“Are you really going to reign over us?” his brothers asked him. “Are you really going to rule us?” So they hated him even more because of his dream and what he had said.

He told his father and brothers, but his father rebuked him. “What kind of dream is this that you have had?” he said. “Are your mother and brothers and I going to come and bow down to the ground before you?”

His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind.

Then Israel said to him, “Go and see how your brothers and the flocks are doing, and bring word back to me.” So he sent him from the Valley of Hebron, and he went to Shechem.

A man found him there, wandering in the field, and asked him, “What are you looking for?”

They saw him in the distance, and before he had reached them, they plotted to kill him.

Come on, let’s kill him and throw him into one of the pits. We can say that a vicious animal ate him. Then we’ll see what becomes of his dreams!”

When Reuben heard this, he tried to save him from them. He said, “Let’s not take his life.”

Reuben also said to them, “Don’t shed blood. Throw him into this pit in the wilderness, but don’t lay a hand on him”—intending to rescue him from their hands and return him to his father.

Then they took him and threw him into the pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it.

Come, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay a hand on him, for he is our brother, our own flesh,” and they agreed.

When Midianite traders passed by, his brothers pulled Joseph out of the pit and sold him for 20 pieces of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took Joseph to Egypt.

His father recognized it. “It is my son’s robe,” he said. “A vicious animal has devoured him. Joseph has been torn to pieces!”

All his sons and daughters tried to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “No,” he said. “I will go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.” And his father wept for him.

She conceived and gave birth to a son, and he named him Er.

She conceived again, gave birth to a son, and named him Onan.

She gave birth to another son and named him Shelah. It was at Chezib that she gave birth to him.

Now Er, Judah’s firstborn, was evil in the Lord’s sight, and the Lord put him to death.

What he did was evil in the Lord’s sight, so He put him to death also.

So she took off her widow’s clothes, veiled her face, covered herself, and sat at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the way to Timnah. For she saw that, though Shelah had grown up, she had not been given to him as a wife.

“What should I give you?” he asked.

She answered, “Your signet ring, your cord, and the staff in your hand.” So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she got pregnant by him.

Now Joseph had been taken to Egypt. An Egyptian named Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had brought him there.

When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord made everything he did successful,

Joseph found favor in his master’s sight and became his personal attendant. Potiphar also put him in charge of his household and placed all that he owned under his authority.

From the time that he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the Egyptian’s house because of Joseph. The Lord’s blessing was on all that he owned, in his house and in his fields.

She grabbed him by his garment and said, “Sleep with me!” But leaving his garment in her hand, he escaped and ran outside.

Then she told him the same story: “The Hebrew slave you brought to us came to make a fool of me,

When his master heard the story his wife told him—“These are the things your slave did to me”—he was furious

and had him thrown into prison, where the king’s prisoners were confined. So Joseph was there in prison.

But the Lord was with Joseph and extended kindness to him. He granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden.

The warden did not bother with anything under Joseph’s authority, because the Lord was with him, and the Lord made everything that he did successful.

So he asked Pharaoh’s officers who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why do you look so sad today?”

“We had dreams,” they said to him, “but there is no one to interpret them.”

Then Joseph said to them, “Don’t interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

“This is its interpretation,” Joseph said to him. “The three branches are three days.

Yet the chief cupbearer did not remember Joseph; he forgot him.

When morning came, he was troubled, so he summoned all the magicians of Egypt and all its wise men. Pharaoh told them his dreams, but no one could interpret them for him.

Now a young Hebrew, a slave of the captain of the guards, was with us there. We told him our dreams, he interpreted our dreams for us, and each had its own interpretation.

Then Pharaoh sent for Joseph, and they quickly brought him from the dungeon. He shaved, changed his clothes, and went to Pharaoh.

“So now, let Pharaoh look for a discerning and wise man and set him over the land of Egypt.

Let Pharaoh do this: Let him appoint overseers over the land and take a fifth of the harvest of the land of Egypt during the seven years of abundance.

Then Pharaoh said to his servants, “Can we find anyone like this, a man who has God’s spirit in him?”

Pharaoh removed his signet ring from his hand and put it on Joseph’s hand, clothed him with fine linen garments, and placed a gold chain around his neck.

He had Joseph ride in his second chariot, and servants called out before him, “Abrek!” So he placed him over all the land of Egypt.

Pharaoh gave Joseph the name Zaphenath-paneah and gave him a wife, Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest at On. And Joseph went throughout the land of Egypt.

Two sons were born to Joseph before the years of famine arrived. Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest at On, bore them to him.

But Jacob did not send Joseph’s brother Benjamin with his brothers, for he thought, “Something might happen to him.”

Joseph was in charge of the country; he sold grain to all its people. His brothers came and bowed down before him with their faces to the ground.

Although Joseph recognized his brothers, they did not recognize him.

He turned away from them and wept. Then he turned back and spoke to them. He took Simeon from them and had him bound before their eyes.

When they reached their father Jacob in the land of Canaan, they told him all that had happened to them:

But we told him: We are honest and not spies.

Then Reuben said to his father, “You can kill my two sons if I don’t bring him back to you. Put him in my care, and I will return him to you.”

But Jacob answered, “My son will not go down with you, for his brother is dead and he alone is left. If anything happens to him on your journey, you will bring my gray hairs down to Sheol in sorrow.”

But Judah said to him, “The man specifically warned us: ‘You will not see me again unless your brother is with you.’

But if you will not send him, we will not go, for the man said to us, ‘You will not see me again unless your brother is with you.’”

They answered, “The man kept asking about us and our family: ‘Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?’ And we answered him accordingly. How could we know that he would say, ‘Bring your brother here’?”

I will be responsible for him. You can hold me personally accountable! If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, I will be guilty before you forever.

So they approached Joseph’s steward and spoke to him at the doorway of the house.

When Joseph came home, they brought him the gift they had carried into the house, and they bowed to the ground before him.

They answered, “Your servant our father is well. He is still alive.” And they bowed down to honor him.

They served him by himself, his brothers by themselves, and the Egyptians who were eating with him by themselves, because Egyptians could not eat with Hebrews, since that is abhorrent to them.

They were seated before him in order by age, from the firstborn to the youngest. The men looked at each other in astonishment.

Put my cup, the silver one, at the top of the youngest one’s bag, along with his grain money.” So he did as Joseph told him.

They said to him, “Why does my lord say these things? Your servants could not possibly do such a thing.

When Judah and his brothers reached Joseph’s house, he was still there. They fell to the ground before him.

But Judah approached him and said, “Sir, please let your servant speak personally to my lord. Do not be angry with your servant, for you are like Pharaoh.

and we answered my lord, ‘We have an elderly father and a younger brother, the child of his old age. The boy’s brother is dead. He is the only one of his mother’s sons left, and his father loves him.’

Then you said to your servants, ‘Bring him to me so that I can see him.’

“This is what happened when we went back to your servant my father: We reported your words to him.

We told him, ‘We cannot go down unless our younger brother goes with us. So if our younger brother isn’t with us, we cannot see the man.’

One left—I said that he must have been torn to pieces—and I have never seen him again.

If you also take this one from me and anything happens to him, you will bring my gray hairs down to Sheol in sorrow.’

Your servant became accountable to my father for the boy, saying, ‘If I do not return him to you, I will always bear the guilt for sinning against you, my father.’

Now please let your servant remain here as my lord’s slave, in place of the boy. Let him go back with his brothers.

Joseph could no longer keep his composure in front of all his attendants, so he called out, “Send everyone away from me!” No one was with him when he revealed his identity to his brothers.

Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still living?” But they could not answer him because they were terrified in his presence.

“Return quickly to my father and say to him, ‘This is what your son Joseph says: “God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me without delay.

Joseph kissed each of his brothers as he wept, and afterward his brothers talked with him.

But when they told Jacob all that Joseph had said to them, and when he saw the wagons that Joseph had sent to transport him, the spirit of their father Jacob revived.

Then Israel said, “Enough! My son Joseph is still alive. I will go to see him before I die.”

Jacob left Beer-sheba. The sons of Israel took their father Jacob in the wagons Pharaoh had sent to carry him, along with their children and their wives.

They also took their cattle and possessions they had acquired in the land of Canaan. Then Jacob and all his children went with him to Egypt.

His sons and grandsons, his daughters and granddaughters, indeed all his offspring, he brought with him to Egypt.

Manasseh and Ephraim were born to Joseph in the land of Egypt. They were born to him by Asenath daughter of Potiphera, a priest at On.

And Joseph’s sons who were born to him in Egypt: two persons.
All those of Jacob’s household who had come to Egypt: 70 persons.

Now Jacob had sent Judah ahead of him to Joseph to prepare for his arrival at Goshen. When they came to the land of Goshen,

Joseph hitched the horses to his chariot and went up to Goshen to meet his father Israel. Joseph presented himself to him, threw his arms around him, and wept for a long time.

Joseph said to his brothers and to his father’s household, “I will go up and inform Pharaoh, telling him: My brothers and my father’s household, who were in the land of Canaan, have come to me.

Joseph then brought his father Jacob and presented him before Pharaoh, and Jacob blessed Pharaoh.

When that year was over, they came the next year and said to him, “We cannot hide from our lord that the money is gone and that all our livestock belongs to our lord. There is nothing left for our lord except our bodies and our land.

When the time drew near for him to die, he called his son Joseph and said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, put your hand under my thigh and promise me that you will deal with me in kindness and faithfulness. Do not bury me in Egypt.

And Jacob said, “Swear to me.” So Joseph swore to him. Then Israel bowed in thanks at the head of his bed.

Now his eyesight was poor because of old age; he could hardly see. Joseph brought them to him, and he kissed and embraced them.

Judah is a young lion—
my son, you return from the kill.
He crouches; he lies down like a lion
or a lioness—who dares to rouse him?

The scepter will not depart from Judah
or the staff from between his feet
until He whose right it is comes
and the obedience of the peoples belongs to Him.

The archers attacked him,
shot at him, and were hostile toward him.

Then Joseph, leaning over his father’s face, wept and kissed him.

They took 40 days to complete this, for embalming takes that long, and the Egyptians mourned for him 70 days.

Then Joseph went to bury his father, and all Pharaoh’s servants, the elders of his household, and all the elders of the land of Egypt went with him,

Horses and chariots went up with him; it was a very impressive procession.