Don’t you know that a person like me practices divination?: Don’t you know that a person as esteemed as I knows how to test and ascertain through knowledge, reason, and discernment that you stole the goblet?- [from Targum Onkelos]
16And Judah said, "What shall we say to my master? What shall we speak, and how shall we exonerate ourselves? God has found your servants' iniquity, behold, we are my lord's servants, both we and the one in whose possession the goblet has been found."
God has found: We know that we have not sinned, but this has come from the Omnipresent to bring this upon us. The Creditor has found a place to collect His debt. — [from Gen. Rabbah 92:9]
and how shall we exonerate ourselves: Heb. נִצְטַדָּק, an expression of justice (צֶדֶק). Similarly, every word whose radical begins with a “zaddi,” and is to be used in the form of “hithpa’el” or “nithpa’el” (the reflexive voice), a “teth” is substituted for the “tav” [of the “hithpa’el”] and it is not placed before the first letter of the radical but in the middle of the radical letters. E.g., “shall we exonerate ourselves (נִצְטַדָּק),” from the root צדק, justice; “was drenched (יִצְטַבַּע)” (Dan. 4:30), from the root צבע, to drench; “and disguised as ambassadors (וַיִצְטַיָרוּ)” (Josh. 9:4), from the root of“a faithful emissary (צִיר)” (Prov. 13:17); “we took…for our provision (הִצְטַיַדְנוּ)” (Josh. 9:12) from the root of “provisions (צֵידָה) for the way” (Gen. 42:25). [In cont-rast, in the case of] a word whose radical begins with a “sammech” or “sin,” when it is used in the “hith-pa’el,” [it is] a “tav” [that] separates the letters of the radical, e.g., “and the grasshopper will drag itself along (וְיִסְתַּבֵּל)” (Eccl. 12:5), from the root kcx; “I looked (מִסְתַּכֵּל) at these horns” (Dan. 7: 8), from the root סכל “And the statutes of Omri shall be observed (וְיִשְׁתַּמֵר)” (Micah 6:16), from the root שׁמר “and he who turns away from evil is considered mad (מִשְׁתּוֹלֵל)” (Isa. 59: 15), from the root of “He leads counselors away with madness (שׁוֹלָל)” (Job 12:17); “tread (מִסְתּוֹלֵל) upon My people” (Exod. 9:17), from the root of “a way that is not trodden (סְלוּלָה)” (Jer. 18:15).
17But he said, "Far be it from me to do this! The man in whose possession the goblet was found he shall be my slave, but as for you go up in peace to your father."
