John Calvin Commentary Genesis 41:50

"And unto Joseph were born two sons before the year of famine came, whom Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On, bare unto him." — Genesis 41:50 (ASV)

And unto Joseph were born two sons. Although the names Joseph gave his sons as a result of the outcome of his affairs reflect some piety, because in them he celebrates the kindness of God. Yet, the forgetfulness of his father’s house, which he says God had brought upon him, can hardly be entirely excused.

It was a pious and holy motive for gratitude that God had caused him to forget all his former miseries. But no honor should have been so highly valued as to displace from his mind the desire and remembrance of his father’s house. Granted, he is Viceroy of Egypt, yet his condition is unhappy as long as he is an exile from the Church.

Some, to excuse the holy man, explain the passage as meaning that he so rejoiced in God's present favor as to make him later forgetful of the injuries inflicted on him by his brothers; but this (in my judgment) is far too forced.

Indeed, we must not strive anxiously to excuse Joseph's sin. Rather, I think, we are admonished how greatly we must be on our guard against the world's attractions, lest our minds be unduly gratified by them.

Consider Joseph: although he sincerely worships God, he is nevertheless so captivated by the sweetness of honor, and his mind so clouded, that he becomes indifferent to his father’s house and contents himself in Egypt. But this was almost to wander from the fold of God.

It was, indeed, a fitting modesty that, from a desire to proclaim God's goodness toward him, he was not ashamed to preserve a memorial of his humbled condition in the names of his sons.

Those who are raised to a high position from an obscure and ignoble origin often desire to erase the knowledge of their beginnings, because they consider it disgraceful to themselves. Joseph, however, valued the acknowledgment of God's grace more highly than an ostentatious future nobility.