Study Desk

We answered, ‘We have a father who is old and a younger brother, born to him in his old age. The boy's brother is dead, and he is the only one of his mother's children still alive; his father loves him very much.'

and we answered that the boy could not leave his father; if he did, his father would die.

"And now, sir," Judah continued, "if I go back to my father without the boy, as soon as he sees that the boy is not with me, he will die. His life is wrapped up with the life of the boy, and he is so old that the sorrow we would cause him would kill him.

And now, sir, I will stay here as your slave in place of the boy; let him go back with his brothers.

Joseph was no longer able to control his feelings in front of his servants, so he ordered them all to leave the room. No one else was with him when Joseph told his brothers who he was.

Joseph said to his brothers, "I am Joseph. Is my father still alive?" But when his brothers heard this, they were so terrified that they could not answer.

So it was not really you who sent me here, but God. He has made me the king's highest official. I am in charge of his whole country; I am the ruler of all Egypt.

"Now hurry back to my father and tell him that this is what his son Joseph says: ‘God has made me ruler of all Egypt; come to me without delay.

He threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and began to cry; Benjamin also cried as he hugged him.

Then, still weeping, he embraced each of his brothers and kissed them. After that, his brothers began to talk with him.

When the news reached the palace that Joseph's brothers had come, the king and his officials were pleased.

He sent his father ten donkeys loaded with the best Egyptian goods and ten donkeys loaded with grain, bread, and other food for the trip.

He sent his brothers off and as they left, he said to them, "Don't quarrel on the way."

Jacob packed up all he had and went to Beersheba, where he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac.

Jacob set out from Beersheba. His sons put him, their small children, and their wives in the wagons which the king of Egypt had sent.

They took their livestock and the possessions they had acquired in Canaan and went to Egypt. Jacob took all his descendants with him:

his sons, his grandsons, his daughters, and his granddaughters.

The members of Jacob's family who went to Egypt with him were his oldest son Reuben

Simeon and his sons: Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jachin, Zohar, and Shaul, the son of a Canaanite woman.

Levi and his sons: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.