The setting of Joseph and Aseneth is well known from Genesis: Joseph travels through Egypt collecting grain to ease the great famine to come. At the house of Pentephres, high priest of Heliopolis, he meets Aseneth. Young and beautiful, she rejected all men who asked for her hand in marriage, detesting everybody whom she did not consider as equal. Joseph is the first man whom she is impressed by. But when he refuses her greetings as unsuitable for him, as he bound his life to the God of Israel and she worships Egyptian idols, her world falls apart. Deeply offended, her search for the god of Joseph begins.