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When Lehi obtained the brass plates in the wilderness, he was delighted to have a history of his people and the teachings of many holy prophets. He also found it meaningful that this record connected him directly with that heritage:

My father, Lehi, also found upon the plates of brass a genealogy of his fathers; wherefore he knew that he was a descendant of Joseph; yea, even that Joseph who was the son of Jacob, who was sold into Egypt, and who was preserved by the hand of the Lord, that he might preserve his father, Jacob, and all his household from perishing with famine.

1 Nephi 5:14

This connection was important to Lehi. He named his next two sons Jacob and Joseph, and he later spoke at length with Joseph, sharing the prophecies of his ancestral namesake and testifying, “Great were the covenants of the Lord which he made unto Joseph” (2 Nephi 3:4).

The name Joseph is associated with two Hebrew words with opposite meanings. Asaph (אָסַף) means to take away. Yasaph (יָסַף) means to add. Joseph’s mother Rachel uses both of these words in her explanation of his name:

And she conceived, and bare a son; and said, God hath taken away [asaph] my reproach:

And she called his name Joseph [Yoseph]; and said, The Lord shall add [yasaph] to me another son.

Genesis 30:23-24

These contrasting terms describe not only Joseph’s birth but also his life and legacy. He was taken away from his father—sold into slavery in Egypt—so that he could later give back to his family, saving them from starvation. (See Genesis 45:7-8; 49:22-26.) And his descendants, including Lehi’s family, were scattered throughout the earth so that they could participate in the gathering of Israel, fulfilling God’s promise to Abraham that his seed would bless all families of the earth (2 Nephi 3:5; 3 Nephi 15:12; 20:13, 25).

The prophet Amos later declared that the Lord would be “gracious unto the remnant of Joseph” (Amos 5:15). Captain Moroni referred to Lehi’s descendants as “a remnant of the seed of Joseph” (Alma 46:23). After ripping his own coat and turning part of it into a banner called the Title of Liberty, Moroni compared his people to a fragment of Joseph’s coat, which his brothers had given to his father. According to Moroni, just before Jacob’s death, he observed that he still had a piece of that coat which he had received so many years earlier:

And he said—Even as this remnant of garment of my son hath been preserved, so shall a remnant of the seed of my son be preserved by the hand of God, and be taken unto himself, while the remainder of the seed of Joseph shall perish, even as the remnant of his garment.

Alma 46:24

This pattern of subtraction and addition is Joseph’s story. God takes things away so that He can give us more. He scatters us so that we can help Him gather other people.

This week, as we study the life of Joseph, let’s watch for these patterns of loss and blessing, so that we can better understand how God guides us to happiness and growth.