, and the chief of the bakers. And he put them in ward in the house of the captain of the guard, into the prison, the place where Joseph was bound."

This passage is not the melding of three different "documents," each using a different designation for the offenders, butler, chief of the butlers, and officer (and similarly for the baker), but these various terms are for the sake of greater clarity and more information. "Butler" in this narrative means the chief of the butlers, the same being called also "an officer." Note also that three different terms are used for the ruler of Egypt. He is called "King of Egypt," "Pharaoh," and "their lord." Now, if we suppose that each of the six terms here cited belonged exclusively to one of those imaginary "documents" the scholars are always talking about, it results in no less than half a dozen "sources" for these three short verses! The refutation of such nonsense lies in the simple truth that it is a mark of all intelligent writing that various and synonymous terms are always visible; and it could hardly be otherwise here.

There have been many speculations about the manner of these men offending Pharaoh, ranging all the way from the allegation that they had plotted to poison him to some more trivial offense. From the Jewish writings, we have this:

"The chief baker was put into prison because a pebble had been found in the pastry he baked for Pharaoh, and he was guilty of a misdemeanor because he had neglected the sifting of the flour. A fly had happened to fall into the wine that the chief butler poured for Pharaoh, but that could not be construed as caused by any negligence on his part. Thus, the butler had not committed a punishable offense."[2]

The distorted value of judgments of that ancient society appear vividly in such a comment.

Now, if to the triple designations of the offenders, and of the king, we add the triple designations of the place where the offenders were incarcerated, namely, (1) the ward in the house of the captain of the guard; (2) the prison; and (3) the place where Joseph was kept, we thus find a total of no less than nine possible "sources," according to the usual scholarly dictum to that effect. No wonder there is not any agreement anywhere on earth today as to what belongs to which "source" in Genesis. Even the New English Bible's gratuitous rendition of (1) as The Round House is no help! All the scholars we have read confess that the exact meaning of some of these terms is either unknown or ambiguous, and therein may lie the reason why the sacred author (singular) used various words.

As it stands, the text rewards us richly. Potiphar was not only the captain of the guard, but his duties also included the administration of the special prison used for detaining the king's prisoners. The keeper of the prison is not named, but the keeper was Potiphar's deputy, and the compound or palace where this establishment lay also served as Potiphar's residence.

This understanding of the passage clears up everything. Here is the explanation of how Potiphar was able to cast Joseph into prison without even an examining trial, and how things were said to be done by Potiphar, the captain of the guard, that were actually done by the deputy, who is nowhere named in the passage.

"The chief of the butlers ..." This office was also known as "the cupbearer," a position held by Nehemiah (Nehemiah 1:11) in the court of Persia. It was a highly-respected position because of the holder's access to the presence of the king. "Rabshakeh (Aramaic for `chief of the cup-bearers') was in the court of Assyria (2 Kings 18:17)."[3]

"Offended, or gave offense, to their lord ..." Speiser tells us that, "Literally, the word means proved to be at fault,"[4] Therefore, such a rendition as "sinned against" is inappropriate, especially in a secular context.