But Jacob replied, "My son will not go down there with you, for his brother is dead and he alone is left. If an accident happens to him on the journey you have to make, then you will bring down my gray hair in sorrow to the grave."

But if you will not send him, we won't go down there because the man said to us, 'You will not see my face unless your brother is with you.'"

But if we had not delayed, we could have traveled there and back twice by now!"

They got their gifts ready for Joseph's arrival at noon, for they had heard that they were to have a meal there.

Joseph hurried out, for he was overcome by affection for his brother and was at the point of tears. So he went to his room and wept there.

So Judah and his brothers came back to Joseph's house. He was still there, and they threw themselves to the ground before him.

We said to my lord, 'We have an aged father, and there is a young boy who was born when our father was old. The boy's brother is dead. He is the only one of his mother's sons left, and his father loves him.'

But we replied, 'We cannot go down there. If our youngest brother is with us, then we will go, for we won't be permitted to see the man's face if our youngest brother is not with us.'

For these past two years there has been famine in the land and for five more years there will be neither plowing nor harvesting.

I will provide you with food there because there will be five more years of famine. Otherwise you would become poor -- you, your household, and everyone who belongs to you."'

He said, "I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you into a great nation there.

I will go down with you to Egypt and I myself will certainly bring you back from there. Joseph will close your eyes."

Then they said to Pharaoh, "We have come to live as temporary residents in the land. There is no pasture for your servants' flocks because the famine is severe in the land of Canaan. So now, please let your servants live in the land of Goshen."

But there was no food in all the land because the famine was very severe; the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan wasted away because of the famine.

Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the land of Goshen, and they owned land there. They were fruitful and increased rapidly in number.

But as for me, when I was returning from Paddan, Rachel died -- to my sorrow -- in the land of Canaan. It happened along the way, some distance from Ephrath. So I buried her there on the way to Ephrath" (that is, Bethlehem).

There they buried Abraham and his wife Sarah; there they buried Isaac and his wife Rebekah; and there I buried Leah.

My father made me swear an oath. He said, "I am about to die. Bury me in my tomb that I dug for myself there in the land of Canaan." Now let me go and bury my father; then I will return.'"

When they came to the threshing floor of Atad on the other side of the Jordan, they mourned there with very great and bitter sorrow. There Joseph observed a seven day period of mourning for his father.

He looked this way and that and saw that no one was there, and then he attacked the Egyptian and concealed the body in the sand.

When he went out the next day, there were two Hebrew men fighting. So he said to the one who was in the wrong, "Why are you attacking your fellow Hebrew?"

The Lord also said to him, "Put your hand into your robe." So he put his hand into his robe, and when he brought it out -- there was his hand, leprous like snow!

He said, "Put your hand back into your robe." So he put his hand back into his robe, and when he brought it out from his robe -- there it was, restored like the rest of his skin!

You go get straw for yourselves wherever you can find it, because there will be no reduction at all in your workload.'"

The slave masters were pressuring them, saying, "Complete your work for each day, just like when there was straw!"

When they went out from Pharaoh, they encountered Moses and Aaron standing there to meet them,

Then the Lord said to Moses, "Tell Aaron, 'Take your staff and stretch out your hand over Egypt's waters -- over their rivers, over their canals, over their ponds, and over all their reservoirs -- so that it becomes blood.' There will be blood everywhere in the land of Egypt, even in wooden and stone containers."

When the fish that were in the Nile died, the Nile began to stink, so that the Egyptians could not drink water from the Nile. There was blood everywhere in the land of Egypt!

He said, "Tomorrow." And Moses said, "It will be as you say, so that you may know that there is no one like the Lord our God.

But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and did not listen to them, just as the Lord had predicted.

When the magicians attempted to bring forth gnats by their secret arts, they could not. So there were gnats on people and on animals.

But on that day I will mark off the land of Goshen, where my people are staying, so that no swarms of flies will be there, that you may know that I am the Lord in the midst of this land.

For this time I will send all my plagues on your very self and on your servants and your people, so that you may know that there is no one like me in all the earth.

Then the Lord said to Moses, "Extend your hand toward the sky that there may be hail in all the land of Egypt, on people and on animals, and on everything that grows in the field in the land of Egypt."

Hail fell and fire mingled with the hail; the hail was so severe that there had not been any like it in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation.

Only in the land of Goshen, where the Israelites lived, was there no hail.

Moses said to him, "When I leave the city I will spread my hands to the Lord, the thunder will cease, and there will be no more hail, so that you may know that the earth belongs to the Lord.

The locusts went up over all the land of Egypt and settled down in all the territory of Egypt. It was very severe; there had been no locusts like them before, nor will there be such ever again.

The Lord said to Moses, "Extend your hand toward heaven so that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, a darkness so thick it can be felt."

So Moses extended his hand toward heaven, and there was absolute darkness throughout the land of Egypt for three days.

Our livestock must also go with us! Not a hoof is to be left behind! For we must take these animals to serve the Lord our God. Until we arrive there, we do not know what we must use to serve the Lord."

There will be a great cry throughout the whole land of Egypt, such as there has never been, nor ever will be again.

On the first day there will be a holy convocation, and on the seventh day there will be a holy convocation for you. You must do no work of any kind on them, only what every person will eat -- that alone may be prepared for you.

Pharaoh got up in the night, along with all his servants and all Egypt, and there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was no house in which there was not someone dead.

The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Sukkoth. There were about 600,000 men on foot, plus their dependants.

Moses said to the people, "Remember this day on which you came out from Egypt, from the place where you were enslaved, for the Lord brought you out of there with a mighty hand -- and no bread made with yeast may be eaten.

For seven days you must eat bread made without yeast, and on the seventh day there is to be a festival to the Lord.

When Pharaoh got closer, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians marching after them, and they were terrified. The Israelites cried out to the Lord,

and they said to Moses, "Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the desert? What in the world have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt?

He cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree. When Moses threw it into the water, the water became safe to drink. There the Lord made for them a binding ordinance, and there he tested them.

Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve wells of water and seventy palm trees, and they camped there by the water.

As Aaron spoke to the whole community of the Israelites and they looked toward the desert, there the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud,

When the layer of dew had evaporated, there on the surface of the desert was a thin flaky substance, thin like frost on the earth.

So they put it aside until the morning, just as Moses had commanded, and it did not stink, nor were there any worms in it.

Six days you will gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any."

The whole community of the Israelites traveled on their journey from the Desert of Sin according to the Lord's instruction, and they pitched camp in Rephidim. Now there was no water for the people to drink.

But the people were very thirsty there for water, and they murmured against Moses and said, "Why in the world did you bring us up out of Egypt -- to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?"

I will be standing before you there on the rock in Horeb, and you will strike the rock, and water will come out of it so that the people may drink." And Moses did so in plain view of the elders of Israel.

After they journeyed from Rephidim, they came to the Desert of Sinai, and they camped in the desert; Israel camped there in front of the mountain.

On the third day in the morning there was thunder and lightning and a dense cloud on the mountain, and the sound of a very loud horn; all the people who were in the camp trembled.

"If men fight and hit a pregnant woman and her child is born prematurely, but there is no serious injury, he will surely be punished in accordance with what the woman's husband demands of him, and he will pay what the court decides.

But if there is serious injury, then you will give a life for a life,

"If a thief is caught breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there will be no blood guilt for him.

If the sun has risen on him, then there is blood guilt for him. A thief must surely make full restitution; if he has nothing, then he will be sold for his theft.

then there will be an oath to the Lord between the two of them, that he has not laid his hand on his neighbor's goods, and its owner will accept this, and he will not have to pay.

and they saw the God of Israel. Under his feet there was something like a pavement made of sapphire, clear like the sky itself.

The Lord said to Moses, "Come up to me to the mountain and remain there, and I will give you the stone tablets with the law and the commandments that I have written, so that you may teach them."

I will meet with you there, and from above the atonement lid, from between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the testimony, I will speak with you about all that I will command you for the Israelites.

On the lampstand there are to be four cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms,

So there are to be eight frames and their silver bases, sixteen bases, two bases under the first frame, and two bases under the next frame.

You are to hang this curtain under the clasps and bring the ark of the testimony in there behind the curtain. The curtain will make a division for you between the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place.

"You are to make the courtyard of the tabernacle. For the south side there are to be hangings for the courtyard of fine twisted linen, one hundred fifty feet long for one side,

Likewise for its length on the north side, there are to be hangings for one hundred fifty feet, with twenty posts and their twenty bronze bases, with silver hooks and bands on the posts.

On the second side there are to be hangings twenty-two and a half feet long, with their three posts and their three bases.

For the gate of the courtyard there is to be a curtain of thirty feet, of blue, purple, and scarlet yarn and fine twined linen, the work of an embroiderer, with four posts and their four bases.

There is to be an opening in its top in the center of it, with an edge all around the opening, the work of a weaver, like the opening of a collar, so that it cannot be torn.

"This will be a regular burnt offering throughout your generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet with you to speak to you there.

There I will meet with the Israelites, and it will be set apart as holy by my glory.

"When you take a census of the Israelites according to their number, then each man is to pay a ransom for his life to the Lord when you number them, so that there will be no plague among them when you number them.

Be prepared in the morning, and go up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and station yourself for me there on the top of the mountain.

The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the Lord by name.

So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did not eat bread, and he did not drink water. He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.

In six days work may be done, but on the seventh day there must be a holy day for you, a Sabbath of complete rest to the Lord. Anyone who does work on it will be put to death.

So there were eight frames and their silver bases, sixteen bases, two bases under each frame.

On the lampstand there were four cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms,

For the west side there were hangings seventy-five feet long, with their ten posts and their ten bases, with the hooks of the posts and their bands of silver.

There was an opening in the center of the robe, like the opening of a collar, with an edge all around the opening so that it could not be torn.

There was a bell and a pomegranate, a bell and a pomegranate, all around the hem of the robe, to be used in ministering, just as the Lord had commanded Moses.

Then he must bring it to the sons of Aaron, the priests, and the priest must scoop out from there a handful of its choice wheat flour and some of its olive oil in addition to all of its frankincense, and the priest must offer its memorial portion up in smoke on the altar -- it is a gift of a soothing aroma to the Lord.

Or when there is a person who touches anything ceremonially unclean, whether the carcass of an unclean wild animal, or the carcass of an unclean domesticated animal, or the carcass of an unclean creeping thing, even if he did not realize it, but he himself has become unclean and is guilty;

Then Moses said to Aaron and his sons, "Boil the meat at the entrance of the Meeting Tent, and there you are to eat it and the bread which is in the ordination offering basket, just as I have commanded, saying, 'Aaron and his sons are to eat it,'

The priest will then examine it, and if a white swelling is on the skin, it has turned the hair white, and there is raw flesh in the swelling,

and in the place of the boil there is a white swelling or a reddish white bright spot, he must show himself to the priest.

If, however, the priest examines it, and there is no white hair in it, it is not deeper than the skin, and it has faded, then the priest is to quarantine him for seven days.

If, however, the priest examines it and there is no white hair in the bright spot, it is not deeper than the skin, and it has faded, then the priest is to quarantine him for seven days.

But if the priest examines the scall infection and it does not appear to be deeper than the skin, and there is no black hair in it, then the priest is to quarantine the person with the scall infection for seven days.

The priest must then examine the infection on the seventh day, and if the scall has not spread, there is no reddish yellow hair in it, and the scall does not appear to be deeper than the skin,

But if there is a reddish white infection in the back or front bald area, it is a disease breaking out in his back or front bald area.

This is the law of the one in whom there is a diseased infection, who does not have sufficient means for his purification."

When a man has sexual intercourse with a woman and there is a seminal emission, they must bathe in water and be unclean until evening.