Pharaoh handed over almost everything. House, people, signet, authority. But one line held back: "only in the throne of the kingdom will I be greater than thou." Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on Genesis 41:40 renders the elevation of Joseph with the exact boundary a monarch must keep if he is to remain a monarch.
Viceroy, not king
The Aramaic paraphrase — whose final redaction belongs to the Land of Israel around the seventh or eighth century CE — uses the phrase "by the decree of thy mouth shall all my people be armed." Armed. Mobilized. Fed. Judged. Joseph's voice becomes Egyptian law. And yet the throne itself stays with Pharaoh. The midrashic tradition reads this line as the establishment of the category that would later shape Jewish political thought: the mishneh la-melekh, the second to the king, the one who governs in the monarch's name without displacing him. Joseph is the first in the Hebrew Bible to hold this position, and the Torah is precise about where the line is drawn.
Why the limit matters
A trustworthy official is one who knows what is not his. Joseph had every reason to resent Pharaoh's boast — he had just saved Egypt with his interpretation — and yet he accepts the throne's boundary. The story works only because he does.
The takeaway
Real authority is confident enough to be delegated without being dissolved. Pharaoh kept his throne; Joseph gained a kingdom. Both understood the difference.