Study Desk

Three days later, on his birthday, the king gave a feast for all his officers. In front of his officers, he released from prison the chief officer who served his wine and the chief baker.

The next morning the king was troubled about these dreams, so he sent for all the magicians and wise men of Egypt. The king told them his dreams, but no one could explain their meaning to him.

So the king called for Joseph. The guards quickly brought him out of the prison, and he shaved, put on clean clothes, and went before the king.

Joseph answered the king, "I am not able to explain the meaning of dreams, but God will do this for the king."

The seven good cows stand for seven years, and the seven good heads of grain stand for seven years. Both dreams mean the same thing.

The seven thin and ugly cows stand for seven years, and the seven thin heads of grain burned by the hot east wind stand for seven years of hunger.

The time of hunger became terrible in all of Egypt, and the people cried to the king for food. He said to all the Egyptians, "Go to Joseph and do whatever he tells you."

I have heard that there is grain in Egypt. Go down there and buy grain for us to eat, so that we will live and not die."

Then Joseph put them all in prison for three days.

They said to each other, "We are being punished for what we did to our brother. We saw his trouble, and he begged us to save him, but we refused to listen. That is why we are in this trouble now."

Then Reuben said to them, "I told you not to harm the boy, but you refused to listen to me. So now we are being punished for what we did to him."

Joseph told his servants to fill his brothers' bags with grain and to put the money the brothers had paid for the grain back in their bags. The servants were also to give them what they would need for their trip back home. And the servants did this.

When they stopped for the night, one of the brothers opened his sack to get food for his donkey. Then he saw his money in the top of the sack.

He said to the other brothers, "The money I paid for the grain has been put back. Here it is in my sack!" The brothers were very frightened. They said to each other, "What has God done to us?"

When Jacob's family had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, Jacob said to them, "Go to Egypt again and buy a little more grain for us to eat."

If you will send Benjamin with us, we will go down and buy food for you.

I will guarantee you that he will be safe, and I will be personally responsible for him. If I don't bring him back to you, you can blame me all my life.

While we were going home, we stopped for the night and when we opened our sacks each of us found all his money in his sack. We brought that money with us to give it back to you.

And we have brought more money to pay for the food we want to buy this time. We don't know who put that money in our sacks."

But the servant answered, "It's all right. Don't be afraid. Your God, the God of your father, must have put the money in your sacks. I got the money you paid me for the grain last time." Then the servant brought Simeon out to them.