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.

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

Then Judah said to Onan, “Sleep with your brother’s wife. Perform your duty as her brother-in-law and produce offspring for your brother.”

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

Then Judah said to his daughter-in-law Tamar, “Remain a widow in your father’s house until my son Shelah grows up.” For he thought, “He might die too, like his brothers.” So Tamar went to live in her father’s house.

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.

He went over to her and said, “Come, let me sleep with you,” for he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law.

She said, “What will you give me for sleeping with me?”

“I will send you a young goat from my flock,” he replied.

But she said, “Only if you leave something with me until you send it.”

So the Adullamite returned to Judah, saying, “I couldn’t find her, and furthermore, the men of the place said, ‘There has been no cult prostitute here.’”

About three months later Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law, Tamar, has been acting like a prostitute, and now she is pregnant.”

“Bring her out!” Judah said. “Let her be burned to death!”

Judah recognized them and said, “She is more in the right than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah.” And he did not know her intimately again.

But then he pulled his hand back, and his brother came out. Then she said, “You have broken out first!” So he was named Perez.

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.

After some time his master’s wife looked longingly at Joseph and said, “Sleep with me.”

But he refused. “Look,” he said to his master’s wife, “with me here my master does not concern himself with anything in his house, and he has put all that he owns under my authority.

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

she called the household servants. “Look,” she said to them, “my husband brought a Hebrew man to make fools of us. He came to me so he could sleep with me, and I screamed as loud as I could.

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.

When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was positive, he said to Joseph, “I also had a dream. Three baskets of white bread were on my head.

Then the chief cupbearer said to Pharaoh, “Today I remember my faults.

Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I have had a dream, and no one can interpret it. But I have heard it said about you that you can hear a dream and interpret it.”

So Pharaoh said to Joseph: “In my dream I was standing on the bank of the Nile,

Then Joseph said to Pharaoh, “Pharaoh’s dreams mean the same thing. God has revealed to Pharaoh what He is about to do.

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

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

So Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has made all this known to you, there is no one as intelligent and wise as you are.

Pharaoh also said to Joseph, “See, I am placing you over all the land of Egypt.”

Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I am Pharaoh, but no one will be able to raise his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt without your permission.”

and the seven years of famine began, just as Joseph had said. There was famine in every country, but throughout the land of Egypt there was food.

When Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why do you keep looking at each other?

Joseph remembered his dreams about them and said to them, “You are spies. You have come to see the weakness of the land.”

“No, my lord. Your servants have come to buy food,” they said.

“No,” he said to them. “You have come to see the weakness of the land.”

Then Joseph said to them, “I have spoken: ‘You are spies!’

On the third day Joseph said to them, “I fear God—do this and you will live.

Then they said to each other, “Obviously, we are being punished for what we did to our brother. We saw his deep distress when he pleaded with us, but we would not listen. That is why this trouble has come to us.”

He said to his brothers, “My money has been returned! It’s here in my bag.” Their hearts sank. Trembling, they turned to one another and said, “What is this that God has done to us?”

The man who is the lord of the country said to us, ‘This is how I will know if you are honest: Leave one brother with me, take food to relieve the hunger of your households, and go.

Their father Jacob said to them, “You have deprived me of my sons. Joseph is gone and Simeon is gone. Now you want to take Benjamin. Everything happens to me!”

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.”

When they had used up the grain they had brought back from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us some food.”

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.’”

Then Judah said to his father Israel, “Send the boy with me. We will be on our way so that we may live and not die—neither we, nor you, nor our children.

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.

Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: Put some of the best products of the land in your packs and take them down to the man as a gift—some balsam and some honey, aromatic gum and resin, pistachios and almonds.

When Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to his steward, “Take the men to my house. Slaughter an animal and prepare it, for they will eat with me at noon.”

The man did as Joseph had said and brought them to Joseph’s house.

But the men were afraid because they were taken to Joseph’s house. They said, “We have been brought here because of the money that was returned in our bags the first time. They intend to overpower us, seize us, make us slaves, and take our donkeys.”

They said, “Sir, we really did come down here the first time only to buy food.

Then the steward said, “May you be well. Don’t be afraid. Your God and the God of your father must have put treasure in your bags. I received your money.” Then he brought Simeon out to them.

He asked if they were well, and he said, “How is your elderly father that you told me about? Is he still alive?”

When he looked up and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother’s son, he asked, “Is this your youngest brother that you told me about?” Then he said, “May God be gracious to you, my son.”

Then he washed his face and came out. Regaining his composure, he said, “Serve the meal.”

They had not gone very far from the city when Joseph said to his steward, “Get up. Pursue the men, and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good?

When he overtook them, he said these words to them.

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

The steward replied, “What you have said is right, but only the one who is found to have it will be my slave, and the rest of you will be blameless.”

“What is this you have done?” Joseph said to them. “Didn’t you know that a man like me could uncover the truth by divination?”

Then Joseph said, “I swear that I will not do this. The man in whose possession the cup was found will be my slave. The rest of you can go in peace to your father.”

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.

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

But we said to my lord, ‘The boy cannot leave his father. If he were to leave, his father would die.’

Then you said to your servants, ‘If your younger brother does not come down with you, you will not see me again.’

But our father said, ‘Go again, and buy us some food.’

Your servant my father said to us, ‘You know that my wife bore me two sons.

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

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.

Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Please, come near me,” and they came near. “I am Joseph, your brother,” he said, “the one you sold into Egypt.

Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Tell your brothers, ‘Do this: Load your animals and go on back to the land of Canaan.

So Joseph sent his brothers on their way, and as they were leaving, he said to them, “Don’t argue on the way.”

They said, “Joseph is still alive, and he is ruler over all the land of Egypt!” Jacob was stunned, for he did not believe them.

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.”

Israel set out with all that he had and came to Beer-sheba, and he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac.

That night God spoke to Israel in a vision: “Jacob, Jacob!” He said.

And Jacob replied, “Here I am.”

God 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.

Then Israel said to Joseph, “At last I can die, now that I have seen your face and know you are still alive!”

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.

Then Pharaoh asked his brothers, “What is your occupation?”

And they said to Pharaoh, “Your servants, both we and our fathers, are shepherds.”

Then they said to Pharaoh, “We have come to live in the land for a while because there is no grazing land for your servants’ sheep, since the famine in the land of Canaan has been severe. So now, please let your servants settle in the land of Goshen.”

Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Now that your father and brothers have come to you,

Then Pharaoh said to Jacob, “How many years have you lived?”

Jacob said to Pharaoh, “My pilgrimage has lasted 130 years. My years have been few and hard, and they have not surpassed the years of my fathers during their pilgrimages.”

When the money from the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan was gone, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die here in front of you? The money is gone!”

But Joseph said, “Give me your livestock. Since the money is gone, I will give you food in exchange for your livestock.”

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.

Why should we die here in front of you—both us and our land? Buy us and our land in exchange for food. Then we with our land will become Pharaoh’s slaves. Give us seed so that we can live and not die, and so that the land won’t become desolate.”

Then Joseph said to the people, “Understand today that I have acquired you and your land for Pharaoh. Here is seed for you. Sow it in the land.

At harvest, you are to give a fifth of it to Pharaoh, and four-fifths will be yours as seed for the field and as food for yourselves, your households, and your dependents.”

And they said, “You have saved our lives. We have found favor in our lord’s eyes and will be Pharaoh’s slaves.”

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.

Some time after this, Joseph was told, “Your father is weaker.” So he set out with his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim.

When Jacob was told, “Your son Joseph has come to you,” Israel summoned his strength and sat up in bed.

Jacob said to Joseph, “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me.

He said to me, ‘I will make you fruitful and numerous; I will make many nations come from you, and I will give this land as an eternal possession to your future descendants.’

When Israel saw Joseph’s sons, he said, “Who are these?”