Unlike Islamic poetry or Protestant engravings, the paintings no longer
gloss theology. Rather than casting the wife as evil and Joseph as blameless,
as in the exegetical interpretation, or recasting the affair in terms of divine
love as in Judeo-Islamic interpretations, the interaction between the two
characters dramatizes the complexities of a human relationship external to
its theological origins. The eyes of man and woman meet with expressions
of longing, accusation, apology, and shame. Each rendition presents two
parties involved in a complex negotiation that ends in betrayal more clearly
Figure 18Paolo Finoglia,Joseph and Potiphar’sWife,oil on canvas, 232.7 × 193.7 cm,
c.1640. Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of Samuel H. Kress Foundation,
1962.163. Imaging Department © President and Fellows of Harvard College
Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife in Post-Reformation Europe 263