The First Book of Moses Genesis

• Author: Moses
• Place Written: Wilderness
• When Written: c. 1500 B.C.E.

CHAPTER 1

The Creation

1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

² The earth was without form and empty; and darkness was over the face of the deep,[1] and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

First Creation Day

³ And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. ⁴ And God saw the light, that it was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. ⁵ And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

Second Creation Day

⁶ And God went on to say, “Let there be an expanse[2] in the middle of the waters and let there be a separation between the waters and the waters.” ⁷ And God went on to make the expanse, and make a separation between the waters, which were under the expanse and between the waters, which were above the expanse: and it came to be so. ⁸ And God called the expanse heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.

Third Creation Day

⁹ And God went on to say, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. ¹⁰ God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.

¹¹ And God went on to say, “Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth.” And it was so. ¹² The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. ¹³ And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.

Fourth Creation Day

¹⁴ And God went on to say, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, ¹⁵ and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. ¹⁶ And God had made[3] the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night, and the stars. ¹⁷ And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, ¹⁸ to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. ¹⁹ And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

Fifth Creation Day

²⁰ And God said, “Let the waters swarm with swarms of living souls, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens.” ²¹ So God went on to create[4] the great sea creatures and every living soul that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. ²² And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” ²³ And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.

Sixth Creation Day

²⁴ And God went on to say, “Let the earth bring forth living souls according to their kinds, livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so. ²⁵ And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

²⁶ And God went on to say, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth[5] and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

²⁷ So God created man in his own image,
    in the image of God he created him;
    male and female he created them.

²⁸ And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” ²⁹ And God went on to say, “Look, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. ³⁰ And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is a living soul, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. ³¹ And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

CHAPTER 2

God Rests on the Seventh Day

2 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts. ² And by the seventh day God completed his work[6] which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done. ³ Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it, he rested from all his work which God had created and made.

⁴ This is the history[7] of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that Jehovah[8] God made earth and heaven.

The Creation of Man and Woman

⁵ Now no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up, for Jehovah God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground.[9] ⁶ But there went up a mist[10] from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground.

⁷ Then Jehovah God formed man[11] of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;[12] and man became a living soul. ⁸ And Jehovah God planted a garden toward the east, in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. ⁹ And out of the ground Jehovah God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

¹⁰ Now a river flowed out[13] of Eden to water the garden; and from there it divided and became four rivers.[14] ¹¹ The name of the first is Pishon; it flows around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. ¹² And the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. ¹³ The name of the second river is Gihon; it flows around the whole land of Cush. ¹⁴ The name of the third river is Tigris; it flows east of Assyria.[15] And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

¹⁵ And Jehovah God took the man and set him in the garden of Eden to cultivate it and to keep it. ¹⁶ And Jehovah God commanded the man, saying, “From every tree of the garden you may freely eat, ¹⁷ but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat,[16] for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die.”[17]

¹⁸ Then Jehovah God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper for him.[18] ¹⁹ And out of the ground Jehovah God formed every beast of the field, and every bird of the heavens; and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatsoever the man called every living soul, that was its name. ²⁰ And the man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the heavens, and to every beast of the field; but for man there was found no helper as a counterpart of him. ²¹ So Jehovah God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. ²² And the rib that Jehovah God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.

²³ Then the man said,

“This at last is bone of my bones
    and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman,[19]
    because she was taken out of Man.”

²⁴ Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall be as one flesh. ²⁵ And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

CHAPTER 3

The Temptation and the Fall of Man

3 Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which Jehovah God had made. And he said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You[20] shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” ² And the woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat,  ³ but from the tree that is in the midst of the garden, God said, ‘You shall not eat from it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’”  ⁴ And the serpent said to the woman, “You shall not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”  

⁶ So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desirable to make one wise,[21] and she took of its fruit and ate, then she also gave some to her husband when[22] with her, and he ate. ⁷ Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

The Costs of Sin

⁸ Then they heard the sound[23] of Jehovah God walking in the garden in the cool[24] of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of Jehovah God among the trees of the garden. ⁹ Then Jehovah God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” ¹⁰ And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, and I hid myself.” ¹¹ And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree, of which I commanded you not to eat?” ¹² The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.” ¹³ Then Jehovah God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

¹⁴ Jehovah God said to the serpent,

“Because you have done this,
    cursed are you above all livestock
    and above all beasts of the field;
on your belly you shall go,
    and dust you shall eat
    all the days of your life.
¹⁵ And I will put enmity between you and the woman,
    and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
    and you shall bruise his heel.”

¹⁶ To the woman he said,

“I will surely increase your pain and your pregnancy;[25]
    in pain you shall bring forth children.
Your desire shall be for your husband,
    and he shall rule over you.”

¹⁷ And to Adam he said,

“Because you have listened to the voice of your wife
    and have eaten of the tree
of which I commanded you,
    ‘You shall not eat of it,’
cursed is the ground because of you;
    in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
¹⁸ Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
    and you shall eat the plants of the field.
¹⁹ By the sweat of your face
    you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground,
    for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
    and to dust you shall return.”

²⁰ Now the man called his wife’s name Eve,[26] because she was the mother of all living. ²¹ And Jehovah God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them. ²² Then Jehovah God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil; and in order that he may not put his hand out and take fruit also from the tree of life and eat and live forever.” ²³ Therefore Jehovah God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. ²⁴ So he drove the man out, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

CHAPTER 4

Cain and Abel

4 Now the man knew[27] Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain,[28] and said, “I have gotten a man with the help of Jehovah.” ² And again she bore[29] his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.

³ And in the course of time[30] Cain brought to Jehovah an offering of the fruit of the ground. ⁴ And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions. And Jehovah had regard for Abel and his offering; ⁵ but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell.[31] ⁶ Then Jehovah said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? ⁷ If you do well, will there not be a lifting up?[32] And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.”

⁸ Cain said to Abel his brother. “Let us go out into the field.”[33] And it came about when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him.

⁹ Then Jehovah[34] said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” And he said, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?” ¹⁰ He said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground. ¹¹ Now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. ¹² When you cultivate the ground, it will no longer yield its strength to you; you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.” ¹³ Cain said to Jehovah, “My punishment is greater than I can bear! ¹⁴ Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.” ¹⁵ So Jehovah said to him, “Not so![35] Whoever kills Cain, vengeance will be taken on him sevenfold.” And Jehovah put a mark on Cain so that no one finding him would slay him.

¹⁶ Then Cain went out from the presence of Jehovah, and dwelt in the land of Nod,[36] east of Eden.

¹⁷ Cain knew[37] his wife and she conceived and gave birth to Enoch; and he built a city, and called the name of the city Enoch, after the name of his son, Enoch. ¹⁸ Now to Enoch was born Irad, and Irad fathered Mehujael, and Mehujael fathered Methushael, and Methushael fathered Lamech. ¹⁹ And Lamech took two wives. The name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah. ²⁰ Adah gave birth to Jabal; he was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock. ²¹ His brother’s name was Jubal; he was the father of all those who play the lyre and pipe. ²² As for Zillah, she also bore Tubal-cain, the forger of all instruments of copper and iron; and the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah.

²³ Lamech said to his wives,

“Adah and Zillah,
Listen to my voice,
You wives of Lamech,
Give heed to my speech,
For I have killed a man for wounding me;
And a boy for striking me;
²⁴ If Cain is avenged sevenfold,
Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.”

²⁵ Adam knew[38] his wife again; and she bore a son and called his name Seth, for, she said, “God has appointed me another offspring in place of Abel, for Cain killed him.” ²⁶ To Seth, to him also a son was born; and he called his name Enosh. At that time men began to call upon the name of Jehovah.

CHAPTER 5

Adam’s Descendants to Noah

5 This is the book of the history of Adam. In the day when God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. ² Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man[39] when they were created.

³ When Adam had lived one hundred and thirty years, he became[40] the father of a son in his own likeness, according to his image, and named him Seth. ⁴ Then the days of Adam after he became the father of Seth were eight hundred years, and he had other sons and daughters. ⁵ So all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years, and he died.

⁶ Seth lived one hundred and five years and became the father of Enosh. ⁷ Then Seth lived eight hundred and seven years after he became the father of Enosh, and he had other sons and daughters. ⁸ So all the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years, and he died.

⁹ Enosh lived ninety years and became the father of Kenan. ¹⁰ Then Enosh lived eight hundred and fifteen years after he became the father of Kenan, and he had other sons and daughters. ¹¹ So all the days of Enosh were nine hundred and five years, and he died.

¹² Kenan lived seventy years and became the father of Mahalalel. ¹³ Then Kenan lived eight hundred and forty years after he became the father of Mahalalel, and he had other sons and daughters. ¹⁴ So all the days of Kenan were nine hundred and ten years, and he died.

¹⁵ Mahalalel lived sixty-five years and became the father of Jared. ¹⁶ Then Mahalalel lived eight hundred and thirty years after he became the father of Jared, and he had other sons and daughters. ¹⁷ So all the days of Mahalalel were eight hundred and ninety-five years, and he died.

¹⁸ Jared lived one hundred and sixty-two years and became the father of Enoch. ¹⁹ Then Jared lived eight hundred years after he became the father of Enoch, and he had other sons and daughters. ²⁰ So all the days of Jared were nine hundred and sixty-two years, and he died.

²¹ Enoch lived sixty-five years and became the father of Methuselah. ²² Then Enoch walked with God[41] three hundred years after he became the father of Methuselah, and he had other sons and daughters. ²³ So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years. ²⁴ Enoch walked with God;[42] and he was not,[43] for God took him.[44]

²⁵ Methuselah lived one hundred and eighty-seven years and became the father of Lamech. ²⁶ Then Methuselah lived seven hundred and eighty-two years after he became the father of Lamech, and he had other sons and daughters. ²⁷ So all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred and sixty-nine years, and he died.

²⁸ Lamech lived one hundred and eighty-two years and became the father of a son. ²⁹ Now he called his name Noah,[45] saying, “This one will give us comfort[46] from our work and from the toil of our hands arising from the ground which Jehovah has cursed.”[47] ³⁰ Then Lamech lived five hundred and ninety-five years after he became the father of Noah, and he had other sons and daughters. ³¹ So all the days of Lamech were seven hundred and seventy-seven years, and he died.

³² Noah was five hundred years old, and Noah became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

CHAPTER 6

The Corruption of Mankind

6 Now it came about when men began to multiply on the face of the ground, and daughters were born to them, ² that the sons[48] of God[49] saw that the daughters of men were beautiful;[50] and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose. ³ Then Jehovah said, “My Spirit shall not remain[51] with man forever, for he[52] also is flesh; therefore, his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” ⁴ The Nephilim[53] were on the earth in those days,[54] and also afterward, when the sons of God came into the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.

⁵ Then Jehovah saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart[55] was only evil continually. ⁶ And Jehovah regretted[56] that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. ⁷ Jehovah said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the heavens;[57] for I regret that I have made them.” ⁸ But Noah found favor in the eyes of Jehovah.

⁹ This is the history of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless[58] in his generation. Noah walked[59] with God. ¹⁰ Noah became[60] the father of three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

¹¹ Now the earth was corrupt in the sight of God, and the earth was filled with violence. ¹² And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.

¹³ Then God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before me; for the earth is filled with violence because of them; and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth. ¹⁴ Make yourself an ark of gopher wood.[61] Make rooms in the ark and cover it inside and out with pitch. ¹⁵ This is how you shall make it: the length of the ark three hundred cubits,[62] its breadth fifty cubits,[63] and its height thirty cubits.[64] ¹⁶ You shall make a roof[65] for the ark and finish it to a cubit[66] from the above;[67] and set the door of the ark in the side of it; you shall make it with lower, second, and third decks. ¹⁷ Behold, I, even I am bringing the flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life, from under heaven; everything that is on the earth shall perish. ¹⁸ But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. ¹⁹ And of all living creatures of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. ²⁰ Of the flying creatures after their kind, and of the animals after their kind, of every creeping thing of the ground after its kind, two of every sort will come to you to keep them alive. ²¹ As for you, take for yourself some of all food which is edible, and gather it to yourself; and it shall be for food for you and for them.” ²² And Noah did according to all that God had commanded him. He did just so.

CHAPTER 7

The Flood

7 Then Jehovah said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation. ² You shall take with you of every clean animal by sevens,[68] a male and his female; and of the animals that are not clean two, the male and its mate; ³ also of the flying creatures of the heavens by sevens,[69] male and female, to keep their offspring alive on the face of all the earth. ⁴ For after seven more days, I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights; and I will blot out from the face of the land every living thing that I have made.” ⁵ And Noah did all that Jehovah had commanded him.

⁶ Now Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters came[70] upon the earth. ⁷ And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him went into the ark to escape the waters of the flood. ⁸ Of clean animals and animals that are not clean and birds and everything that creeps on the ground, ⁹ there went into the ark to Noah two and two,^[71] male and female, as God had commanded Noah. ¹⁰ It came about after the seven days, that the water of the flood came[72] upon the earth. ¹¹ In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same day all the fountains of the great deep burst open, and the windows of heaven were opened. ¹² And the rain fell upon the earth for forty days and forty nights.

¹³ On the very same day Noah and his sons, Shem and Ham and Japheth, and Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them entered the ark, ¹⁴ they and every beast, according to its kind, and all the livestock according to their kinds, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, according to its kind, and every bird, according to its kind, every winged creature. ¹⁵ And they went into the ark with Noah, two and two of all flesh in which there was the breath of life. ¹⁶ And those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him. And Jehovah shut him in.

¹⁷ And the flood continued forty days on the earth. The waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the earth. ¹⁸ The waters prevailed and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the face[73] of the waters. ¹⁹ And the waters prevailed overwhelmingly[74] on the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heavens were covered. ²⁰ The waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them fifteen cubits[75] deep. ²¹ And every living thing that moved on the earth perished, the birds, and the domesticated animals, and the wild animals, and everything that swarmed on the earth, and all mankind; ²² everything in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life among all that was on dry land, died. ²³ And he blotted out every living thing that was upon the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to flying creatures of the heavens, and they were blotted out from the earth; and only Noah was left, together with those that were with him in the ark. ²⁴ The waters prevailed on the earth one hundred and fifty days.

CHAPTER 8

The Flood Subsides

8 But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark; and God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided. ² The fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed, the rain from the heavens was restrained, ³ and the waters receded from the earth continually, and at the end of one hundred and fifty days the waters had abated. ⁴ And in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. ⁵ And the waters continued to abate until the tenth month; in the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were visible.

⁶ And it came to be at the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made, ⁷ and he sent forth a raven; it went out, going out and returning until the waters were dried up from the earth. ⁸ Then he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground, ⁹ but the dove found no place to set her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were still on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and took her and brought her into the ark to himself. ¹⁰ And he waited another seven days, and again he sent out the dove from the ark. ¹¹ And the dove came back to him in the evening, and behold, in her mouth was a freshly plucked olive leaf. So Noah knew that the waters had abated from the earth. ¹² And he waited again another seven days, and he sent out the dove, but it did not return again to him.

¹³ In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from upon the earth. And Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dried up. ¹⁴ In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry. ¹⁵ Then God spoke to Noah, saying, ¹⁶ “Go out from the ark, you and your wife, and your sons and your sons’ wives with you. ¹⁷ Bring out with you all the living creatures[76]  that are with you of all flesh, flying creatures and animals and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, that they may swarm on the earth, and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” ¹⁸ So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him. ¹⁹ Every beast, every creeping thing, and every flying creature, everything that moves on the earth, went out by families from the ark.

²⁰ Then Noah built an altar to Jehovah and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. ²¹ Jehovah smelled the soothing aroma; and Jehovah said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground on account of man, for the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth;[77] and I will never again destroy every living thing, as I have done.

²² While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”

CHAPTER 9

Covenant of the Rainbow

9 And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. ² The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every living creature of the earth and upon every flying creature of the heavens, upon every creature that moves on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. ³ Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. ⁴ Only flesh with its soul,[78] its blood, you shall not eat ⁵ And for your blood of your souls[79] I will require back: from every living creature I will require it and from man. From the hand of man, even at the hand of every man’s brother, I will require the soul[80] of man.

⁶ “Whoever sheds man’s blood, by man his blood shall be shed, for in the image of God he made man. ⁷ “And you, be fruitful and multiply, increase abundantly on the earth and multiply in it.”

⁸ Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, saying, ⁹ “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, ¹⁰ and with every living soul[81] that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, to all the beasts of the earth.[82] ¹¹ I establish my covenant with you, that never again will all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.” ¹² And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: ¹³ I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. ¹⁴ It shall be, when I bring clouds over the earth, that the bow is seen in the cloud, ¹⁵ then I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. ¹⁶ When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” ¹⁷ And God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

Prophecies about Descendants of Noah

¹⁸ The sons of Noah who went forth from the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.) ¹⁹ These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was scattered.[83]

²⁰ Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. ²¹ He drank of the wine and became drunk and uncovered himself inside his tent. ²² And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father and told his two brothers outside. ²³ Then Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it on both their shoulders, and walked backward and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were turned backward,[84] and they did not see their father’s nakedness. ²⁴ When Noah awoke from his wine,[85] he knew what his youngest son had done to him. ²⁵ And he said,

“Cursed be Canaan;
    a slave of slaves[86] shall he be to his brothers.”

²⁶ He also said,

“Blessed be Jehovah, the God of Shem;
    and let Canaan be his slave.

²⁷ “May God enlarge Japheth,
    and let him dwell in the tents of Shem;
    and let Canaan be his slave.”

²⁸ Noah lived three hundred and fifty years after the flood. ²⁹ And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years, and he died.

CHAPTER 10

Descendants of Noah

10 Now these are the records of the generations of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah; and sons were born to them after the flood.

² The sons of Japheth: Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras. ³ The sons of Gomer: Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah. ⁴ The sons of Javan: Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim.[87] ⁵ From these the island peoples spread in their lands, each with his own language, by their families, in their nations.

⁶ The sons of Ham: Cush, Egypt, Put, and Canaan. ⁷ The sons of Cush: Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca. The sons of Raamah: Sheba and Dedan. ⁸ Cush fathered Nimrod; he was the first on earth to be a mighty man. ⁹ He was a mighty hunter before Jehovah.[88] Therefore it is said, “Like Nimrod a mighty hunter before Jehovah.” ¹⁰ The beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. ¹¹ From that land he went forth into Assyria, and built Nineveh and Rehoboth-Ir and Calah, ¹² and Resen between Nineveh and Calah; that is the great city. ¹³ Mizraim fathered Ludim, Anamim, Lehabim, Naphtuhim, ¹⁴ and Pathrusim and Casluhim (from which came the Philistines) and Caphtorim.

¹⁵ Canaan fathered Sidon his firstborn and Heth, ¹⁶ and the Jebusites, the Amorites, the Girgashites, ¹⁷ the Hivites, the Arkites, the Sinites, ¹⁸ the Arvadites, the Zemarites, and the Hamathites. Afterward the families of the Canaanites dispersed. ¹⁹ And the territory of the Canaanites extended from Sidon in the direction of Gerar as far as Gaza, and in the direction of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, as far as Lasha. ²⁰ These are the sons of Ham, according to their families, their languages, their lands, and their nations.

²¹ To Shem also, the father of all the children of Eber, the elder brother of Japheth, children were born. ²² The sons of Shem: Elam, Asshur, Arpachshad, Lud, and Aram. ²³ The sons of Aram: Uz, Hul, Gether, and Mash.[89] ²⁴ Arpachshad fathered Shelah;[90] and Shelah fathered Eber. ²⁵ To Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg,[91] for in his days the earth was divided, and his brother’s name was Joktan. ²⁶ Joktan fathered Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, 27 Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, ²⁸ Obal, Abimael, Sheba, ²⁹ Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab; all these were the sons of Joktan. ³⁰ The territory in which they lived extended from Mesha in the direction of Sephar to the hill country of the east. ³¹ These are the sons of Shem, according to their families, according to their languages, by their lands, according to their nations.

³² These are the families of the sons of Noah, according to their genealogies, by their nations; and out of these the nations were separated on the earth after the flood.

CHAPTER 11

Universal Language, Babel, Confusion

11 Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. ² And as men migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. ³ And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. ⁴ Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered over the face of the whole earth.” ⁵ Jehovah came down to see the city and the tower that the sons of men had built. ⁶ And Jehovah said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. ⁷ Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they will not understand one another’s speech. ⁸ So Jehovah scattered them from there over the face of the whole earth, and they stopped building the city. ⁹ Therefore its name was called Babel, because there Jehovah confused the language of the whole earth; and from there Jehovah scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth.

Descendants of Shem

¹⁰ These are the generations of Shem. When Shem was one hundred years old, he fathered Arpachshad, two years after the flood. ¹¹ And Shem lived five hundred years after he fathered Arpachshad, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

¹² When Arpachshad[92] had lived thirty-five years,[93] he fathered Shelah. ¹³ And Arpachshad lived four hundred and three years after he fathered Shelah, and he fathered other sons and daughters.[94]

¹⁴ When Shelah had lived thirty years, he fathered Eber. ¹⁵ And Shelah lived four hundred and three years after he fathered Eber, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

¹⁶ When Eber had lived thirty-four years, he fathered Peleg. ¹⁷ And Eber lived four hundred and thirty years after he fathered Peleg, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

¹⁸ When Peleg had lived thirty years, he fathered Reu. ¹⁹ And Peleg lived two hundred and nine years after he fathered Reu, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

²⁰ When Reu had lived thirty-two years, he fathered Serug. ²¹ And Reu lived two hundred and seven years after he fathered Serug, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

²² When Serug had lived thirty years, he fathered Nahor. ²³ And Serug lived two hundred years after he fathered Nahor, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

²⁴ When Nahor had lived twenty-nine years, he fathered Terah. ²⁵ And Nahor lived one hundred and nineteen years after he fathered Terah, and he fathered other sons and daughters.

²⁶ When Terah had lived seventy years, he fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

²⁷ Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran, and Haran fathered Lot. ²⁸ Haran died in the presence of his father Terah in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans.[95] ²⁹ And Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves. The name of the wife of Abram was Sarai, and the name of the wife of Nahor was Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah and Iscah. ³⁰ Now Sarai was barren; she had no child.

³¹ Terah took Abram his son, and Lot, the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, the wife of Abram his son, and went out with them[96] from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan. And they went to Haran, and they settled there. ³² And the days of Terah were two hundred and five years, and Terah died in Haran.

CHAPTER 12

Abram Leaves Haran for Canaan

12 Now Jehovah said to Abram, “Go out from your land and from your kindred,[97] and from the house of your father to the land that I will show you. ² And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. ³ I will bless those who bless you, and him who curses you I will curse,[98] and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

⁴ So Abram went, as Jehovah had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. ⁵ And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot the son of his brother, and all their possessions that they had gathered, and the souls that they had acquired in Haran, and they set out to go to the land of Canaan. When they came to the land of Canaan. ⁶ Abram traveled through the land up to the place of Shechem, to the Oak[99] of Moreh. Now the Canaanites were in the land. ⁷ Jehovah appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to Jehovah, who had appeared to him. ⁸ From there he moved to the hill country on the east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. And there he built an altar to Jehovah and called upon the name of Jehovah. ⁹ And Abram journeyed on, still going toward the Negev.[100]

Abram and Sarai in Egypt

¹⁰ Now there was a famine in the land, so Abram went down to Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was severe in the land. ¹¹ And it came about when he came near to Egypt, that he said to Sarai his wife, “Look please, I know that you are a beautiful woman, ¹² and when the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me, but they will let you live. ¹³ Please say that you are my sister so that it may go well with me because of you, and that my soul may live[101] on account of you.” ¹⁴ As soon as Abram entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful. ¹⁵ And the princes of Pharaoh saw her, and praised her to Pharaoh, so the woman was taken to the house of Pharaoh. ¹⁶ And he dealt well with Abram because of her, and he had sheep, cattle, male and female donkeys, male and female slaves, and camels.

¹⁷ But Jehovah afflicted Pharaoh and his household with severe plagues because of Sarai, Abram’s wife. ¹⁸ So Pharaoh called Abram and said, “What is this you have done to me? Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? ¹⁹ Why did you say, ‘She is my sister,’ so that I was about to take her as my wife? Here is your wife. Take her and go!” ²⁰ So Pharaoh gave his men orders concerning him, and they sent him away with his wife and all that he had.

CHAPTER 13

Abram and Lot

13 And Abram went up out of Egypt, he, and his wife, and all that he had, and Lot with him, to the Negev.

² Now Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold. ³ And he went on his journeys from the Negev as far as Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, ⁴ to the place of the altar which he had made there formerly; and there Abram called on the name of Jehovah. ⁵ And Lot, who went with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. ⁶ And the land could not support them while dwelling together, for their possessions were so great that they were not able to remain together. ⁷ And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram’s livestock and the herdsmen of Lot’s livestock. At that time, the Canaanites and the Perizzites were dwelling in the land.

⁸ Then Abram said to Lot, “Let there be no strife between you and me, and between your herdsmen and my herdsmen, for we are kinsmen. ⁹ Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me. If you take the left hand, then I will go to the right, or if you take the right hand, then I will go to the left.” ¹⁰ And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw that the Jordan Valley was well watered everywhere like the garden[102] of Jehovah, like the land of Egypt, in the direction of Zoar. This was before Jehovah destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. ¹¹ So Lot chose for himself all the plain of the Jordan, and Lot journeyed east. Thus, they separated from each other.[103] ¹² Abram dwelt in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the cities of the plain, and moved his tent as far as Sodom. ¹³ Now the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners exceedingly against Jehovah.

¹⁴ And Jehovah said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, “Now lift up your eyes, and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward, ¹⁵ for all the land that you see to you will I give it, and to your offspring forever. ¹⁶ And I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then may your offspring also be numbered. ¹⁷ Arise, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for to you I will give it.” ¹⁸ So Abram moved his tent, and came and dwelt by the oaks of Mamre, which are in Hebron, and there he built an altar to Jehovah.

CHAPTER 14

Abram Rescues Lot

14 And it came to pass in the days of Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goiim,[104] ² that they made war with Bera king of Sodom, and with Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, and Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar). ³ And all these joined forces in the Valley of Siddim (that is, the Salt Sea). ⁴ Twelve years they had served Chedorlaomer, but in the thirteenth year they rebelled. ⁵ In the fourteenth year Chedorlaomer and the kings that were with him, came and smote[105] the Rephaim in Ashteroth-karnaim and the Zuzim in Ham and the Emim in Shaveh-kiriathaim,[106] ⁶ and the Horites in their Mount Seir, as far as El-paran, which is by the wilderness. ⁷ Then they turned back and came to En-mishpat (that is, Kadesh), and smote all the country of the Amalekites, and also the Amorites, who dwelt in Hazazon-tamar. ⁸ And there went out the king of Sodom, and the king of Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar); and they drew up in battle formation against them in the Valley of Siddim, ⁹ against Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goiim, and Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar, four kings against the five. ¹⁰ Now the valley of Siddim was full of tar pits, and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, and they fell into them, but the rest fled to the mountains. ¹¹ And they took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their provisions, and went their way. ¹² And they took Lot, the son of the brother of Abram, who was dwelling in Sodom, and his possessions, and went their way.

¹³ And there came one that had escaped and told Abram the Hebrew, now dwelling by the oaks of Mamre, the Amorite, brother of Eshcol, and brother of Aner; and these men were allies[107] with Abram. ¹⁴ When Abram heard that his relative[108] had been taken captive, he led out his trained men, born in his house, three hundred and eighteen, and went in pursuit as far as Dan. ¹⁵ And he divided himself against them by night, he and his slaves, and smote[109] them, and pursued them to Hobah, which is north[110] of Damascus. ¹⁶ And he brought back all the goods, and also brought back his relative[111] Lot with his possessions, and also the women, and the people.

Melchizedek Blesses Abram

¹⁷ After Abram returned from defeating Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him, the king of Sodom went out to meet Abram at the Valley of Shaveh, that is, the Valley of the King. ¹⁸ And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was priest of the Most High[112] God. ¹⁹ He blessed him and said,

“Blessed be Abram by the Most High God,
    Maker[113] of heaven and earth;
²⁰ and blessed be the Most High God,
    who has delivered your enemies^[114] into your hand.”

And he gave him a tenth of everything. ²¹ And the king of Sodom said to Abram, “Give me the souls,[115] but take the goods for yourself.” ²² But Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have lifted up my hand[116] to Jehovah the Most High God, Creator of heaven and earth, ²³ that I will not take a thread or a sandal strap or anything that is yours, so that you may not say, ‘I made Abram rich.’ ²⁴ I will take nothing but what the young men have eaten, and the share of the men who went with me; Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their share.”

CHAPTER 15

God’s Covenant with Abram

15 After these things the word of Jehovah came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Do not fear, Abram, I am a shield to you; Your reward shall be very great.” ² But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord Jehovah,[117] what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” ³ And Abram said, “Look, you have given me no offspring, and one born in my house is my heir.” ⁴ Then look, the word of Jehovah came to him, saying, “This man will not be your heir; but one who will come forth from your own inward parts,[118] he shall be your heir.” ⁵ And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward the heavens, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” ⁶ And he believed in Jehovah, and he credited it to him as righteousness. ⁷ And he said unto him, “I am Jehovah who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give you this land to inherit it.” ⁸ And he said, Sovereign Lord Jehovah, “how am I to know that I shall inherit it?” ⁹ And he said to him, “Take for me a three-year-old heifer, and a three-year-old female goat, and a three-year-old ram, and a turtledove and a young pigeon.” ¹⁰ And he took him all these, and divided them in the middle, and laid each half opposite the other, but he did not cut the birds in half. ¹¹ And the birds of prey came down upon the dead bodies, and Abram drove them away.

¹² And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram and look, a dreadful great darkness fell upon him. ¹³ Then he said to Abram: “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners[119] in a land not theirs and they shall serve them[120] and they[121] shall oppress them for four hundred years. ¹⁴ But also on the nation that they[122] serve I will bring judgment, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. ¹⁵ As for you, you shall go to your forefathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age. ¹⁶ And in the fourth generation shall return here, for the error of the Amorites is not yet complete.”[123]

¹⁷ When the sun had gone down and it was dark, look, a smoking firepot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. ¹⁸ On that day Jehovah made a covenant with Abram, saying, “to your offspring have I given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates: ¹⁹ the Kenite, and the Kenizzite, and the Kadmonite, ²⁰ and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Rephaim, ²¹ and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Girgashite, and the Jebusite.”

CHAPTER 16

Sarai and Hagar

16 Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children, but she had a female Egyptian slave whose name was Hagar. ² And Sarai said to Abram, “Look, please, Jehovah has prevented me from bearing children. Please go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. ³ Then Sarai, the wife of Abram, took Hagar, her Egyptian female slave, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to Abram her husband as his wife. ⁴ And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised[124] in her eyes. ⁵ And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done me be upon you. I gave my maid into your bosom, but when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes. May Jehovah judge between me and you.”^{[125] 6} But Abram said to Sarai, “Look, your maid is in your hand;[126] do to her that which is good in your eyes. And Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her face.[127]

⁷ Now the angel[128] of Jehovah found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. ⁸ He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from and where are you going?” And she said, “I am fleeing from the face of my mistress Sarai.” ⁹ And the angel of Jehovah said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hands.”[129] ¹⁰ And the angel of Jehovah said to her, I will greatly multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude.”  ¹¹ And the angel of Jehovah said to her,

“Look, you are with child
    and shall bear a son.
You shall call his name Ishmael,[130]
    because Jehovah has heard your affliction.[131]
¹² And he shall be a wild donkey of a man,
    his hand will be against every man
    and every man’s hand against him,
and he shall dwell over against all his kinsmen.”

¹³ Then she called on the name of Jehovah, who spoke to her, “You are a God who sees,” for she said, “Have I even here looked upon the one who sees me?” ¹⁴ Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi;[132] look, it is between Kadesh and Bered.

¹⁵ And Hagar bore Abram a son; and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael. ¹⁶ Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to him.

CHAPTER 17

Abraham and the Covenant of Circumcision

17 When Abram was ninety-nine years old Jehovah appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am God Almighty;[133] walk before me and be blameless.[134] ² so that I may make my covenant between me and you and may multiply you exceedingly.” ³ Then Abram fell upon his face and God spoke with him, saying, ⁴ “As for me, look, my covenant shall be with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. ⁵ No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I will make you the father of a multitude of nations. ⁶ And I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make nations and kings come out of you. ⁷ And I will establish my covenant between me and you, and between your offspring after you, throughout their generations as an everlasting covenant to be as God for you and to your offspring after you. ⁸ And I will give to you and to your offspring after you, the land of your sojourning, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.”

⁹ And God said to Abraham, “Now as for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you, throughout their generations. ¹⁰ This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised.[135] ¹¹ And you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. ¹² And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every male throughout your generations, he that is born in the house, or who was purchased with money from a foreigner that is not of your offspring. ¹³ Every man born in your house and every man purchased with your money must be circumcised, and my covenant in your flesh must serve as a lasting covenant. ¹⁴ And the uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”

¹⁵ And God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah[136] shall be her name. ¹⁶ I will bless her; indeed, I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she will produce nations; kings of peoples will come from her.” ¹⁷ And Abraham fell upon his face and laughed. And he said in his heart, “Can a child be born to a man a hundred years old, and will Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?” ¹⁸ And Abraham said to God, “Oh that Ishmael might live before You!” ¹⁹ God said, “No, but Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him. ²⁰ And as for Ishmael, I have heard you. Look, I have blessed him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall father twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. ²¹ But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this time next year.” ²² When he had finished talking with him, God went up from Abraham.

²³ Then Abraham took Ishmael his son and all those born in his house and all who were bought with his money, every male among the men of Abraham’s house, and he circumcised the flesh of their foreskins that same day, as God had said to him. ²⁴ Now Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. ²⁵ And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old when he circumcised the flesh of his foreskin. ²⁶ On the same day Abraham was circumcised, and Ishmael his son. ²⁷ And all the men of his house, those born in the house and those bought with money from a foreigner, were circumcised with him.

CHAPTER 18

Birth of Isaac Promised

18 And Jehovah appeared to him by the oaks of Mamre, as he was sitting at the tent door in the heat of the day. ² He lifted up his eyes and looked, behold three men were standing in front of him. When he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to meet them, and he bowed down to the ground. ³ And he said, “Jehovah,[137] if I have found favor in your sight do not pass by your servant. ⁴ Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree, ⁵ and while I bring a morsel of bread, that you may refresh yourselves,[138] and after that you may pass on—since you have come to your servant.” So they said, “Do as you have said.” ⁶ And Abraham went quickly into the tent to Sarah and said, “Quick! Three seah measures[139] of fine flour! Knead it and make bread cakes.” ⁷ And Abraham ran to the herd and chose a tender and good calf.[140] He gave it to the servant, who hurried to prepare it. ⁸ Then he took curds and milk, as well as the calf that he had prepared, and he stood by them under the tree while they ate.

⁹ Then they said to him, “Where is Sarah your wife?” And he said, “There, in the tent.” ¹⁰ Jehovah said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife shall have a son.” And Sarah was listening at the tent door behind him. ¹¹ Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in years. The way of women had ceased to be with Sarah. ¹² Sarah laughed to herself, saying, “After I have become old, shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?” ¹³ Jehovah said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?’ ¹⁴ Is anything too hard for Jehovah? At the appointed time I will return to you, about this time next year, and Sarah shall have a son.” ¹⁵ But Sarah denied it, saying, “I did not laugh,” for she was afraid. He said, “No, but you did laugh.”

The Faithfulness of Abraham

¹⁶ Then the men rose up from there and looked down toward Sodom; and Abraham was walking with them to send them away. ¹⁷ Jehovah said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, ¹⁸ seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? ¹⁹ For I have known[141] him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of Jehovah by doing righteousness and justice, so that Jehovah may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.” ²⁰ Then Jehovah said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great and their sin is very grave,[142] ²¹ I will go down now, and see if they have done entirely according to its outcry, which has come to me; and if not, I will know.”

Abraham Pleads for Sodom

²² And the men turned from there and went toward Sodom, but Jehovah remained standing before Abraham.[143] ²³ Abraham came near and said, “Will You indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? ²⁴ Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will you indeed sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous who are in it? ²⁵ Far be it from you to do such a thing as this, to slay the righteous with the wicked, that the righteous would be as the wicked! Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do justice?” ²⁶ And Jehovah said, “If I find fifty righteous in Sodom, in the midst of the city, then I will spare[144] the whole place for their sake.” ²⁷ Abraham answered and said, “Behold, I have undertaken to speak to Jehovah, I who am but dust and ashes. ²⁸ Suppose the fifty righteous are lacking five, will you destroy the whole city because of five?” And he said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.” ²⁹ He spoke to him yet again and said, “Suppose forty are found there?” And he said, “I will not do it on account of the forty.” ³⁰ Then he said, “Oh let not Jehovah be angry, and I will speak; suppose thirty are found there?” And he said, “I will not do it, if I find thirty there.” ³¹ And he said, “Behold, I have undertaken to speak to Jehovah; suppose twenty are found there?” And he said, “For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it.” ³² Then he said, “Oh may Jehovah not be angry, and I shall speak only this once; suppose ten are found there?” And He said, “For the sake of ten I will not destroy it.” ³³ And Jehovah went his way, when he had finished speaking to Abraham, and Abraham returned to his place.

CHAPTER 19

Lot Visited by Angels

19 The two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed himself with his face to the earth ² And he said, “Now behold, my lords, please turn aside into your servant’s house, and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.” They said however, “No, but we shall spend the night in the square.” ³ But he pressed them strongly; so they turned aside to him and entered his house; and he made them a feast and baked unleavened bread, and they ate. ⁴ Before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter; ⁵ and they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may know[145] them.” ⁶ But Lot went out to them at the doorway, and shut the door behind him, ⁷ and said, “Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly. ⁸ Now behold, I have two daughters who have not known[146] a man; please let me bring them out to you and do to them as is good in your eyes;[147] only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shadow[148] of my roof.” ⁹ But they said, “Stand aside.” Furthermore, they said, “This one came in to sojourn,[149] and already he is acting like a judge; now we will treat you worse than them.” So they pressed hard against the man Lot and came near to break the door. ¹⁰ But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them and shut the door. ¹¹ They struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they wearied themselves trying to find the doorway.

Lot and His Family Urged to Leave

¹² Then the men said to Lot, “Whom else have you here? A son-in-law, and your sons, and your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, bring them out of the place; ¹³ for we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before Jehovah that Jehovah has sent us to destroy it.” ¹⁴ Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law, who were taking[150] his daughters, and said, “Up, get out of this place, for Jehovah will destroy the city.” But he appeared to his sons-in-law like a man who was jesting.

¹⁵ When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be swept away in the punishment[151] of the city.” ¹⁶ But he lingered. So the men seized his hand and the hand of his wife and the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of Jehovah was upon him; and they brought him out and set him outside the city. ¹⁷ When they had brought them outside, one said,[152] “Flee for your soul![153] Do not look behind you, and do not stay anywhere in the valley; escape to the mountains, lest you be swept away.” ¹⁸ But Lot said to them, “Oh no, my lords! ¹⁹ Now behold, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have magnified your loyal love, which you have shown me by saving my life; but I cannot escape to the mountains, lest the disaster overtake me and I die; ²⁰ now behold, this town is near enough to flee to, and it is small. Please, let me escape there (is it not a little one?) and my soul shall live.[154]” ²¹ He said to him, “Behold, I grant you this thing[155] also, not to overthrow the town of which you have spoken. ²² Hurry, escape there, for I cannot do anything until you arrive there.” Therefore, the name of the town was called Zoar.[156]

Sodom and Gomorrah Destroyed

²³ The sun had risen over the earth when Lot came to Zoar. ²⁴ Then Jehovah rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from Jehovah out of heaven, ²⁵ and he overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. ²⁶ But his wife, from behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.

From Over Twenty Miles Abraham Sees the Destruction

²⁷ Now Abraham arose early in the morning and went to the place where he had stood before Jehovah; ²⁸ and he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the valley, and he saw, and behold, the smoke of the land ascended like the smoke of a furnace.

²⁹ Thus it came about, when God destroyed the cities of the valley, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when he overthrew the cities in which Lot dwelt.

Lot and His Daughters

³⁰ Lot went up from Zoar, and stayed in the mountains, and his two daughters with him; for he was afraid to dwell in Zoar; and he dwelt in a cave, he and his two daughters. ³¹ And the firstborn said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is not a man on earth to come in to us after the manner of all the earth. ³² Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father.” ³³ So they made their father drink wine that night, and the firstborn went in and lay with her father; and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. ³⁴ On the following day, the firstborn said to the younger, “Behold, I lay last night with my father; let us make him drink wine tonight also; then you go in and lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father.” ³⁵ So they made their father drink wine that night also, and the younger arose and lay with him; and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. ³⁶ Thus both the daughters of Lot were with child by their father. ³⁷ The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab; he is the father of the Moabites to this day. ³⁸ And the younger, she also bore a son, and called his name Ben-ammi; he is the father of the sons of Ammon to this day.

CHAPTER 20

Sarah Rescued from Abimelech

20 And Abraham journeyed from there toward the land of the Negev[157] and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur; and he sojourned in Gerar. ² Abraham said of Sarah his wife, “She is my sister.” So Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. ³ But God came to Abimelech in a dream of the night, and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man, because of the woman you have taken; for she is another man’s wife.” ⁴ Now Abimelech had not come near her, so he said, “Jehovah, will you even slay a righteous nation?” ⁵ Did he not himself say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands I have done this.” ⁶ Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that in the integrity of your heart you have done this, and I also restrained you from sinning against me. Therefore, I did not let you touch her. ⁷ Now therefore restore the man’s wife; for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for you, and you shall live. But if you do not restore her, know that you shall surely die, you, and all that are yours.”

⁸ So Abimelech rose early in the morning and called all his servants and told all these things in their ears, and the men were very much afraid. ⁹ Then Abimelech called Abraham and said to him, “What have you done to us? And how have I sinned against you, that you have brought on me and my kingdom a great sin? You have done to me things that ought not to be done.” ¹⁰ And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What have you seen[158] that you have done this thing?” ¹¹ And Abraham said, “Because I thought, surely there is no fear of God in this place; they will kill me because of my wife. ¹² Besides, she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife. ¹³ And it came about that, when God caused me to wander[159] from my father’s house, that I said to her, ‘This is your kindness that you shall show to me: at every place where we shall go, say of me, “He is my brother.”’” 

¹⁴ Then Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and male servants and female servants, and gave them to Abraham, and restored Sarah his wife to him. ¹⁵ And Abimelech said, “Look, my land is before you; dwell where it pleases you.” ¹⁶ And to Sarah he said, “Look, I have given your brother a thousand pieces of silver. It is for you a covering of the eyes to all who are with you, and before everyone, and you are righted.”[160] ¹⁷ Then Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, and also healed his wife and female slaves so that they bore children. ¹⁸ for Jehovah had completely closed every womb of the house of Abimelech because of Sarah, Abraham’s wife.

CHAPTER 21

The Birth of Isaac

21 And Jehovah visited Sarah as he had said, and Jehovah did to Sarah as he had spoken.[161] ² And Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the time of which God had spoken to him. ³ And Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac.[162] ⁴ And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. ⁵ And Abraham was one hundred years old, when his son Isaac was born to him. ⁶ Sarah said, “God has made me laugh, and everyone who hears will laugh with me.”[163] ⁷ And she said, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

⁸ And the child grew and was weaned. And Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. ⁹ But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, mocking.[164] ¹⁰ So she said to Abraham, “Drive out this slave woman with her son, for the son of this slave woman shall not be heir with my son Isaac.” ¹¹ And the thing was very displeasing in the eyes of Abraham on account of his son. ¹² And God said to Abraham, “Let it not be displeasing in your eyes because of the lad, and because of your slave woman. Whatever Sarah says to you, listen to her voice, for through Isaac your offspring will be named. ¹³ And I will also make the son of the slave woman into a nation, for he is your offspring.” 

¹⁴ So Abraham rose early in the morning and took bread and a skin[165] of water and gave them to Hagar, putting them on her shoulder, and gave her the boy, and sent her away. And she departed and wandered about in the wilderness of Beersheba. ¹⁵ And when the water in the skin was gone, she put[166] the boy under one of the bushes. ¹⁶ Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot, for she said, “Let me not look on the death of the child.” And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept.[167] 

¹⁷ And God heard the voice of the boy, and God’s angel called to Hagar from the heavens and said to her: “What is the matter with you, Hagar? Do not be afraid, for God has heard the voice of the boy there where he is. ¹⁸ Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him with your hand, for I will make him a great nation.” ¹⁹ And God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. And she went and filled the skin[168] with water and gave the boy a drink. ²⁰ And God was with the boy, and he grew and dwelt in the wilderness, and he became an archer.[169] ²¹ He dwelt in the wilderness of Paran, and his mother took a wife for him from the land of Egypt.

Abraham’s Covenant with Abimelech

²² At that time Abimelech together with Phicol the commander of his army said to Abraham, “God is with you in all that you do. ²³ So now, swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me and with my offspring and with my descendants. According to the kindness that I have done to you, so you will deal with me and with the land where you have sojourned.” ²⁴ And Abraham said, “I will swear.” 

²⁵ But Abraham reproved Abimelech because of the well of water which the servants of Abimelech had seized. ²⁶ And Abimelech said, “I do not know who did this thing, neither did you tell me, nor have I heard of it until today.” ²⁷ And Abraham took sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelech, and the two of them made a covenant. ²⁸ Then Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock by themselves. ²⁹ And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What is the meaning of these seven ewe-lambs that you have set by themselves?” ³⁰ And he said, “You shall take the seven ewe-lambs from my hand so that it may be a witness to me, that I dug this well.” ³¹ Therefore he called that place Beersheba, because there both of them swore an oath. ³² So they made a covenant at Beersheba, and Abimelech and Phicol, the commander of his army, rose up and returned to the land of the Philistines. ³³ Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba and called there on the name of Jehovah, the Everlasting God. ³⁴ And Abraham sojourned in the land of the Philistines for many days.

CHAPTER 22

Abraham Told to Offer Up Isaac

22 Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” ² He said, “Please take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.” 

³ So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey and took two of his young men with him and Isaac his son; and he split wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. ⁴ On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar. ⁵ Then Abraham said to his young men, “You stay here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go up there and we will worship, then we will return to you.”

⁶ And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. ⁷ And Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” And he said, “Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” ⁸ Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So the two of them walked on together.

⁹ And they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood and bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. ¹⁰ And Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. ¹¹ But the angel of Jehovah called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” ¹² He said, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God,[170] seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” ¹³ And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him[171] was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. ¹⁴ And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-jireh:[172] as it is said to this day, “in the mount of Jehovah it shall be provided.”

Blessing Because of Abraham’s Offspring

¹⁵ And the angel of Jehovah called to Abraham a second time from the heavens, ¹⁶ and said, “By myself I have sworn, declares Jehovah, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, ¹⁷ I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore; and your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies. ¹⁸ In your offspring all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.” 

¹⁹ So Abraham returned to his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba. And Abraham dwelt at Beersheba.

The Family of Rebekah

²⁰ Now it came about after these things, that it was told Abraham, saying, “Look, Milcah also has borne children to your brother Nahor: ²¹ Uz his firstborn and Buz his brother and Kemuel the father of Aram, ²² and Chesed, and Hazo, and Pildash, and Jidlaph, and Bethuel.” ²³ And Bethuel became the father of Rebekah. Milcah bore these eight to Nahor, the brother of Abraham. ²⁴ And his concubine, whose name was Reumah, she also bore Tebah, and Gaham, and Tahash, and Maacah.

CHAPTER 23

Death and Burial of Sarah

23 And the life of Sarah was one hundred and twenty-seven years: these were the years of the life of Sarah. ² And Sarah died in Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan; and Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her. ³ Then Abraham got up from before his dead and spoke to the sons of Heth,[173] saying, ⁴ I am a stranger and a sojourner among you; give me a burial site among you that I may bury my dead out of my sight.” ⁵ The sons of Heth[174] answered Abraham, saying to him, ⁶ “Hear us, my lord, you are a mighty prince among us; bury your dead in the choicest of our burial places; none of us will refuse you his burial place for burying your dead.” 

⁷ And Abraham rose up, and bowed himself to the people of the land, even to the sons of Heth.[175] ⁸ And he spoke with them, saying, “If your souls agree that I should bury my dead out of my sight, hear me, and entreat for me to Ephron the son of Zohar, ⁹ that he may give me the cave of Machpelah, which he owns, which is in the end of his field. For the full price let him give it to me in midst of you as a possession for a burial place.” 

¹⁰ Now Ephron was sitting among the sons of Heth: and Ephron the Hittite answered Abraham in the hearing[176] of the sons of Heth, even of all went in at the gate of his city, saying, ¹¹ “No, my lord, hear me; I give you the field, and I give you the cave that is in it. In the presence of the sons of my people I give it to you; bury your dead.” ¹² And Abraham bowed before the people of the land. ¹³ And he spoke to Ephron in the hearing[177] of the people of the land, saying, “But if you will hear me, please, I will give the price of the field. Accept it from me that I may bury my dead there.” 

¹⁴ And Ephron answered Abraham, saying to him, ¹⁵ “My lord, listen to me: a piece of land worth four hundred shekels[178] of silver, what is that between you and me? Bury your dead.” ¹⁶ Abraham listened to Ephron, and Abraham weighed out for Ephron the silver that he had named in the hearing[179] of the sons of Heth,[180] four hundred shekels of silver, according to the weights current among the merchants.

¹⁷ So Ephron’s field, which was in Machpelah, which faced Mamre, the field and cave which was in it, and all the trees which were in the field, that were in all its border around, were made over ¹⁸ to Abraham for a possession in the presence of the sons of Heth, before all who went in at the gate of his city. ¹⁹ And after this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah in front of Mamre (that is, Hebron), in the land of Canaan. ²⁰ And the field and the cave that is in it were made over to Abraham as property for a burial place by the sons of Heth.[181]

CHAPTER 24

A Wife for Isaac

24 Abraham was now old, advanced in years, and Jehovah had blessed Abraham in all things. ² And Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his house, that ruled over all that he had, “Please put your hand under my thigh, ³ and I will make you swear by Jehovah, the God of the heavens and the God of the earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am dwelling, ⁴ but will go to my country and to my kindred, and take a wife for my son Isaac.” ⁵ The servant said to him, “Suppose the woman is unwilling to follow me to this land? Should I take your son back to the land from where you came?” ⁶ Abraham said to him, “See to it that you do not take my son back there. ⁷ Jehovah the God of the heavens, who took me from my father’s house and from the land of my birth and who spoke with me and swore to me, saying, ‘To your offspring I will give this land,’ he will send his angel before you, and you will take a wife for my son from there. ⁸ And if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be free from this oath of mine; only you must not take my son back there.” ⁹ So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master, and he swore to him concerning this matter.

¹⁰ And the servant took ten camels from the camels of his master, and departed, having all sorts of good things of his master’s in his hand; and he arose, and went to Aram-Naharaim,[182] to the city of Nahor. ¹¹ And he made the camels kneel down outside the city by the well of water at the time of evening, the time when women go out to draw water. ¹² And he said, “O Jehovah, God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show loyal love to my master Abraham. ¹³ Look, I am standing by the spring of water, and the daughters of the men of the city are coming out to draw water. ¹⁴ And let it be that the young woman to whom I say, ‘Please let down your water jar so that I may take a drink,’ and who replies, ‘Take a drink, and I will also water your camels,’ let this be the one you choose for your servant Isaac; and by this let me know that you have shown your loyal love to my master.”

Rebekah Is Chosen

¹⁵ And it happened that before he finished speaking, Rebekah, who was the daughter of Bethuel the son of Milcah the wife of Nahor, Abraham’s brother, came out with her water jar on her shoulder. ¹⁶ Now the young woman was very pleasing in appearance, a virgin; no man had had sexual relations with her. And she went down to the spring, filled her jar, and came up. ¹⁷ Then the servant ran to meet her and said, “Please give me a little water to drink from your jar.” ¹⁸ And she said, “Drink, my lord.” And she quickly lowered her jar in her hand and gave him a drink. ¹⁹ When she finished giving him a drink she said, “I will also draw water for your camels until they finish drinking.” ²⁰ So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough and ran again to the well to draw water, and she drew for all his camels. ²¹ And, keeping silent, the man was gazing at her, to know whether Jehovah had made his journey successful or not.

²² And it happened that as the camels finished drinking the man took a gold ring of a half shekel in weight and two bracelets for her arms, ten shekels[183] in weight, ²³ and he said, “Whose daughter are you, please tell me? Is there room at your father’s house for us to lodge?” ²⁴ She said to him, “I am the daughter of Bethuel, the son of Milcah, whom she bore to Nahor.” ²⁵ Then she added, “We have both straw and much fodder and room to lodge in.” ²⁶ And the man knelt down and prostrated himself before Jehovah. ²⁷ And he said, “Blessed be Jehovah, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his loyal love and his truth toward my master; as for me, Jehovah has guided me in the way to the house of my master’s kinsmen.”

²⁸ Then the young woman ran and told her mother’s household about these things. ²⁹ Now Rebekah had a brother whose name was Laban, and Laban ran outside to the man at the spring. ³⁰ And when he saw the ring and the bracelets on the arms of his sister and heard the words of Rebekah his sister, saying, “Thus the man spoke to me,” he went to the man. And look, he was standing by the camels at the spring. ³¹ And he said, “Come, O blessed one of Jehovah. Why do you stand outside? For I have prepared the house and a place for the camels.” ³² So the man came to the house, and he[184] unharnessed the camels, and gave straw and fodder to the camels, and there was water to wash his feet and the feet of the men who were with him. ³³ Then food was set before him to eat. But he said, “I will not eat until I have told my errand.” He said, “Speak on.” 

³⁴ And he said, “I am the servant of Abraham. ³⁵ And Jehovah has blessed my master very much, and he has made him very wealthy by giving him sheep and cattle, silver and gold, male and female servants, and camels and donkeys. ³⁶ And Sarah the wife of my master bore a son to my master after her old age. And he has given to him all that he has. ³⁷ My master made me swear, saying, ‘You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell, ³⁸ But you shall go to the house of my father, and to my kindred, and take a wife for my son.’ ³⁹ And I said to my master, ‘Perhaps the woman will not follow me.’ ⁴⁰ And he said to me, ‘Jehovah, before whom I have walked, shall send his angel with you and will make your journey successful. And you will take a wife for my son from my kindred, and from the house of my father. ⁴¹ Then you will be free from my oath,[185] when you come to my kindred. And if they will not give her to you, you will be free from my oath.’

⁴² “I came today to the spring and said, ‘O Jehovah, the God of my master Abraham, if now you are prospering the way that I go, ⁴³ look, I am standing by the spring of water. Let it be that the young woman who comes out to draw water and to whom I say, “Please give me a little water to drink from your jar,” ⁴⁴ let her say to me, “Drink; I will also draw water for your camels,” she is the woman whom Jehovah has appointed for the son of my master.’

⁴⁵ “Before I had finished speaking in my heart, behold, Rebekah came out with her jar on her shoulder, and went down to the spring and drew, and I said to her, ‘Please let me drink.’ ⁴⁶ So she quickly lowered her jar from her shoulder and said, ‘Drink, and I will also water your camels.’ So I drank, and she also watered the camels. ⁴⁷ Then I asked her and said, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ And she said, ‘The daughter of Bethuel, son of Nahor, whom Milcah bore to him.’ And I put the ring on her nose and the bracelets on her arms. ⁴⁸ And I bowed down and worshiped Jehovah, and I praised Jehovah, the God of my master Abraham, who led me on the right way, to take the daughter of the brother of my master for his son. ⁴⁹ And now if you will show loyal love and faithfulness with my master, tell me; and if not, tell me, that I may turn to the right hand, or to the left.

⁵⁰ Then Laban and Bethuel answered and said, “The thing has come from Jehovah; we cannot speak to you bad or good. ⁵¹ Here is Rebekah before you. Take her and go; let her be a wife for the son of your master as Jehovah has spoken.”

⁵² When Abraham’s servant heard their words, he bowed himself to the earth before Jehovah. ⁵³ And the servant brought out silver jewelry and gold jewelry, and garments, and he gave them to Rebekah. And he gave precious gifts to her brother and to her mother. ⁵⁴ And he and the men who were with him ate and drank, and they spent the night. And they rose up in the morning, and he said, “Let me go to my master.” ⁵⁵ Her brother and her mother said, “Let the young woman remain with us a while, for about ten days; after that she may go.” ⁵⁶ But he said to them, “Do not delay me, since Jehovah has prospered my way. Send me away that I may go to my master.” ⁵⁷ And they said, “Let us call the young woman and ask her.” ⁵⁸ And they called Rebekah and said to her, “Will you go with this man?” And she said, “I will go.” ⁵⁹ So they sent away Rebekah their sister and her nurse, and Abraham’s servant and his men. ⁶⁰ And they blessed Rebekah and said to her, “Our sister, may you become thousands of ten thousands, and may your offspring possess the gate of those who hate them.”

⁶¹ Then Rebekah and her young women arose and rode on the camels and followed the man. Thus, the servant took Rebekah and went his way.

Isaac Marries Rebekah

⁶² Now Isaac had come from the direction of Beer-lahai-roi, for he was dwelling in the land of the Negev.[186] ⁶³ And Isaac went out to meditate in the field toward evening, and he lifted up his eyes and saw, and look, there were camels coming. ⁶⁴ And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she dismounted from the camel. ⁶⁵ She said to the servant, “Who is that man walking in the field to meet us?” And the servant said, “It is my master.” So she took her veil and covered herself. ⁶⁶ And the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done. ⁶⁷ Then Isaac brought her into the tent of Sarah his mother and took Rebekah, and she became his wife, and he loved her. So Isaac was comforted after the death of his mother.[187]

CHAPTER 25

Abraham’s Death

25 Now Abraham took another wife, whose name was Keturah. ² And she bore him Zimran, and Jokshan, and Medan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shuah. ³ And Jokshan fathered Sheba and Dedan. And the sons of Dedan were Asshurim and Letushim and Leummim. ⁴ And the sons of Midian were Ephah, and Epher, and Hanoch, and Abida, and Eldaah. All these were the sons of Keturah. ⁵ And Abraham gave all that he had to Isaac. ⁶ But Abraham gave gifts to his sons by his concubines. Then while he was still alive, he sent them eastward, away from Isaac his son, to the land of the East.

The Death of Abraham

⁷ And these are the days of the years of Abraham’s life that he lived, one hundred and seventy-five years. ⁸ Then Abraham breathed his last and died at a good old age, an old man and full of years, and he was gathered to his people.[188] ⁹ And Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite, that was east of Mamre, ¹⁰ the field that Abraham purchased from the sons of Heth. There Abraham was buried and Sarah his wife. ¹¹ It came about after the death of Abraham, that God blessed his son Isaac; and Isaac dwelt by Beer-lahai-roi.

The Sons of Ishmael

¹² Now these are the generations of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah’s servant, bore to Abraham. ¹³ And these are the names of the sons of Ishmael, by their names according to their family origins. The firstborn of Ishmael was Nebaioth, then Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam, ¹⁴ Mishma, Dumah, Massa, ¹⁵ Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish, and Kedemah. ¹⁶ These are the sons of Ishmael, and these are their names, by their villages and by their encampments, twelve princes according to their tribes. ¹⁷ And these are the years of the life of Ishmael, a hundred and thirty and seven years. Then he breathed his last and died and was gathered to his kindred.[189] ¹⁸ And they dwelt from Havilah to Shur, which is opposite Egypt as you go to Assyria.[190] He settled[191] over against all his brothers.[192]

The Birth of Jacob and Esau

¹⁹ Now these are the generations of Isaac, the son of Abraham. Abraham fathered Isaac, ²⁰ and Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel the Aramean[193] of Paddan-aram, the sister of Laban the Aramean, to be his wife. ²¹ And Isaac plead to Jehovah on behalf of his wife, because she was barren. And Jehovah responded to his plea, and Rebekah his wife conceived. ²² And the sons within her began to struggle with each other, so that she said, “If this is the way it is, why should I go on living?” So she inquired of Jehovah. ²³ Jehovah said to her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples will be separated from within you; and the one nation will be stronger than the other nation, and the older will serve the younger.”

²⁴ When her days to give birth were completed, look, there were twins in her womb. ²⁵ Then the first came out red all over and was like a garment of hair, so they called his name Esau.[194] ²⁶ And afterward his brother came out, and his hand grasped the heel of Esau, so his name was called Jacob.[195] Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them.

Esau Sells His Birthright

²⁷ When the boys grew up, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field, but Jacob was a quiet man, dwelling in tents. ²⁸ Now Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game,[196] but Rebekah loved Jacob. ²⁹ Once when Jacob was cooking a stew, Esau came in from the field, and he was exhausted. ³⁰ And Esau said to Jacob, “Please let me have a swallow of that red stew there, for I am exhausted!” Therefore, his name was called Edom.[197] ³¹ Jacob said, “Sell me your birthright today.” ³² Esau said, “I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?” ³³ And Jacob said, “Swear to me today.” So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. ³⁴ Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank and rose up and went on his way. So Esau despised[198] his birthright.

CHAPTER 26

Isaac and Rebekah Settle in Gerar

26 Now there was a famine in the land, besides the former famine that had occurred in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went to Gerar to Abimelech king of the Philistines. ² And Jehovah appeared to him, and said, “Do not go down into Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell you. ³ Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you and will bless you, for to you and to your offspring I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath that I swore to Abraham your father. ⁴ I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heavens and will give to your offspring all these lands. And in your offspring, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, ⁵ because Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.” ⁶ So Isaac dwelt in Gerar.

⁷ When the men of the place asked about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” for he feared to say, “my wife,” thinking, “the men of the place might kill me on account of Rebekah, for she was beautiful in appearance.” ⁸ And it happened that, when he had been there a long time, Abimelech the king of the Philistines looked through the window, and saw, look, Isaac was showing affection for[199] Rebekah his wife. ⁹ So Abimelech called Isaac and said, “She is actually your wife! Why did you say, ‘She is my sister’?” At this Isaac said to him, “I said it for fear I should die because of her.” ¹⁰ Abimelech said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the people might easily have lain with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.” ¹¹ So Abimelech charged all the people, saying, “He who touches this man, or his wife shall surely be put to death.”

Conflict over Wells

¹² Isaac sowed seed in that land, and in that year, he reaped a hundred times what was sown, and Jehovah blessed him, ¹³ and the man became rich, and gained more and more until he became very wealthy.[200] ¹⁴ And he had possessions of flocks and herds and many servants, so that the Philistines envied him. 

¹⁵ Now all the wells that the servants of his father had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines stopped up and filled them with earth. ¹⁶ And Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are much mightier than we.” ¹⁷ So Isaac departed from there and camped in the valley of Gerar and dwelt there. ¹⁸ And Isaac dug again the wells of water that had been dug in the days of Abraham his father,[201] which the Philistines had stopped up after the death of Abraham, and he gave them the same names which his father had given them.

¹⁹ But when Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of spring water, ²⁰ and the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with the herdsmen of Isaac, saying, “The water is ours.” And he called the name of the well Esek,[202] because they contended with him. ²¹ And they dug another well, and they quarreled over it also, so he called its name Sitnah.[203] ²² And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. And he called its name Rehoboth,[204] and said, “Truly now Jehovah has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”

²³ And he went up from there to Beersheba. ²⁴ Jehovah appeared to him the same night and said, “I am the God of Abraham your father. Fear not, for I am with you and will bless you and multiply your offspring for the sake of my servant Abraham.”

²⁵ So he built an altar there and called upon the name of Jehovah, and pitched his tent there, and the servants of Isaac dug a well there.

Isaac’s Covenant with Abimelech

²⁶ Then Abimelech went to him from Gerar with Ahuzzath his friend and Phicol the commander of his army. ²⁷ Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, seeing that you hate me and have sent me away from you?” ²⁸ They said, “We see plainly that Jehovah has been with you, so we said, let there be an oath between us, between you and us, and let us make a covenant with you, ²⁹ that you will do us no harm, just as we have not touched you and have done to you nothing but good and have sent you away in peace. You are now the blessed of Jehovah.” ³⁰ So he made them a feast, and they ate and drank. ³¹ In the morning they rose up early and exchanged oaths, and Isaac sent them on their way, and they departed from him in peace. ³² On that day the servants of Isaac came and told him about the well that they had dug and said to him, “We have found water.” ³³ And he called it Shibah; therefore, the name of the city is Beersheba to this day.

Esau’s Two Hittite Wives

³⁴ When Esau was forty years old, he took Judith[205] the daughter of Beeri the Hittite to be his wife, and Basemath[206] the daughter of Elon the Hittite, ³⁵ And they were a bitterness of spirit to Isaac and Rebekah.

CHAPTER 27

Jacob’s Gets Isaac’s Blessing

27 When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he could not see, he called his older son Esau and said to him, “My son.” And he answered, “Here I am.” ² Isaac said, “Look now, I am old, and I do not know the day of my death. ³ So at this time take, please, your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt some wild game for me, ⁴ and prepare a savory food for me such as I love, and bring it to me that I may eat, so that my soul may bless you before I die.”

⁵ Now Rebekah was listening when Isaac spoke to Esau his son. So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game and bring it, ⁶ Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “Look, I heard your father speak to your brother Esau, saying, ⁷ ‘Bring me some game and make me some savory food, that I may eat it and bless you before Jehovah before I die.’ ⁸ Now therefore, my son, obey my voice as I command you. ⁹ Go to the flock and bring me two good young goats, so that I may prepare from them savory food for your father, such as he loves. ¹⁰ Then you shall bring it to your father, that he may eat, so that he may bless you before his death.” 

¹¹ And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, “look, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man. ¹² Perhaps my father will feel me, and I shall be in his eyes as one mocking him and bring a curse upon myself and not a blessing.” ¹³ But his mother said to him, “Your curse be on me, my son; only obey my voice, and go, get them for me.” ¹⁴ So he went and took them and brought them to his mother, and his mother prepared savory food, such as his father loved. ¹⁵ Then Rebekah took the most desirable garments of Esau her older son, which were with her in the house, and put them on Jacob her younger son. ¹⁶ And she put the skins of the young goats on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck. ¹⁷ And she put the savory food and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob.

¹⁸ And he went to his father and said, “My father.” And he said, “Here I am. Who are you, my son?” ¹⁹ Jacob said to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn; I have done as you told me. Please get up, sit up and eat of my game, that you may bless me.” ²⁰ But Isaac said to his son, “How is it that you have found it so quickly, my son?” He answered, “Because Jehovah your God granted me success.” ²¹ Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come closer, so that I may feel you, my son, whether you are really my son Esau or not.” ²² So Jacob came closer to Isaac his father, and he felt him and said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.” ²³ And he did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like his brother Esau’s hands. So he blessed him. 

²⁴ And he said, “Are you really my son Esau?” And he said, “I am.” ²⁵ Then he said, “Bring it closer to me that I may eat from the game of my son, so that I may bless you.” And he brought it to him, and he ate. And he brought wine to him, and he drank. ²⁶ Then his father Isaac said to him, “Please come closer and kiss me, my son.” ²⁷ So he came closer and kissed him. When Isaac smelled his garments, he blessed him and said,

“See, the smell of my son
    is as the smell of a field that Jehovah has blessed!
²⁸ May God give you of the dew of heaven
    and of the fatness of the earth
    and abundance of grain and new wine.
²⁹ Let peoples serve you,
    and nations bow down to you.
Be lord over your brothers,
    and may the sons of your mother bow down to you.
Cursed be those who curses you,
    and blessed be those who blesses you!”

Esau Unrepentantly Seeks Blessing

³⁰ As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, when Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of Isaac his father, Esau his brother came in from his hunting. ³¹ And he also made savory food and brought it to his father; and he said to his father, “Let my father arise and eat of his son’s game, that you may bless me.” ³² And Isaac his father said to him, “Who are you?” And he said, “I am your son, your firstborn, Esau.” ³³ Then Isaac trembled very violently and said, “Who was it then that hunted game and brought it to me, and I ate it all before you came, and I have blessed him? Yes, and he shall be blessed.” 

³⁴ When Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father, “Bless me, even me also, O my father!” ³⁵ And he said, “Your brother came deceitfully and has taken away your blessing.” ³⁶ Then he said, “Is he not rightly named Jacob,[207] for he has supplanted me these two times? He took away my birthright, and look, now he has taken away my blessing.” And he said, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?” ³⁷ But Isaac answered and said to Esau, “Look, I have made him lord over you, and I have given him all his brothers as servants, and with grain and wine I have sustained him. Now what can I do for you, my son?” 

³⁸ And Esau said to his father, “Have you only one blessing, my father? Bless me also, my father!” And Esau lifted up his voice and wept.

³⁹ Then Isaac his father answered and said to him,

“Look, away from the fatness of the earth shall your dwelling be,
    and away from the dew of the heavens above.
⁴⁰ By your sword you shall live,
    and you shall serve your brother;
but when you grow restless
    you shall tear off his yoke from your neck.”

Esau’s Hostility toward Jacob

⁴¹ Now Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him, and Esau said to himself, “The days of mourning for my father are approaching; then I will kill my brother Jacob.” ⁴² But the words of Esau her older son were told to Rebekah. So she sent and called Jacob her younger son and said to him, “Look, Esau your brother is consoling himself concerning you by planning to kill you. ⁴³ Now, then, my son, listen to my voice, and arise, flee to Laban my brother in Haran. ⁴⁴ And stay with him for a few days until the wrath of your brother turns away, ⁴⁵ until the anger of your brother turns away from you and he has forgotten what you have done to him. Then I will send and bring you from there. Why should I lose the two of you in one day?”

⁴⁶ Rebekah said to Isaac, “I am tired of living because of the daughters of Heth; if Jacob takes a wife from the daughters of Heth, like these, from the daughters of the land, what good will my life be to me?”

CHAPTER 28

Jacob Is Sent Away

28 So Isaac called Jacob and blessed him and charged him, and said to him, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. ² Arise, go to Paddan-aram, to the house of Bethuel your mother’s father, and take for yourself a wife from there, from the daughters of Laban your mother’s brother. ³ And may God Almighty[208] bless you and make you fruitful and multiply you, that you may become a congregation of peoples. ⁴ And may he give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and to your offspring with you, that you may take possession of the land of your sojourning, which God gave to Abraham.” 

⁵ Then Isaac sent Jacob away, and he went to Paddan-aram to Laban, son of Bethuel the Aramean, the brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau.

⁶ Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Paddan-Aram, to take for himself a wife from there, and he blessed him and instructed him, saying, “You must not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan,” ⁷ and that Jacob had obeyed his father and his mother and had gone to Paddan-aram. ⁸ So Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan were displeasing in the eyes of his father Isaac; ⁹ Esau went to Ishmael and took as his wife, besides the wives he had, Mahalath[209] the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebaioth.

Jacob’s Dream

¹⁰ Then Jacob went out from Beersheba and went to Haran. ¹¹ And he arrived at a certain place and spent the night there, because the sun had set. And he took one of the stones of the place and put it under his head and slept at that place. ¹² And he dreamed, and look, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to the heavens; and look, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. ¹³ And behold, Jehovah stood above it and said, “I am Jehovah, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring. ¹⁴ Your offspring will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring will all the families of the earth be blessed. ¹⁵ Look, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” ¹⁶ Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely Jehovah is in this place, and I did not know it.” ¹⁷ And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”

¹⁸ And Jacob rose early in the morning, and he took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. ¹⁹ He called the name of that place Bethel,[210] but the name of the city was Luz at the first. ²⁰ Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and garments to wear, ²¹ so that I come again to the house of my father in peace, then Jehovah will be my God, ²² This stone, which I have set up as a pillar, will be the house of God, and of all that you give me I will surely give a tenth to you.”

CHAPTER 29

Jacob Meets Rachel

29 Then Jacob went on his journey and came to the land of the sons of the east. ² And he looked, and look, there was a well in the field, and behold, there were three flocks of sheep lying beside it, for out of that well the flocks were watered. And the stone on the mouth of the well was large. ³ And when all the flocks were gathered there, they would then roll the stone from the mouth of the well and water the sheep and put the stone back in its place over the mouth of the well.

⁴ And Jacob said to them, “My brothers, where are you from?” And they said, “We are from Haran.” ⁵ And he said to them, “Do you know Laban, son of Nahor?” And they said, “We know him.” ⁶ And he said to them, “Is it well with him?” And they said, “It is well, and look Rachel his daughter coming with the sheep.” ⁷ He said, “Behold, it is still high day; it is not time for the livestock to be gathered together. Water the sheep and go, pasture them.” ⁸ But they said, “We cannot, until all the flocks are gathered, and they roll the stone from the mouth of the well; then we water the sheep.”

⁹ While he was still speaking with them, Rachel came with her father’s sheep, for she was a shepherdess. ¹⁰ Now as soon as Jacob saw Rachel the daughter of Laban his mother’s brother, and the sheep of Laban his mother’s brother, Jacob came near and rolled the stone from the mouth of the well and watered the flock of Laban his mother’s brother. ¹¹ And Jacob kissed Rachel and lifted up his voice and wept. ¹² Jacob told Rachel that he was a relative[211] of her father and that he was Rebekah’s son, and she ran and told her father.

¹³ As soon as Laban heard the news about Jacob, the son of his sister, he ran to meet him and embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his house. Jacob told Laban all these things, ¹⁴ and Laban said to him, “Surely you are my bone and my flesh!” And he stayed with him a month.

Jacob Falls in Love with Rachel

¹⁵ Then Laban said to Jacob, “Because you are my relative,[212] should you therefore serve me for nothing? Tell me, what shall your wages be?” ¹⁶ Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the older was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. ¹⁷ Now the eyes of Leah were dull,[213] but Rachel was beautiful in form and appearance. ¹⁸ Now Jacob loved Rachel, so he said, “I will serve you seven years for your younger daughter Rachel.” ¹⁹ Laban said, “It is better that I give her to you than that I should give her to another man; stay with me.” ²⁰ So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her.

Laban’s Treachery Causes Jacob to marry Leah and Rachel

²¹ And Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife, that I may go in to her, for my days[214] is completed.” ²² Laban gathered all the men of the place and made a feast. ²³ And it proceeded to be that in the evening he took Leah his daughter and brought her to him, and he went in to her. ²⁴ And Laban gave Zilpah his female slave to her, to Leah his daughter as a female slave. ²⁵ And it proceeded to be that in the morning, look, it was Leah! And he said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? Did I not serve with you for Rachel? Now why did you deceive me?” ²⁶ Then Laban said, “It is not the custom in our country to give the younger before the firstborn. ²⁷ Complete the week of this one, and we will give you the other also for the service which you shall serve with me for another seven years.” ²⁸ Jacob did so and completed the week of this one, then he gave him his daughter Rachel as a wife. ²⁹ And Laban gave Bilhah his female slave to Rachel his daughter as a female slave. 

Jacob’s Four Sons by Leah: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah

³⁰ So Jacob went in to Rachel also, and he loved Rachel more than Leah, and served Laban for another seven years. ³¹ When Jehovah saw that Leah was hated[215] he opened her womb,[216] but Rachel was barren. ³² And Leah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Reuben,[217] for she said, “Because Jehovah has looked upon my affliction;[218] for now, my husband will love me.” ³³ She conceived again and bore a son, and said, “Because Jehovah has heard that I am hated,[219] he has given me this son also.” And she called his name Simeon.[220] ³⁴ Again she conceived and bore a son, and said, “Now this time my husband will be attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” Therefore, his name was called Levi.[221] ³⁵ And she conceived again and bore a son, and said, “This time I will praise Jehovah.” Therefore, she called his name Judah.[222] Then she ceased bearing.

CHAPTER 30

Bilhah Gives Birth to Dan and Naphtali

30 And when Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister; and she said to Jacob, “Give me children, or else I die.” ² Then Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?” ³ Then she said, “Here is my slave girl Bilhah, go in to her that she may give birth upon my knees,[223] and that I, even I, may have children from her.” ⁴ So she gave him Bilhah, her female slave, as a wife, and Jacob went in to her. ⁵ And Bilhah conceived and bore Jacob a son. ⁶ Then Rachel said, “God has judged me, and has also heard my voice and given me a son.” Therefore, she called his name Dan.[224] ⁷ Rachel’s slave Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son. ⁸ Then Rachel said, “With mighty wrestlings I have wrestled with my sister and have prevailed,” and she called his name Naphtali.[225]

Zilpah Gives Birth to Gad and Asher

⁹ When Leah saw that she had ceased bearing children, she took Zilpah her female slave and gave her to Jacob as a wife. ¹⁰ And Zilpah bore the female slave of Leah a son to Jacob. ¹¹ Then Leah said: “With good fortune!”[226] So she named him Gad.[227] ¹² And Zilpah, Leah’s female slave, bore a second son to Jacob. ¹³ And Leah said, “Happy am I! For women have called me happy.” So she called his name Asher.[228]

Leah Gives Birth to Issachar and Zebulun

¹⁴ Now in the days of wheat harvest Reuben went and found mandrakes[229] in the field and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.” ¹⁵ But she said to her, “Is it a small matter that you have taken away my husband? Would you take away my son’s mandrakes also?” So, Rachel said, “Then he may lie with you tonight in exchange for your son’s mandrakes. 

¹⁶ When Jacob came from the field in the evening, then Leah went out to meet him and said, “You must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So, he lay with her that night. ¹⁷ And God listened to Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son. ¹⁸ Then Leah said, “God has given me my wages because I gave my servant to my husband.” So, she called his name Issachar.[230] ¹⁹ And Leah conceived again and bore a sixth son to Jacob. ²⁰ Then Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good gift; now my husband will dwell with me, because I have borne him six sons.” So, she called his name Zebulun.[231] ²¹ And afterward she bore a daughter and called her name Dinah.[232]

Rachel Gives Birth to Joseph

²² Then God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and opened her womb. ²³ And she conceived, and bore a son and said, “God has taken away my reproach.” ²⁴ And she called his name Joseph,[233] saying, “Jehovah add to me another son.”

The Flocks of Jacob Increase

²⁵ After Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own home and country. ²⁶ Give me my wives and my children for which I have served you and let me go. For you yourself know my service that I have served to you.” ²⁷ But Laban said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, I have learned by divination that Jehovah has blessed me because of you.” ²⁸ And he said, “Name your wage to me and I will give it.” ²⁹ And he said to him, “You yourself know how I have served you and how your livestock have been with me. ³⁰ For you had little before I came, and it has increased abundantly, and Jehovah has blessed you wherever I turned. But now when shall I provide for my own household also?” 

³¹ And he said, “What shall I give you?” And Jacob said, “Do not give me anything. If you will do this thing for me, I will again feed your flock and keep it. ³² let me pass through your entire flock today, removing from there every speckled and spotted sheep and every black lamb among the lambs and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and such shall be my wages. ³³ So my righteousness[234] will answer for me later, when you come to look into my wages which are before you. Every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats and black among the lambs, if found with me, shall be counted stolen.” 

³⁴ Laban said, “Look! Let it be according to your word.” ³⁵ So he removed on that day the male goats that were striped and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white on it, and all the black ones among the sheep, and put them in the charge of his sons. ³⁶ And he set a distance of three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob pastured the rest of Laban’s flock.

³⁷ Then Jacob took fresh sticks of poplar and almond and plane trees, and peeled white streaks in them, exposing the white of the sticks. ³⁸ He set the sticks that he had peeled in front of the flocks in the troughs, that is, the watering places, where the flocks came to drink. And since they bred when they came to drink, 

³⁹ the flocks bred in front of the sticks and so the flocks brought forth striped, speckled, and spotted. ⁴⁰ And Jacob separated the lambs and set the faces of the flocks toward the striped and all the black in the flock of Laban. He put his own herds apart and did not put them with Laban’s flock. ⁴¹ And whenever any of the stronger of the flocks were breeding, Jacob would lay the sticks in the troughs before the eyes of the flock, that they might breed among the sticks, ⁴² but with the more feeble of the flock he would not put them there. So, the feebler were Laban’s and the stronger were Jacob’s.

⁴³ And the man became very rich and had large flocks, female slaves, male slaves, camels, and donkeys.

CHAPTER 31

Jacob Leaves Secretly for Canaan

31 Now he heard the words of Laban’s sons, saying, “Jacob has taken away all that was our father’s, and from what belonged to our father he has made all this wealth.” ² Then Jacob saw the face of Laban and behold, it was not the same as before. ³ Then Jehovah said to Jacob, “Return to the land of your fathers and to the place of your birth, and I will be with you.” ⁴ So Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah into the field where his flock was, ⁵ and said to them, “I see the face of your father does not regard me as he did before. But the God of my father has been with me. ⁶ Now you yourselves know that I have served your father with all my strength, ⁷ and your father has cheated me and changed my wages ten times, but God has not allowed him to harm me. ⁸ If he said, ‘The spotted shall be your wages,’ then all the flock bore spotted; and if he said, ‘The striped shall be your wages,’ then all the flock bore striped. ⁹ Thus God has taken away the livestock of your father and given them to me. ¹⁰ Now it happened that at the time of the mating of the flock I lifted up my eyes and saw in a dream, and look, the goats that mated with the flock were striped, spotted, and mottled. ¹¹ Then the angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob,’ and I said, ‘Here I am.’ ¹² And he said, ‘Lift up your eyes and see, all the goats that mate with the flock are striped, spotted, and mottled, for I have seen all that Laban is doing to you. ¹³ I am the God of Bethel[235] where you anointed a pillar, where you made a vow to me. Now arise, go out from this land, and return to the land of your birth.’” 

¹⁴ Then Rachel and Leah answered and said to him, “Is there yet any portion or inheritance left to us in our father’s house? ¹⁵ Are we not regarded by him as foreigners? For he has sold us and has also entirely consumed our money. ¹⁶ All the wealth that God has taken away from our father belongs to us and to our sons; so now, all that God has said to you, do.”

¹⁷ Then Jacob rose up and put his sons and his wives upon the camels. ¹⁸ And he drove all his livestock and his goods that he had acquired, the livestock of his possession that he had acquired in Paddan-aram, to go to Isaac his father in the land of Canaan. 

¹⁹ When Laban had gone to shear his sheep, Rachel stole the teraphim[236] statues that belonged to her father. ²⁰ And Jacob deceived Laban the Aramean, not telling him that he was fleeing. ²¹ So he fled with all that he had, and he rose up and crossed the river,[237] and set his face toward the hill country of Gilead.

Laban Pursues Jacob

²² And it was told Laban on the third day that Jacob had fled. ²³ So he took his kinsmen with him and pursued him for a journey of seven days, and he overtook him in the hill country of Gilead. ²⁴ And God came to Laban the Syrian in a dream of the night, and said to him, “Watch yourself that you do not speak with Jacob either good or bad.”

²⁵ And Laban overtook Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the hill country, and Laban and his kinsmen pitched their tents in the hill country of Gilead. ²⁶ And Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done, that you have tricked me and have carried off my daughters like captives of the sword? ²⁷ Why did you flee secretly and trick me,[238] and did not tell me, so that I might have sent you away with mirth and songs, with tambourine and lyre? ²⁸ And did not allow me to kiss my sons and my daughters? Now you have done foolishly. ²⁹ It is in my power to do you harm, but the God of your father spoke to me last night, saying, ‘Watch yourself not to speak either good or bad to Jacob.’ ³⁰ Now you have gone away because you longed greatly for your father’s house, but why did you steal my gods?” 

³¹ Then Jacob answered and said to Laban, “Because I was afraid, for I thought that you would take your daughters from me by force. ³² Anyone with whom you find your gods shall not live. Before our kinsmen examine what I have, and take what is yours.” But Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen them.

³³ So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and into the tent of the two female slaves, but he did not find them. And he went out of Leah’s tent and entered Rachel’s tent. ³⁴ Now Rachel had taken the teraphim, and put them in the camel’s saddle, and sat upon them. And Laban felt about all the tent but did not find them. ³⁵ And she said to her father, “Let not my lord be angry that I cannot rise before you, for the way of women is upon me.” So he searched but did not find the teraphim.

³⁶ Then Jacob became angry and quarreled with Laban. Jacob answered and said to Laban, “What is my sin? What is my sin that you pursued after me? ³⁷ Now that you have searched through all my goods, what have you found that belongs to your house? Put it here in front of my kinsmen and your kinsmen and let them decide between the two of us. ³⁸ These twenty years I have been with you; your ewes and your female goats have not miscarried, and the rams of your flocks have I not eaten. ³⁹ That which was torn of beasts I did not bring to you. I bore the loss of it myself. From my hand you required it, whether stolen by day or stolen by night. ⁴⁰ There I was: by day the heat consumed me, and the cold by night, and my sleep fled from my eyes. ⁴¹ These twenty years I have been in your house. I served you[239] fourteen years for your two daughters, and six years for your flock, and you have changed my wages ten times. ⁴² If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac had not been with me, surely now you would have sent me away empty-handed. God saw my affliction and the labor of my hands and rebuked you last night.”

The Covenant of Mizpah

⁴³ Then Laban answered and said to Jacob, “The daughters are my daughters, and the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks, and all that you see is mine. But what can I do this day for these my daughters or for their children whom they have borne? ⁴⁴ So now, come, let us make a covenant, you and I, and let it be a witness between me and you.” ⁴⁵ So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar. ⁴⁶ And Jacob said to his kinsmen, “Gather stones.” And they took stones and made a heap, and they ate there by the heap. ⁴⁷ Laban called it Jegar-sahadutha,[240] but Jacob called it Galeed.[241]

⁴⁸ Laban said, “This heap is a witness between you and me this day.” Therefore, its name is called Galeed, ⁴⁹ and Mizpah, for he said, “May Jehovah watch between you and me when we are absent one from the other. ⁵⁰ If you mistreat my daughters, or if you take wives besides my daughters, although no man is with us, see, God is witness between you and me.” ⁵¹ And Laban said to Jacob, “Look this heap and look the pillar which I have set between you and me. ⁵² This heap is a witness, and the pillar is a witness, that I will not pass over this heap to you, and you will not pass over this heap and this pillar to me, to do harm. ⁵³ The God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father,[242] judge between us.” So Jacob swore by the Fear of his father Isaac, 

⁵⁴ After that Jacob offered a sacrifice in the mountain and invited his kinsmen to eat bread. And they ate bread and spent the night on the mountain. ⁵⁵ And early in the morning Laban rose up, and kissed his sons and his daughters, and blessed them. And Laban departed and returned to his place.

CHAPTER 32

Jacob Meets Angel

32 And Jacob went on his way, and angels of God met him. ² And when he saw them, Jacob said, “This is the camp of God!” And he called the name of that place Mahanaim.[243]

Jacob Gets Ready to Meet Esau

³ Then Jacob sent messengers before him to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the territory[244] of Edom. ⁴ And he commanded them saying, “Thus you shall say to my lord Esau: ‘Thus says your servant Jacob, “I have sojourned with Laban, and stayed until now. ⁵ I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, male servants, and female servants. I have sent to tell my lord, in order that I may find favor in your sight.’”

⁶ And the messengers returned to Jacob, saying, “We came to your brother Esau, and he is coming to meet you, and there are four hundred men with him.” ⁷ Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks and the herds and the camels, into two camps, ⁸ And he thought: “If Esau comes to one camp and attacks it, then the other camp will be able to escape.”

⁹ And Jacob said, “O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac, O Jehovah who said to me, ‘Return to your country and to your kindred, that I may do you good,’ ¹⁰ I am not worthy of the least of all the deeds of loyal love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant, for with only my staff I crossed this Jordan, and now I have become two camps. ¹¹ Please rescue me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him, that he may come and attack me, the mothers with the children. ¹² And you have said, ‘I will surely do good with you, and I will make your offspring like the grains of sand of the sea, which are too numerous to count.’”

¹³ So he spent the night there. Then he took from what he had with him[245] a present for Esau his brother: ¹⁴ two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, ¹⁵ thirty milking camels and their young, forty cows and ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys. 

¹⁶ He delivered them into the hand of his servants, every drove by itself, and said to his servants, “Pass on before me, and put a space between drove and drove.” ¹⁷ He also commanded the first one, saying, “When my brother Esau meets you and asks you, saying, ‘To whom do you belong, and where are you going, and to whom do these animals in front of you belong?’ ¹⁸ then you shall say, ‘They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a present sent to my lord Esau. And look, he also is behind us.’” ¹⁹ And he commanded also the second, the third, and all those who followed the droves, saying, “According to this word, you are to speak to Esau when you find him. ²⁰ and you shall say, ‘Look, your servant Jacob also is behind us.’” For he said, “I will appease him with the present that goes before me. Then afterward I will see his face; perhaps he will accept me.” ²¹ So the present passed on ahead of him, but he himself stayed that night in the camp.

²² The same night he rose up and took his two wives, his two female slaves, and his eleven children and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. ²³ And he took them, and sent them across the stream, and sent across all that he had.

Jacob Wrestles with an Angel

²⁴ And Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. ²⁵ When he saw that he had not prevailed against him, he touched the socket of his thigh; so the socket of Jacob’s thigh was dislocated as he wrestled with him. ²⁶ Then he said, “Let me go, for the dawn is breaking.” But he said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” ²⁷ And he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” ²⁸ And he said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel,[246] for you have struggled with God and with men and have prevailed.” ²⁹ Then Jacob asked him and said, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And he blessed him there. ³⁰ So Jacob named the place Peniel,[247] for he said, “I have seen God face to face, yet my soul has been preserved.” 

³¹ Then the sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, and he was limping because of his hip. ³² That is why to this day the sons of Israel do not eat the sinew of the thigh nerve, which is on the socket of the hip joint, because he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip joint by the thigh sinew.

CHAPTER 33

Jacob Meets Esau

33 And Jacob lifted up his eyes and looked. And look, Esau was coming, and four hundred men were with him. And he[248] divided the children among Leah and among Rachel, and among the two of his female slaves. ² And he put the female slaves and their children in front, then Leah and her children next, then Rachel with Joseph behind. ³ Then he himself went ahead of them and bowed down to the earth seven times as he came near to his brother.

⁴ But Esau ran to meet him and embraced him and fell on his neck and kissed him,[249] and they wept. ⁵ And when Esau lifted up his eyes and saw the women and children, he said, “Who are these with you?” Jacob said, “The children whom God has graciously given your servant.” ⁶ Then the female slaves drew near, they and their children, and they bowed down. ⁷ Then Leah and her children drew near and bowed down, and afterward Joseph and Rachel drew near and they bowed down. 

⁸ And he said, “What do you mean by all this company that I have met?” Then he said, “To find favor in the eyes of my lord.” ⁹ But Esau said, “I have enough, my brother; keep what you have for yourself.” ¹⁰ And Jacob said, “No, please, if I have found favor in your eyes, you must take my gift from my hand, for then I have seen your face which is like seeing the face of God, and you have received me. ¹¹ Please accept my blessing that is brought to you, because God has dealt graciously with me, and because I have enough.” Thus he urged him, and he took it.

¹² Then he[250] said, “Let us journey on our way, and I will go ahead of you.” ¹³ But Jacob said to him, “My lord knows that the children are frail, and that the nursing flocks and herds are a care to me. And if they are driven hard for one day, all the flocks will die. ¹⁴ Let my lord, please, go on ahead of his servant, but I will continue the journey more slowly at the pace of my livestock and of the children until I come to my lord at Seir.”

¹⁵ Then Esau said, “Let me leave with you some of the people who are with me.” But he said, “What need is there? Let me find favor in the sight of my lord.” ¹⁶ So Esau returned that day on his way to Seir. 

¹⁷ But Jacob journeyed to Succoth and built himself a house and made booths for his livestock. Therefore, the name of the place is called Succoth.[251]

Jacob Journeys to Shechem

¹⁸ And Jacob came safely to the city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, on his way from Paddan-aram, and he camped before the city. ¹⁹ And he bought the piece of land where he had pitched his tent from the hand of the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for one hundred qesitahs.[252] ²⁰ And there he erected an altar and called it El-Elohe-Israel.[253]

CHAPTER 34

Dinah Is Raped

34 Now Dinah the daughter of Leah, whom she had borne to Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the land. ² When Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the land, saw her, he took her and lay with her and violated her.[254] ³ His soul clung[255] to Dinah the daughter of Jacob, and he loved the girl and spoke to the heart of the girl. ⁴ So Shechem spoke to his father Hamor, saying, “Get me this young woman for a wife.” 

⁵ Now Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah, his daughter: but his sons were with his livestock in the field, so Jacob held his peace until they came. ⁶ And Hamor the father of Shechem went out to Jacob to speak with him. ⁷ And the sons of Jacob came in from the field when they heard it. And the men were grieved and very angry because he had done a disgraceful thing in Israel by having sexual relations with the daughter of Jacob, for such a thing ought not to be done.

⁸ But Hamor spoke with them, saying, “The soul of my son Shechem longs for your daughter. Please give her to him as his wife. ⁹ Make marriages with us. Give us your daughters and take our daughters for yourselves. ¹⁰ You shall dwell with us, and the land shall be before you; settle and trade in it and acquire property in it.” ¹¹ Then Shechem said to her father and to her brothers, “Let me find favor in your eyes, and whatever you say to me I will give. ¹² Ask me ever so much bride-price and gift, and I will give according as you say to me. Only give me the young woman to be my wife.”

The Sons of Jacob Act Deviously

¹³ Then the sons of Jacob answered Shechem and his father Hamor speaking deceitfully, because he had defiled Dinah their sister. ¹⁴ They said to them, “We cannot do this thing, to give our sister to one who is uncircumcised, for that would be a disgrace to us. ¹⁵ Only on this condition will we consent to you: if you will become like us, in that every male of you be circumcised. ¹⁶ Then we will give our daughters to you, and we will take your daughters to ourselves, and we will dwell with you and become one people. ¹⁷ But if you will not listen to us and be circumcised, then we will take our daughter, and we will be gone.”

¹⁸ Now their words seemed good to Hamor and Shechem, Hamor’s son. ¹⁹ The young man did not delay doing the thing, because he was delighted with Jacob’s daughter. Now he was more respected than all the household of his father. 

²⁰ So Hamor and his son Shechem came to the gate of their city and spoke to the men of their city, saying, ²¹ “These men are peaceful with us; let them dwell in the land and trade in it, for look, the land is wide on both sides before them.[256] Let us take their daughters as wives, and let us give them our daughters. ²² Only on this condition will the men agree to dwell with us to become one people, when every male among us is circumcised as they are circumcised. ²³ Will not their livestock, their property and all their beasts be ours? Only let us agree with them, and they will dwell with us.” ²⁴ And all those who went out of the gate of his city listened to Hamor and his son Shechem. Every male was circumcised, all those who went out of the gate of his city.

²⁵ And it happened that on the third day, when they were in pain, that two of the sons of Jacob, Simeon and Levi, the brothers of Dinah, each took his sword and came upon the city unawares and killed all the males. ²⁶ They killed Hamor and his son Shechem with the edge of the sword and took Dinah from Shechem’s house and went away. ²⁷ The sons of Jacob came upon the slain and plundered the city, because they had defiled their sister. ²⁸ They took their flocks and their herds and their donkeys, and that which was in the city and in the field. ²⁹ All their wealth, all their little ones and their wives, all that was in the houses, they captured and plundered. 

³⁰ Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble on me by making me odious among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites. I am few in number. If they gather themselves against me and attack me, I shall be destroyed, both I and my household.” ³¹ But they said, “Should he treat our sister like a harlot?”

CHAPTER 35

Jacob Removes the Foreign Gods

35 And God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there, and make an altar to the God who appeared to you when you fled from before Esau your brother.” 

² So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “Put away the foreign gods that are among you and purify yourselves and change your garments. ³ Then let us arise and go up to Bethel, and I will make an altar there to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and has been with me wherever I have gone.” ⁴ So they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods which they had and the rings which were in their ears, and Jacob hid them under the terebinth tree[257] which was near Shechem.

Jacob Returns to Bethel

⁵ And as they journeyed, a terror of God fell upon the cities that were round about them, so that they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob. ⁶ So Jacob came to Luz (that is, Bethel), which is in the land of Canaan, he and all the people who were with him. ⁷ He built an altar there, and called the place El-bethel,[258] because their God had revealed himself to him when he fled from his brother. ⁸ And Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died, and she was buried under an oak below Bethel. And its name was called Allon-Bacuth.[259]

Jacob Is Named Israel

⁹ And God appeared to Jacob again when he came from Paddan-aram, and he blessed him. ¹⁰ And God said to him, “Your name is Jacob. Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name.” So his name was called Israel. ¹¹ And God said to him, “I am God Almighty.[260] Be fruitful and multiply. A nation[261] and an assembly of nations shall be from you, and kings shall go out from your loins. ¹² The land which I gave to Abraham and Isaac, I will give it to you, and I will give the land to your offspring after you.” ¹³ Then God went up from him in the place where he had spoken with him.

¹⁴ And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he had spoken with him, a pillar of stone, and he poured out a drink offering on it and poured oil on it. ¹⁵ And Jacob called the name of the place where God had spoken with him Bethel.

Birth of Benjamin; Death of Rachel

¹⁶ Then they journeyed from Bethel. And while they were still some distance from Ephrath, Rachel went into labor, and she had hard labor. ¹⁷ And when her labor was at its severest, the midwife said to her, “Do not fear, for you have another son.” ¹⁸ It came about as her soul was departing (for she died), that she named him Ben-oni;[262] but his father called him Benjamin. ¹⁹ So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem). ²⁰ Jacob set up a pillar over her grave; that is the pillar of Rachel’s grave to this day. 

²¹ And Israel journeyed on and pitched his tent beyond the tower of Eder. ²² And while Israel was dwelling in that land Reuben went and lay with[263] Bilhah, his father’s concubine. And Israel heard of it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve.

Twelve Sons of Israel

²³ The sons of Leah: Reuben (Jacob’s firstborn), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun. ²⁴ The sons of Rachel: Joseph and Benjamin. ²⁵ The sons of Bilhah, the female slave of Rachel: Dan and Naphtali. ²⁶ The sons of Zilpah, the female slave of Leah: Gad and Asher. These were the sons of Jacob who were born to him in Paddan-aram.

The Death of Isaac

²⁷ And Jacob came to Isaac his father at Mamre, or Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac dwelt as aliens.

²⁸ Now the days of Isaac were one hundred and eighty years. ²⁹ And Isaac breathed his last, and he died and was gathered to his people, old and full of days.[264] And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.

CHAPTER 36

Esau Moves

36 Now these are the generations of Esau (that is, Edom).

² Esau took his wives from the daughters of Canaan: Adah[265] the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Oholibamah the daughter of Anah and the granddaughter[266] of Zibeon the Hivite; ³ and Basemath, the daughter of Ishmael, the sister of Nebaioth. ⁴ And Adah bore to Esau Eliphaz; and Basemath bore Reuel; ⁵ and Oholibamah bore Jeush and Jalam, and Korah. These are the sons of Esau who were born to him in the land of Canaan.

⁶ And Esau took his wives and his sons and his daughters, and all the souls of his house,[267] and his herd and all his other beasts, and all the goods that he had acquired in the land of Canaan and went to a land[268] away from his brother Jacob. ⁷ For their goods had become too many for them to dwell together, and the land where they were living as foreigners was not able to sustain them because of their herds. ⁸ So Esau dwelt in the hill country of Seir (Esau, that is Edom).

Descendants of Esau

⁹ These are the descendants of Esau, the father of Edom, in the hill country of Seir. ¹⁰ These are the names of the sons of Esau: Eliphaz, the son of Adah, the wife of Esau; Reuel, the son of Basemath, the wife of Esau. ¹¹ The sons of Eliphaz were Teman, Omar, Zepho, Gatam, and Kenaz. ¹² (Timnah was the concubine of Eliphaz, the son of Esau. And she bore Amalek to Eliphaz.) These are the sons of Adah, the wife of Esau. ¹³ These are the sons of Reuel: Nahath, Zerah, Shammah, and Mizzah. These are the sons of Basemath, the wife of Esau. ¹⁴ These are the sons of Oholibamah, the daughter of Anah, daughter of Zibeon,[269] the wife of Esau: She bore to Esau Jeush, Jalam, and Korah.

¹⁵ These are the chiefs[270] of the sons of Esau. The sons of Eliphaz, the firstborn of Esau: the chiefs of Teman, Omar, Zepho, Kenaz, ¹⁶ Korah,[271] Gatam, and Amalek. These are the chiefs of Eliphaz in the land of Edom. These are the sons of Adah. ¹⁷ These are the sons Reuel, the son of Esau: the chiefs Nahath, Zerah, Shammah, and Mizzah; these are the chiefs of Reuel in the land of Edom. These are the sons of Basemath, the wife of Esau. ¹⁸ These are the sons of Oholibamah, the wife of Esau: the chiefs Jeush, Jalam, and Korah; these are the chiefs born of Oholibamah, the daughter of Anah, the wife of Esau. ¹⁹ These are the sons of Esau, and these are their chiefs (that is, Edom).

²⁰ These are the sons of Seir, the Horite, the inhabitants of the land: Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah, ²¹ Dishon, Ezer, and Dishan; these are the chiefs of the Horites, the sons of Seir in the land of Edom. ²² And the sons of Lotan were Hori and Hemam; and Lotan’s sister was Timna. ²³ These are the sons of Shobal: Alvan, Manahath, Ebal, Shepho, and Onam. ²⁴ These are the sons of Zibeon: Aiah and Anah; he is Anah who found the hot springs[272] in the desert while he pastured the donkeys of Zibeon his father. ²⁵ These are the sons of Anah: Dishon and Oholibamah, the daughter of Anah. ²⁶ These are the sons of Dishon:[273] Hemdan, Eshban, Ithran, and Cheran. ²⁷ These are the sons of Ezer: Bilhan, Zaavan, and Akan. ²⁸ These are the sons of Dishan: Uz and Aran. ²⁹ These are the chiefs of the Horites: the chiefs Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah, ³⁰ Dishon, Ezer, and Dishan. These are the chiefs of the Horites, according to their chiefs in the land of Seir.

³¹ These are the kings who reigned in the land of Edom before any king ruled over the Israelites. ³² Bela the son of Beor reigned in Edom. And the name of his city was Dinhabah. ³³ And Bela died, and Jobab, the son of Zerah from Bozrah, reigned in his place. ³⁴ And Jobab died, and Husham from the land of the Temanites reigned in his place. ³⁵ And Husham died, and Hadad, son of Bedad, who defeated Midian in the field of Moab reigned in his place, and the name of his city was Avith. ³⁶ And Hadad died, and Samlah from Masrekah reigned in his place. ³⁷ And Samlah died, and Shaul from Rehoboth on the Euphrates reigned in his place. ³⁸ And Shaul died, and Baal-Hanan, the son of Acbor, reigned in his place. ³⁹ And Baal-Hanan the son of Acbor died, and Hadar[274] reigned in his place, and the name of his city was Pau, and the name of his wife was Mehetabel, the daughter of Matred, daughter of Mezahab.

⁴⁰ These are the names of the chiefs of Esau according to their families, according to their dwelling places, by their names: the chiefs Timna, Alvah, Jetheth, ⁴¹ Oholibamah, Elah, Pinon, ⁴² Kenaz, Teman, Mibzar, ⁴³ Magdiel, and Iram; these are the chiefs of Edom (that is, Esau, the father of Edom) according to their settlements in the land of their possession.

CHAPTER 37

Joseph’s Dream

37 And Jacob dwelt in the land of the sojourning of his father, in the land of Canaan. ² These are the generations of Jacob.

Joseph, when seventeen years old, the young man was shepherding the flock with the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, the wives of his father. And Joseph brought a bad report about them to their father. ³ Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his other sons because he was the son of his old age, and he made him a robe of many colors.[275] ⁴ But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him.

⁵ Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more. ⁶ He said to them, “Hear this dream that I have dreamed: ⁷ Look, we were binding sheaves in the field, and look, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.” ⁸ Now his brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words.

⁹ Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, “Look, I have dreamed another dream. Look, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” ¹⁰ But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?” ¹¹ And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind.

Joseph’s Jealous brothers

¹² Now his brothers went to pasture the flock of their father[276] in Shechem. ¹³ Israel said to Joseph, “Are not your brothers pasturing the flock in Shechem? Come, and I will send you to them.” And he said to him, “I will go.” ¹⁴ Then he said to him, “Go now, see about the welfare of your brothers and the welfare of the flock, and bring word back to me.” So he sent him from the valley of Hebron, and he came to Shechem. ¹⁵ A man found him, and behold, he was wandering in the field; and the man asked him, “What are you seeking?” ¹⁶ And he said, “I am seeking my brothers. Tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock.” ¹⁷ And the man said, “They have moved on from here, for I heard them say, ‘Let us go to Dothan.’” So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan.

The Plot against Joseph

¹⁸ And they saw him afar off, and before he came near to them, they conspired against him to kill him. ¹⁹ And they said to one another, “Look, this dreamer comes.” ²⁰ Now then, come, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then we will say that a wild beast has devoured him, and we will see what will become of his dreams.” ²¹ But when Reuben heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying, “Let us not strike his soul.”[277] ²² And Reuben said to them, “Shed no blood; cast him into this pit that is in the wilderness, but lay no hand on him:” that he might deliver him out of their hand, to restore him to his father. 

²³ So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that he wore. ²⁴ And they took him and threw him into the pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it.

Joseph Sold into Slavery

²⁵ Then they sat down to eat bread. And looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing labdanum gum, balsam, and myrrh, on their way to carry it down to Egypt. ²⁶ Then Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? ²⁷ Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers listened to him. ²⁸ Then Midianite traders passed by. And they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt.

²⁹ When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit, he tore his garments. ³⁰ And returned to his brothers and said, “The boy is gone, and I, where shall I go?” 

³¹ Then they took the robe of Joseph and slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood. ³² And they sent the robe of many colors and brought it to their father and said, “This we have found; please identify whether it is your son’s robe or not.” ³³ And he recognized it and said, “The robe of my son! A wild animal has devoured him! Joseph has been torn to pieces!” ³⁴ Then Jacob tore his garments and put sackcloth on his loins and mourned for his son many days. ³⁵ And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, “No, I shall go down to Sheol[278] to my son, mourning.” And his father wept for him.

³⁶ Meanwhile the Midianites[279] had sold him in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard.

CHAPTER 38

Judah and Tamar

38 It happened at that time that Judah went down from his brothers and turned aside to a certain Adullamite, whose name was Hirah. ² And Judah saw the daughter of a certain Canaanite there whose[280] name was Shua. And he took her and went in to her. ³ And she conceived and bore a son, and he called[281] his name Er. ⁴ And she conceived again and bore a son, and he called his name Onan. ⁵ Yet again she bore a son, and she called his name Shelah. And he[282] was in Chezib when she bore him.

⁶ And Judah took a wife for Er his firstborn, and her name was Tamar. ⁷ But Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in the eyes of Jehovah, and Jehovah put him to death. ⁸ Then Judah said to Onan, “Go in to your brother’s wife and perform the duty of a brother-in-law to her,[283] and raise up offspring[284] for your brother.” ⁹ But Onan knew that the offspring would not be his. So whenever he went in to the wife of his brother he would waste the semen[285] on the ground, so as not to give offspring to his brother. ¹⁰ And what he did was wicked in the eyes of Jehovah, and he put him to death also. ¹¹ Then Judah said to his daughter-in-law Tamar, “Dwell as a widow in the house of your father until my son Shelah grows up,” for he said to himself: ‘He too may die like his brothers.’ So Tamar went and dwelt in her father’s house.

¹² In the course of time,[286] and Judah’s wife, the daughter of Shua, died. Judah kept the period of mourning, and then he went to his sheepshearers in Timnah with his companion Hirah the Adullamite. ¹³ And when Tamar was told, “Look your father-in-law is going up to Timnah to shear his sheep,” ¹⁴ she took off her widow’s garments and covered herself with a veil, wrapping herself up, and sat at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the road to Timnah. For she saw that Shelah was grown up, and she had not been given to him in marriage.

¹⁵ When Judah saw her, he thought her to be a harlot, for she had covered her face. ¹⁶ And he went over to her by the roadside, and said, “Come, let me come into you,” for he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law. And she said, “What will you give me, that you may come in to me?” ¹⁷ And he said, “I will send you a young goat from the flock.” And she said, “Will you give a pledge until you send it?” ¹⁸ He said, “What pledge shall I give you?” She replied, “Your signet and your cord and your staff that is in your hand.” So he gave them to her and went in to her, and she conceived by him. ¹⁹ Then she arose and went away and taking off her veil from upon herself, she put on the garments of her widowhood.

²⁰ When Judah sent the young goat by his friend the Adullamite to receive the pledge from the woman’s hand, he did not find her. ²¹ And he asked the men of the place, saying, “Where is the temple prostitute who was at Enaim at the roadside?” And they said, “No temple prostitute has been here.” ²² So he returned to Judah and said, “I have not found her. Also, the men of the place said, ‘No temple prostitute has been here.’” ²³ And Judah replied, “Let her keep the things as her own, lest we be laughed at. You see, I sent this young goat, and you did not find her.”

²⁴ And about three months later it was told to Judah, “Tamar your daughter-in-law has played the prostitute. Moreover, she is also with child by prostitute.” And Judah said, “Bring her out, and let her be burned.” ²⁵ As she was being brought out, she sent to her father-in-law saying, “By the man to whom these belong, I am with child.” And she said, “Please examine to whom these are, the signet and the cord[287] and the staff.” ²⁶ Then Judah examined them and said, “She is more righteous than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah.” And he did not know her again.[288]

²⁷ And it happened that at the time she gave birth that, look, twins were in her womb. ²⁸ And when she was in labor, one put out a hand, and the midwife took and tied a scarlet thread on his hand, saying, “This one came out first.” ²⁹ But it came about as he drew back his hand, that look, his brother came out. And she said, “What a breach you have made for yourself!” Therefore, his name was called Perez.[289] ³⁰ Afterward his brother came out with the scarlet thread on his hand, and his name was called Zerah.[290]

CHAPTER 39

Joseph’s Success in Egypt

39 Now Joseph had been brought down to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard, an Egyptian, had bought him from the hand of the Ishmaelites who had brought him down there. ² Jehovah was with Joseph, so he became a successful man. And he was in the house of his master, the Egyptian. ³ Now his master saw that Jehovah was with him and that Jehovah caused all that he did to succeed in his hands. ⁴ And Joseph found favor in his eyes, and he became his personal attendant; and he made him overseer over his house, and all that he owned he put in his hand. ⁵ It came about that from the time he made him overseer in his house and over all that he owned, Jehovah blessed the Egyptian’s house on account of Joseph; thus Jehovah’s blessing was upon all that he owned, in the house and in the field. ⁶ So he left everything he owned in Joseph’s charge; and with him there he did not concern himself with anything except the bread which he ate.

Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance. ⁷ Now after these things it came about that the wife of his master began to lifted up her eyes at[291] Joseph and say: “Lie down with me.” ⁸ But he refused and said to his master’s wife, “Behold, with me here, my master does not concern himself with anything in the house,[292] and he has put all that he owns in my hand. ⁹ There is no one greater in this house than I, and he has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do this great evil and sin against God?” ¹⁰ And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her. ¹¹ But it happened that on this day that he went into the house to do his work, and none of the men of the household was there inside. ¹² She caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me!” And he left his garment in her hand and fled and went outside. ¹³ And it came about when she saw that he had left his garment in her hand and had fled outside, ¹⁴ she called to the men of her house and said to them, “Look! He brought a Hebrew man to us to mock us; he came to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice. ¹⁵ And when he heard that I raised my voice and called out, he left his garment beside me and fled, and he went outside.” ¹⁶ Then she laid up his garment by her until his master came home. ¹⁷ Then she spoke to him according to these words, saying, “The Hebrew slave that you brought to us came to me to laugh at me.[293] ¹⁸ But as soon as I raised my voice and called out, he left his garment beside me and fled outside.”

Joseph Imprisoned

¹⁹ As soon as his master heard the words his wife spoke to him, saying: “These are the things your slave did to me,” his anger was kindled. ²⁰ And Joseph’s master took him and put him into the prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined, and he was there in the prison. ²¹ And Jehovah was with Joseph, and showed loyal love to him, and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison. ²² And the keeper of the prison put Joseph in charge of all the prisoners who were in the prison. And whatever was done there, he was the one who did it. ²³ The keeper of the prison paid no attention to anything that was in Joseph’s charge, because Jehovah was with him. And whatever he did, Jehovah made it succeed.

CHAPTER 40

Joseph Interprets a Prisoner’s Dream

40 After these things, the cupbearer of the king of Egypt and his baker offended their lord the king of Egypt. ² And Pharaoh was angry with his two officers, the chief cupbearer, and the chief baker, ³ and he put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, in the prison, the place where Joseph was confined. ⁴ And the captain of the guard appointed Joseph to be with them, and he attended them. And they continued for some time in custody. 

⁵ And they dreamed a dream both of them, each man his dream, in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream, the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were confined in the prison. ⁶ When Joseph came to them in the morning, he saw them, and look, they were troubled. ⁷ And he asked Pharaoh’s officers who were with him in custody in his master’s house, saying, “Why are your faces so sad today?” ⁸ They said to him, “We have dreamed a dream, and there is no one to interpret them.” And Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Please tell them to me.”

⁹ So the chief cupbearer told his dream to Joseph and said to him, “In my dream, look, there was a vine before me, ¹⁰ and on the vine, there were three branches. And as soon as it budded, its blossoms shot forth, and the clusters ripened into grapes. ¹¹ And the cup of Pharaoh was in my hand, and I took the grapes and squeezed them into the cup of Pharaoh. Then I placed the cup into the hand of Pharaoh.” ¹² Then Joseph said to him, “This is its interpretation: the three branches are three days. ¹³ Within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your office, and you shall place the cup of Pharaoh in his hand as formerly,[294] when you were his cupbearer. ¹⁴ Only remember me, when it is well with you, and please do me the kindness to mention me to Pharaoh, and so get me out of this house. ¹⁵ For I was indeed stolen out of the land of the Hebrews, and here also I have done nothing that they should put me into the pit.”

¹⁶ When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was favorable, he said to Joseph, “I also had a dream, and look there were three cake baskets on my head, ¹⁷ and in the uppermost basket there were all manner of baked food for Pharaoh, and the birds were eating them out of the basket on my head.” ¹⁸ Then Joseph answered and said, “This is its interpretation: the three baskets are three days. ¹⁹ In three days Pharaoh will lift your head from you and hang you on a tree, and the birds will eat your flesh from you.”

Pharaoh’s Birthday Feast

²⁰ On the third day, which was the birthday of Pharaoh, he made a feast for all his servants and lifted up the head of the chief cupbearer and the head of the chief baker among his servants. ²¹ And he restored the chief cupbearer to his position, and he placed the cup in the hand of Pharaoh. ²² But he hanged the chief baker, as Joseph had interpreted to them. ²³ Yet the chief cupbearer did not remember Joseph but forgot him.

CHAPTER 41

Joseph Interprets Pharaoh’s Dream

41 And it happened that after two full years Pharaoh dreamed, and behold, he was standing by the Nile.[295] ² And look, there came up out of the Nile seven cows, attractive and fat-fleshed, and they fed in the reed grass. ³ And look, seven other cows, ugly and thin fleshed, came up out of the Nile after them, and stood by the other cows on the bank of the Nile. ⁴ And the ugly, thin-fleshed cows ate up the seven attractive, fat-fleshed cows. And Pharaoh awoke. 

⁵ And he fell asleep and dreamed a second time, and look, seven ears of grain, plump and good, were growing on one stalk. ⁶ And look, seven thin ears of grain, scorched by the east wind, sprouted up after them. ⁷ And the thin ears of grain swallowed up the seven plump and full ears of grain. Then Pharaoh awoke, and behold, it was a dream. 

⁸ Now in the morning his spirit was troubled, so he sent and called for all the magicians of Egypt, and all its wise men. And Pharaoh told them his dream, but there was no one who could interpret them to Pharaoh.

⁹ Then the chief cupbearer said to Pharaoh, “I remember my sins today. ¹⁰ When Pharaoh was angry with his servants and put me and the chief baker in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, ¹¹ And we dreamed a dream one night, he and I each had a dream with its own interpretation. ¹² And there with us was a young man, a Hebrew servant of the commander of the guard, and we told him the dream, and he interpreted our dreams for us, each according to his dream he interpreted. ¹³ And it happened, as he interpreted to us, so it was; he restored me in my office, and him he hanged.”[296]

Joseph Interprets

¹⁴ Then Pharaoh sent and called for Joseph, and they brought him quickly from the prison;[297] and he shaved and changed his clothing and came to Pharaoh. ¹⁵ Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I have had a dream, but no one can interpret it. But I have heard it said about you, that when you hear a dream you can interpret it.” ¹⁶ Joseph then answered Pharaoh, saying, “It is not in me; God will give Pharaoh a favorable answer.”[298] 

¹⁷ Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Look, in my dream I was standing on the banks of the Nile. ¹⁸ Seven cows, fat-fleshed and attractive, came up out of the Nile and fed in the reed grass. ¹⁹ Seven other cows came up after them, poor and very ugly and thin fleshed, such as I had never seen in all the land of Egypt. ²⁰ And the lean, ugly cows ate up the first seven fat cows, ²¹ but when they had eaten them no one would have known that they had eaten them, for they were still as ugly as at the beginning. Then I awoke. 

²² Then I saw in my dream and look, seven ears of grain were coming out of one stalk, full and good.[299] ²³ And look, seven withered ears of grain, thin and scorched by the east wind, sprouted up after them. ²⁴ And the thin ears of grain swallowed up the seven good ears of grain. And I told the magicians, but there was no one who could explain it to me.”

²⁵ Then Joseph said to Pharaoh, “The dreams of Pharaoh are one. God has revealed to Pharaoh what he is about to do. ²⁶ The seven good cows are seven years, and the seven good ears are seven years; the dreams are one. ²⁷ The seven lean and ugly cows that came up after them are seven years, and the seven empty ears scorched by the east wind are also seven years of famine. ²⁸ It is as I have spoken to Pharaoh: God has shown to Pharaoh what he is about to do.

²⁹ Look, seven years of great abundance are coming throughout the land of Egypt. ³⁰ And after them seven years of famine will come, and all the abundance will be forgotten in the land of Egypt, and the famine will consume the land. ³¹ And the abundance in the land will not be known because of the famine afterward, for it will be very severe. ³² And the doubling of the dream of Pharaoh twice means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about. 

³³ Now therefore let Pharaoh look for a man discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. ³⁴ Let Pharaoh do this, and let him appoint overseers over the land, and take  one-fifth of the produce of the land of Egypt in the seven years of abundance. ³⁵ And let them gather all the food of these good years that are coming and store up grain under the authority of Pharaoh for food in the cities and let them keep it. ³⁶ That food shall be a reserve for the land against the seven years of famine that will be in the land of Egypt, so that the land may not perish through the famine.”

³⁷ And this proposal was good in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of all his servants.

Joseph Is Exalted as a Ruler of Egypt

³⁸ Then Pharaoh said to his servants, “Can we find a man like this in whom is the spirit of God?” ³⁹ So Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has made all of this known to you, there is no one so discerning and wise as you are. ⁴⁰ You shall be over my house, and according to your word[300] all my people shall obey your commands;[301] only with regard to the throne. will I be greater than you.” ⁴¹ And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “See, I have set you over all the land of Egypt.” ⁴² Then Pharaoh took off his signet ring from his hand and put it on Joseph’s hand and clothed him in garments of fine linen and put the gold chain[302] around his neck. ⁴³ He had him ride in his second chariot, and servants called out before him, “Abrek!”[303] So he placed him over all the land of Egypt. 

⁴⁴ Moreover, Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I am Pharaoh, and without your authorization no man may lift up his hand or his foot in all the land of Egypt.” ⁴⁵ And Pharaoh called Joseph’s name Zaphenath-paneah.[304] And he gave him in marriage Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On.[305] So Joseph traveled through the land of Egypt.

Joseph’s food Distribution

⁴⁶ Now Joseph was thirty years old when he entered the service of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh and traveled through the whole land of Egypt. ⁴⁷ And during the seven years of plenty, the earth produced abundantly.[306] ⁴⁸ And he gathered all the food of the seven years,[307] which occurred in the land of Egypt, and he stored the food in the cities. The food of the fields of the city that surrounded it, he stored up in the midst of it. ⁴⁹ And Joseph stored up grain like the sand of the sea in great abundance until he stopped measuring it, for it could not be measured.

The Sons of Joseph

⁵⁰ And to Joseph were born two sons before the year of famine came, whom Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On, bore to him. ⁵¹ And Joseph called the name of the first-born Manasseh,[308] “For,” he said, “God has made me forget all my hardship, and all my father’s house.” ⁵² The name of the second he called Ephraim,[309] “For God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction.”

⁵³ And the seven years of plenty that was in the land of Egypt came to an end. ⁵⁴ And the seven years of famine began to come, as Joseph had said, and there was famine in all lands, but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. ⁵⁵ And when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread. Pharaoh said to all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph. What he says to you, do.” ⁵⁶ So when the famine was over all the land, Joseph opened all the storehouses[310] and sold to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe in the land of Egypt. ⁵⁷ Moreover, all the earth came to Egypt to buy grain from Joseph, because the famine was severe in all the earth.

CHAPTER 42

Joseph’s Brothers Sent to Egypt

42 When Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why do you look at one another?” ² And he said, “Look, I have heard that there is grain in Egypt. Go down and buy grain for us from there, that we may live and not die.” ³ So ten of Joseph’s brothers went down to buy grain in Egypt. ⁴ But Jacob did not send Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, with his brothers, for he feared that harm might befall to him. 

Joseph Tests His Brothers

⁵ Thus the sons of Israel came to buy among the others who came, for the famine was in the land of Canaan. ⁶ Now Joseph was governor over the land. It was he who sold to all the people of the land. And Joseph’s brothers came and bowed themselves before him with their faces to the ground. ⁷ Joseph saw his brothers and recognized them, but he treated them like strangers and spoke to them roughly and said to them, “Where do you come from?” And they said, “From the land of Canaan to buy food.”

⁸ And Joseph recognized his brothers, but they did not recognize him. ⁹ And Joseph remembered the dreams that he had dreamed of them. And he said to them, “You are spies; you have come to see the weakness of the land.” ¹⁰ And they said to him, “No, my lord, your servants have come to buy food. ¹¹ We all are sons of one man. We are honest men. Your servants are not spies.” ¹² Then he said to them, “No, it is the weakness of the land that you have come to see.” ¹³ Then they said, “We, your servants, are twelve brothers, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan, but behold, the youngest is with our father today, and one is no more.”

¹⁴ But Joseph said to them, “It is as I said to you. You are spies. ¹⁵ By this you shall be tested: by the life of Pharaoh, you shall not go from this place unless your youngest brother comes here. ¹⁶ Send one of you, and let him bring your brother, while you remain in prison, that your words may be tested, whether there is truth in you. Or else, by the life of Pharaoh, surely you are spies.” ¹⁷ And he put them all together in prison for three days.

¹⁸ On the third day Joseph said to them, “Do this and you will live, for I fear God. ¹⁹ If you are honest men, let one of your brothers remain confined where you are in prison, and let the rest go and carry grain for the famine of your households. ²⁰ And bring your youngest brother to me. So your words will be verified, and you shall not die.” And they did so. 

²¹ Then they said to one another, “In truth we are guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us, and we did not listen. Therefore, this distress has come upon us.” ²² Then Reuben answered them, saying, “Did I not tell you, do not sin against the boy? But you would not listen, so now comes the reckoning for his blood.” ²³ They did not know that Joseph understood, for there was an interpreter between them. ²⁴ Then he turned away from them and wept. And he returned to them and spoke to them. And he took Simeon from them and bound him before their eyes. ²⁵ Then Joseph gave orders to fill their bags with grain and to restore every man’s money in his sack, and to give them provisions for the journey. And thus it was done for them.

Joseph’s Brothers Return Home to Jacob

²⁶ Then they loaded their grain upon their donkeys and departed from there. ²⁷ And as one of them opened his sack to give his donkey fodder at the lodging place, he saw his money, and look, it was in the mouth of his sack. ²⁸ And he said to his brothers, “My money was returned and moreover, look, it is in my sack!” Then their hearts failed them, and they turned trembling to one another, saying, “What is this that God has done to us?”

Simeon Is Held Hostage

²⁹ When they came to Jacob their father in the land of Canaan, they told him all that had befallen them, saying, ³⁰ “The man, the lord of the land, spoke roughly to us and took us to be spies of the land. ³¹ But we said to him, ‘We are honest men; we are not spies. ³² We are twelve brothers, sons of our father. One is no more, and the youngest is this day with our father in the land of Canaan.’ ³³ Then the man, the lord of the land, said to us, ‘By this I shall know that you are honest men: leave one of your brothers with me, and take grain for the famine of your households, and go. ³⁴ Bring your youngest brother to me. Then I shall know that you are not spies but you are honest men, and I will deliver your brother to you, and you shall trade in the land.’

³⁵ And it happened as they emptied their sacks, look, every man’s bundle of money was in his sack. And when they and their father saw their bundles of money, they were afraid. ³⁶ And Jacob their father said to them, “You have bereaved me of my children: Joseph is no more, and Simeon is no more, and now you would take Benjamin. All these things are against me.” ³⁷ Then Reuben spoke to his father, saying, “Kill my two sons if I do not bring him back to you. Put him in my hands, and I will bring him back to you.” ³⁸ But he said, “My son shall not go down with you, for his brother is dead, and he alone is left. If harm should happen to him on the journey that you are to make, you would bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to Sheol.”

CHAPTER 43

The Return to Egypt with Benjamin

43 Now the famine was severe in the land. ² And it happened that as they finished eating the grain which they had brought from Egypt their father said to them, “Go again, buy us a little food.” ³ And Judah spoke to him, saying, “The man did solemnly warn us, saying, ‘You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you.’ ⁴ If you will send our brother with us, we will go down and buy food for you. ⁵ But if you will not send him, we will not go down, for the man said to us, ‘You shall not see my face, unless your brother is with you.’ ⁶ Then Israel said, “Why did you treat me so badly as to tell the man that you had another brother?” ⁷ And They replied, “The man questioned us carefully about ourselves and our kindred, saying, ‘Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?’ What we told him was according to these words. Could we in any way know that he would say, ‘Bring your brother down’?” 

⁸ And Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy with me, and we will arise and go, that we may live and not die, both we and you and also our little ones. ⁹ I shall be the one to be surety for him. Out of my hand you may exact the penalty for him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, then let me be the blame all the days.[311] ¹⁰ If we had not delayed, we would now have returned twice.”

¹¹ Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: take some of the choice fruits of the land in your bags, and carry a gift down to the man, a little balm and a little honey, aromatic gum, myrrh, pistachio nuts, and almonds. ¹² Take double the money with you and take back in your hand the money that was returned in the mouth of your sacks. Perhaps it was an oversight. ¹³ And take also your brother, and arise, go again to the man. ¹⁴ And may God Almighty[312] grant you mercy before the man that he may send back your other brother and Benjamin. And as for me, if I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved.” ¹⁵ So the men took this gift, and they took double money in their hand, and Benjamin, and they rose up and went down to Egypt and stood before Joseph.

Joseph Sees Benjamin

¹⁶ When Joseph saw Benjamin with them he said to the one who was over his household, “Bring the men into the house and slaughter an animal and make ready, for the men are to dine with me at noon.” ¹⁷ And the man did as Joseph told him, and the man brought the men into the house of Joseph. ¹⁸ And the men were afraid when they were brought into the house of Joseph, and they said, “It is because of the money, which was replaced in our sacks the first time, that we are brought in, so that he may assault us and fall upon us to take us as slaves with our donkeys.” 

¹⁹ So they went up to the steward of Joseph’s house and spoke with him at the door of the house, ²⁰ and said, “Oh, my lord, we came down the first time to buy food. ²¹ And it was when we came to the lodging place, we opened our sacks, and there was each man’s money in the mouth of his sack, our money in full weight. So we have brought it again in our hand, ²² And other money have we brought down in our hand to buy food. We do not know who put our money in our sacks.” ²³ And he said, “Peace be to you, fear not. Your God, and the God of your father, has given you treasure in your sacks: I had your money.” And he brought Simeon out to them. 

Joseph’s Banquet with His Brothers

²⁴ And when the man had brought the men into Joseph’s house and given them water, and they had washed their feet, and he gave their donkeys fodder, ²⁵ And they prepared the gift for Joseph’s coming at noon, for they heard that they should eat bread there. ²⁶ When Joseph came home, they brought to him the gift that they had with them into the house and bowed down to him to the ground. ²⁷ And he asked them of their welfare, and said, “Is your father well, the older man of whom you spoke? Is he still alive? ²⁸ They said, “Your servant our father is well; he is still alive.” And they bowed their heads and prostrated themselves. 

²⁹ And he lifted up his eyes and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother’s son, and said, “Is this your youngest brother, of whom you spoke to me?” Then he said, “God be gracious to you, my son!” ³⁰ Then Joseph hurried out, for his compassions were warmed[313] for his brother, and he sought a place to weep. And he entered his chamber and wept there. ³¹ Then he washed his face and came out. And controlling himself he said, “Serve the food.” ³² They served him by himself, and them by themselves, and the Egyptians who ate with him by themselves, because the Egyptians could not eat bread with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination[314] to the Egyptians. 

³³ And they sat before him, the firstborn according to his birthright and the youngest according to his youth. And the men looked at one another in amazement. ³⁴ And he took and sent portions from before him to them, but Benjamin’s portion was five times as much as any of theirs. And they drank and were merry with him.

CHAPTER 44

The Silver Cup of Joseph in the Bag of Benjamin

44 Then he commanded the man who was over his house, saying, “Fill the men’s sacks with food, as much as they can carry, and put each man’s money in the mouth of his sack. ² And put my cup, the silver cup, in the mouth of the sack of the youngest, with his money for the grain.” And he did according to the word that Joseph had spoken. 

³ As soon as the morning was light, the men were sent away, they and their donkeys. ⁴ And when they were gone out of the city, and were not yet far off, Joseph said to the man who was over his house, “Up, follow after the men, and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good?[315] ⁵ Is it not from this that my lord drinks, and by this that he practices divination? You have done wrong in doing this.’”

⁶ And when he overtook them, he spoke to them these words. ⁷ They said to him, “Why does my lord speak such words as these? Far be it from your servants that they should do such a thing! ⁸ Look, the money that we found in the mouths of our sacks we brought back to you from the land of Canaan. How then could we steal silver or gold from the house of my lord? ⁹ With whomsoever of your slaves it be found, let him die, and we also will be my lord’s slaves.” ¹⁰ And he said, “Now also let it be according to your words: he with whom it is found shall be my slave, and you shall be blameless.”[316] ¹¹ Then they quickly lowered each man his sack to the ground, and opened each man his sack. ¹² And he searched, and with the eldest he began, and ended with the youngest, and the cup was found in Benjamin’s sack. 

¹³ Then they tore their garments, and loaded every man his donkey, and they returned to the city. ¹⁴ When Judah and his brothers came to the house of Joseph, he was still there, and they fell before him on the ground. ¹⁵ Joseph said to them, “What deed is this that you have done? Do you not know that a man like me can indeed practice divination?” ¹⁶ And Judah said, “What shall we say to my lord? What shall we speak? Or how can we clear ourselves? God has found out the guilt of your slaves; look, we are slaves to my Lord, both we and he also in whose hand the cup has been found.” ¹⁷ But he said, “Far be it from me that I should do so! Only the man in whose hand the cup was found shall be my slave. But as for you, go up in peace to your father.”

Judah Pleads for Benjamin

¹⁸ Then Judah went up to him and said, “Oh, my lord, please let your slave speak a word in my lord’s ears, and let not your anger burn against your slave, for you are like Pharaoh himself. ¹⁹ My lord asked his slaves, saying, ‘Have you a father, or a brother?’ ²⁰ And we said to my lord, ‘We have a father, an older man, and a young brother, the child of his old age. His brother is dead, so he alone is left of his mother, and his father loves him.’ ²¹ Then you said to your slaves, ‘Bring him down to me, that I may set my eyes on him.’ ²² But we said to my lord, ‘The boy cannot leave his father, for if he should leave his father, his father would die.’ ²³ Then you said to your slaves, ‘Unless your youngest brother comes down with you, you shall not again see my face.’

²⁴ “And it was when we went back to your slave my father, we told him the words of my lord. ²⁵ And when our father said, ‘Go again, buy us a little food,’ ²⁶ then we said, ‘We cannot go down. If our youngest brother is with us, then we shall go down. For we cannot see the man’s face unless our youngest brother is with us.’ ²⁷ Then your slave, my father, said to us, ‘You yourselves know that my wife bore me two sons. ²⁸ One left me, and I said, “Surely he has been torn to pieces,” and I have never seen him since. ²⁹ And if you take this one also from me, and harm befalls him, you will bring down my gray hairs in sorrow to Sheol.’ 

³⁰ So now, when I come to your slave, my father, and the boy is not with us, as his soul is bound up with his soul,[317] ³¹ and it shall be when he sees that the boy is not with us, he will die, and your slaves will bring down the gray hairs of your slave our father with sorrow to Sheol. ³² For your servant became a pledge of surety for the boy to my father, saying, ‘If I do not bring him back to you, then I shall bear the blame before my father all my life.’ ³³ Now therefore, let your slave, I pray you, remain instead of the boy a slave to my lord; and let the boy go up with his brothers. ³⁴ For how can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me? I fear to see the evil that would find my father.”

CHAPTER 45

Joseph Reveals Hs Identity and Deals Kindly with His Brothers

45 Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him. And he cried out, “Make everyone go out from me.” So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. 

² And he raises his voice in weeping, so that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. ³ And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence.

⁴ So Joseph said to his brothers, “Come near to me, please.” And they came near. And he said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. ⁵ And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. ⁶ For these two years has the famine been in the land, and there are yet five years, in which there shall be neither plowing nor harvest. ⁷ And God sent me before you to preserve you a remnant on the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. ⁸ So now it was not you that sent me here, but God. And he has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and ruler over all the land of Egypt. 

⁹ Hurry and go up to my father and say to him, ‘Thus says your son Joseph, God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me, do not delay. ¹⁰ You shall dwell in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your sons and the sons of your sons, and your flocks, your herds, and all that you have. ¹¹ And there will I provide for you, for there are yet five years of famine; lest you and your household, and all that you have, do not come to poverty.’ ¹² And, look, your eyes see, and the eyes of my brother Benjamin, that it is my mouth that speaks to you. ¹³ And you shall tell my father of all my glory in Egypt, and of all that you have seen. And you shall hurry and bring my father down here.” 

¹⁴ Then he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck and wept, and Benjamin wept upon his neck. ¹⁵ And he kissed all his brothers and wept upon them. And after that his brothers talked with him.

Joseph’s Brothers Return for Jacob

¹⁶ Then the report was heard in the house of Pharaoh, saying, “Joseph’s brothers have come.” And it was good in the eyes of Pharaoh and his servants. ¹⁷ And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Say to your brothers, ‘Do this: load your beasts and go back to the land of Canaan, ¹⁸ and take your father and your households and come to me, and I will give you the best of the land of Egypt, and you shall eat the fat of the land.’ ¹⁹ And you, Joseph, are commanded to say, ‘Do this: take wagons from the land of Egypt for your little ones and for your wives, and bring your father, and come. ²⁰ Do not worry about your goods, for the best of all the land of Egypt is yours.’”

²¹ The sons of Israel did so: and Joseph gave them wagons, according to the command of Pharaoh, and gave them provisions for the journey. ²² To all of them he gave each man changes of garments, but to Benjamin he gave three hundred pieces of silver, and five changes of garments. ²³ To his father he sent as follows: ten donkeys loaded with the good things of Egypt, and ten female donkeys loaded with grain, bread, and provision for his father on the journey. ²⁴ Then he sent his brothers away, and as they departed, he said to them, “Do not quarrel on the journey.” 

²⁵ So they went up out of Egypt and came to the land of Canaan to Jacob their father. ²⁶ And they spoke to him, saying, “Joseph is still alive, and he is ruler over all the land of Egypt.” And his heart went numb, for he did not believe them. ²⁷ But when they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said to them, and when he saw the wagons that Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of their father Jacob revived. ²⁸ And Israel said, “It is enough; Joseph my son is still alive. I will go and see him before I die.”

CHAPTER 46

Jacob and His Household Move to Egypt

46 So Israel took his journey with all that he had and came to Beersheba and offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. ² And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, “Jacob, Jacob.” And he said, “Here I am.” ³ Then he said, “I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you a great nation there. ⁴ I myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I myself will also bring you back from there, and Joseph will lay his hand on your eyes.[318]

⁵ Then Jacob set out from Beersheba. The sons of Israel carried Jacob their father, their little ones, and their wives, in the wagons which Pharaoh had sent to carry him. ⁶ They also took their livestock and their goods, which they had gained in the land of Canaan, and came into Egypt, Jacob and all his offspring with him, ⁷ his sons, and his sons’ sons with him, his daughters, and his sons’ daughters. All his offspring he brought with him into Egypt.

Names of Those Who Came to Egypt

⁸ Now these are the names of the sons of Israel, who came into Egypt, Jacob and his sons. Reuben, the firstborn of Jacob. ⁹ And the sons of Reuben: Hanoch, and Pallu, and Hezron, and Carmi. ¹⁰ And the sons of Simeon: Jemuel, and Jamin, and Ohad, and Jachin, and Zohar, and Shaul the son of a Canaanite woman. ¹¹ And the sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari. ¹² And the sons of Judah: Er, and Onan, and Shelah, and Perez, and Zerah (but Er and Onan died in the land of Canaan). And the sons of Perez were Hezron and Hamul. ¹³ And the sons of Issachar: Tola, and Puvah, and Iob, and Shimron.[319] ¹⁴ And the sons of Zebulun: Sered, and Elon, and Jahleel. ¹⁵ These are the sons of Leah, whom she bore to Jacob in Paddan-aram, with his daughter Dinah; all the souls of his sons and his daughters were thirty-three. ¹⁶ And the sons of Gad: Ziphion,[320] and Haggi, Shuni, and Ezbon, Eri, and Arodi, and Areli. ¹⁷ And the sons of Asher: Imnah, and Ishvah, and Ishvi, and Beriah, and Serah their sister; and the sons of Beriah: Heber, and Malchiel. ¹⁸ These are the sons of Zilpah, whom Laban gave to Leah his daughter; and these she bore to Jacob, even sixteen souls. ¹⁹ The sons of Rachel Jacob’s wife: Joseph and Benjamin. ²⁰ And to Joseph in the land of Egypt were born Manasseh and Ephraim,[321] whom Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On, bare unto him. ²¹ And the sons of Benjamin: Bela, and Becher, and Ashbel, Gera, and Naaman, Ehi, and Rosh, Muppim, and Huppim, and Ard. ²² These are the sons of Rachel, who were born to Jacob: all the souls were fourteen. ²³ And the sons of Dan: Hushim.[322] ²⁴ And the sons of Naphtali: Jahzeel, and Guni, and Jezer, and Shillem. ²⁵ These are the sons of Bilhah, whom Laban gave to Rachel his daughter, and these she bore to Jacob: all the souls were seven. 

²⁶ All the souls belonging to Jacob who came into Egypt, who came out of his upper thigh,[323] not including the wives of the sons of Jacob, were sixty-six souls in all. ²⁷ And the sons of Joseph, who were born to him in Egypt, were two souls.[324] All the souls of the house of Jacob who came into Egypt were seventy.[325]

Joseph Meets Jacob at Goshen

²⁸ And he sent Judah ahead of him to Joseph, to show the way before him to Goshen; and they came into the land of Goshen. ²⁹ Then Joseph prepared his chariot and went up to meet Israel his father in Goshen. And he presented himself to him and fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while. ³⁰ Then Israel said to Joseph, “Now let me die since I have seen your face, that you are still alive.” 

³¹ Joseph said to his brothers and to his father’s household, “I will go up and tell Pharaoh and will say to him, ‘My brothers and my father’s household, who were in the land of Canaan, have come to me. ³² And the men are shepherds, for they have been keepers of livestock, and they have brought their flocks and their herds and all that they have.’ ³³ And it shall be when Pharaoh calls you and says, ‘What is your occupation?’ ³⁴ you shall say, ‘Your servants have been keepers of livestock from our youth even until now, both we and our forefathers,’ in order that you may dwell in the land of Goshen, for every shepherd is an abomination[326] to the Egyptians.”

CHAPTER 47

Jacob Meets Pharaoh

47 So Joseph went in and told Pharaoh, “My father and my brothers, with their flocks and their herds and all that they possess, have come from the land of Canaan. They are now in the land of Goshen.” ² And from among his brothers he took five men and presented them to Pharaoh.

³ Pharaoh said to his brothers, “What is your occupation?” And they said to Pharaoh, “Your servants are shepherds, as our forefathers were.” ⁴ And they said to Pharaoh, “To sojourn in the land we have come, for there is no pasture for your servants’ flocks, for the famine is severe in the land of Canaan. And now, therefore, please, let your servants dwell in the land of Goshen.” ⁵ Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Your father and your brothers have come to you. ⁶ The land of Egypt is before you. In the best of the land let your father and your brothers dwell. In the land of Goshen let them dwell,  and if you know any able men[327] among them, put them in charge of my livestock.”

⁷ Then Joseph brought in Jacob his father and presented him to Pharaoh, and Jacob blessed Pharaoh. ⁸ And Pharaoh said to Jacob, “How many are the days of the years of your life? ⁹ And Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The days of the years of my sojourning are a hundred and thirty years. Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my forefathers in the days of their sojourning.” ¹⁰ And Jacob blessed Pharaoh and went out from the presence of Pharaoh. 

¹¹ Then Joseph settled his father and his brothers and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses, as Pharaoh had commanded. ¹² And Joseph provided his father, his brothers, and all his father’s household with food,[328] according to the number of their dependents.

Joseph’s Wise Governance

¹³ Now there was no food in all the land, for the famine was very severe, so that the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan languished by reason of the famine. ¹⁴ And Joseph gathered up all the money that was found in the land of Egypt, and in the land of Canaan, for the grain which they bought, and Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh’s house. ¹⁵ And when the money was all spent in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? For our money is gone.” ¹⁶ And Joseph answered, “Give your livestock, and I will give you food in exchange for your livestock, if your money is gone.” ¹⁷ So they brought their livestock to Joseph, and Joseph gave them food in exchange for the horses and the flocks and the herds and the donkeys; and he fed them with food in exchange for all their livestock that year.

¹⁸ And when that year was ended, they came to him the following year and said to him, “We will not hide from my lord that our money is all spent. The herds of livestock are my lord’s. There is nothing left in the sight of my lord but our bodies and our land. ¹⁹ Why should we die before your eyes, both we and our land? Buy us and our land for food, and we with our land will be slaves to Pharaoh. And give us seed that we may live and not die, and that the land may not be desolate.”

Result of the Famine

²⁰ So Joseph bought all the land of Egypt for Pharaoh, for the Egyptians sold each one his field, for the famine was severe upon them. And the land became Pharaoh’s. ²¹ As for the people, he removed them[329] to the cities from one end of Egypt to the other. ²² Only the land of the priests he did not buy, for the priests had a fixed allowance from Pharaoh and lived on the allowance which Pharaoh gave them. Therefore, they did not sell their land. ²³ Then Joseph said to the people, “Look, I have this day bought you and your land for Pharaoh. Now here is seed for you, and you shall sow the land. ²⁴ And at the harvests you shall give a fifth to Pharaoh, and four fifths shall be your own, as seed for the field and as food for yourselves and your households, and as food for your little ones.” ²⁵ And they said, “you have saved our lives. Let us find favor in the sight of my lord, and we will be Pharaoh’s slaves. ²⁶ So Joseph made it a statute concerning the land of Egypt, and it stands to this day, that Pharaoh should have the fifth; only the land of the priests alone did not become Pharaoh’s.

Israel Settles in Goshen

²⁷ Thus Israel dwelt in the land of Egypt, in the land of Goshen. And they gained possessions in it and were fruitful and multiplied greatly. ²⁸ And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years. So the days of Jacob, the years of his life, were one hundred forty and seven years.

²⁹ And the time drew near that Israel must die, and he called his son Joseph, and said to him, “If now I have found favor in your sight, put, please, your hand under my thigh, and deal kindly and truly with me. Please do not bury me in Egypt; ³⁰ but let me lie with my forefathers. Carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burying place.” He answered, “I will do as you have said.” ³¹ And he said, “Swear to me;” and he swore to him. Then Israel bowed himself upon the head of his bed.[330]

CHAPTER 48

Jacob Blesses the Two Sons of Joseph

48 After these things, Joseph was told, “Look, your father is ill.” So he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. ² And it was told to Jacob, “Look your son Joseph has come to you.” Then Israel summoned his strength and sat up in bed. ³ And Jacob said to Joseph, “God Almighty[331] appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me, ⁴ and said to me, ‘Look, I will make you fruitful and multiply you, and I will make of you a multitude of peoples and will give this land to your offspring after you for an everlasting possession.’ ⁵ And now your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, they are mine; Ephraim and Manasseh, even as Reuben and Simeon, shall be mine. ⁶ And your offspring which you shall bear after them shall be yours. They shall be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance. ⁷ As for me, when I came from Paddan, to my sorrow Rachel died in the land of Canaan on the way, when there was still some distance to go to Ephrath, and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).”

⁸ When Israel saw Joseph’s sons, he said, “Who are these?” ⁹ Joseph said to his father, “They are my sons, whom God has given me here.” And he said, “Bring them to me, please, that I may bless them.” ¹⁰ Now the eyes of Israel were dim with age, so that he could not see. So he brought them near him, and he kissed them and embraced them. ¹¹ And Israel said to Joseph, “I had not thought to see your face, and look, God has let me see your offspring also.” ¹² Then Joseph removed them from his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth.

 Ephraim Gets the Greater Blessing

¹³ And Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel’s left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel’s right hand and brought them near him. ¹⁴ And Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on the head of Ephraim, who was the younger, and his left hand on the head of Manasseh, crossing his hands for Manasseh was the firstborn. ¹⁵ He blessed Joseph, and said,

“The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked,
    the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day,
¹⁶ the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the boys;
    and let my name be called upon them, and the name of my fathers, Abraham and Isaac;
    and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.”

¹⁷ When Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him, and he took his father’s hand to move it from Ephraim’s head to Manasseh’s head. ¹⁸ Joseph said to his father, “Not so, my father, for this one is the firstborn. Put your right hand on his head.” ¹⁹ But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He also shall become a people, and he also shall be great. Nevertheless, his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his offspring shall become a multitude of nations.” ²⁰ He blessed them that day, saying,

“By you[332] Israel will pronounce blessings, saying,

‘God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh.’”

Thus, he put Ephraim before Manasseh. 

²¹ Then Israel said to Joseph, “Look, I am about to die, but God will be with you and will bring you again to the land of your forefathers. ²² Moreover I have given to you one portion more than your brothers, which I took out of the hand of the Amorite with my sword and with my bow.”

CHAPTER 49

Israel’s Prophecy Concerning His Sons

49 Then Jacob called his sons and said, “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you what shall befall to you in days to come.

² “Assemble and hear, O sons of Jacob,
    listen to Israel your father.

³ “Reuben, you are my firstborn,
    my might, and the firstfruits of my strength,
    preeminent in dignity and preeminent in power.
⁴ Unstable as water, you shall not have preeminence,
    because you went up to the bed of your father;
    then you defiled it. You went up to my couch![333]

⁵ “Simeon and Levi are brothers;
    weapons of violence are their swords.[334]
⁶ Let my soul come not into their council;
    O my glory,[335] be not joined to their assembly.
For in their anger they killed men,
    and in their willfulness they hamstrung oxen.
⁷ Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce,
    and their wrath, for it is cruel!
I will divide them in Jacob
    and scatter them in Israel.

⁸ “Judah, your brothers shall praise you;
    your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies;
    your father’s sons shall bow down before you.
⁹ Judah is a lion’s cub;
    from the prey, my son, you have gone up.
He stooped down; he crouched as a lion
    and as a lioness; who dares rouse him up?

Shiloh to Come out of Judah

¹⁰ The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
    nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until Shiloh[336] comes;
    and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.[337]
¹¹ Binding his foal to the vine
    and his donkey’s colt to the choice vine,
he has washed his garments in wine
    and his vesture in the blood of grapes.
¹² Dark red are his eyes from wine,
    and his teeth white from milk.

¹³ “Zebulun shall dwell at the shore of the sea;
    he shall become a haven for ships,
    and his border shall be at Sidon.

¹⁴ “Issachar is a strong donkey,
    crouching between the sheepfolds.
¹⁵ He saw that a resting place was good,
    and that the land was pleasant,
so he bowed his shoulder to bear,
    and became a servant at forced labor.

¹⁶ “Dan shall judge his people
    as one of the tribes of Israel.
¹⁷ Dan shall be a serpent in the way,
    a viper by the path,
that bites the horse’s heels
    so that his rider falls backward.
¹⁸ I wait for your salvation, O Jehovah.

¹⁹ “Raiders shall raid Gad,
    but he shall raid at their heels.

²⁰ “Asher’s food shall be rich,[338]
    and he shall yield king’s delicacies.

²¹ “Naphtali is a doe let loose
    that bears beautiful fawns.[339]

²² “Joseph is a fruitful bough,
    a fruitful bough by a spring;
    his branches[340] run over the wall.
²³ The archers bitterly attacked him,
    shot at him, and harassed him severely,
²⁴ yet his bow remained unmoved;
    his arms were made agile
by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob
    (from there is the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel),
²⁵ by the God of your father who will help you,
    by the Almighty who will bless you
    with blessings of heaven above,
blessings of the deep that crouches beneath,
    blessings of the breasts and of the womb.
²⁶ The blessings of your father
    are mighty beyond the blessings of my ancestors,[341]
    up to the bounties of the everlasting hills.
May they be on the head of Joseph,
    and on the crown of the head of him who was singled out from his brothers.

²⁷ “Benjamin is a ravenous wolf,
    in the morning devouring the prey
    and at evening dividing the spoil.”

²⁸ All these are the twelve tribes of Israel. This is what their father said to them as he blessed them, each according to his blessing he blessed them. 

Jacob’s Burial Instructions

²⁹ Then he commanded them and said to them, “I am to be gathered to my people; bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite, ³⁰ in the cave that is in the field at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. ³¹ There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife, and there I buried Leah. ³² The field and the cave in it were purchased from the Hittites.” 

The Death of Jacob

³³ When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and was gathered to his people.

CHAPTER 50

Joseph Buries Jacob in Canaan

50 Then Joseph fell on his father’s face and wept over him and kissed him. ² And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. ³ Forty days were required for it, for thus are the days required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him seventy days.

⁴ And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, ⁵ ‘My father made me swear, saying, “Look, I am about to die. In my tomb that I have hewed out for myself in the land of Canaan, there you must bury me.” So then, please let me go up and let me bury my father; then I will return.’” ⁶ And Pharaoh answered, “Go up, and bury your father, as he made you swear.”

⁷ So Joseph went up to bury his father, and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household and all the elders of the land of Egypt, ⁸ as well as all the household of Joseph, his brothers, and his father’s household. Only their children, their flocks, and their herds were left in the land of Goshen. ⁹ And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company. ¹⁰ When they came to the threshing floor of Atad,[342] which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a very great and sorrowful lamentation, and he made a mourning for his father seven days. ¹¹ When the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning on the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians.” Therefore, the place was named Abel-mizraim;[343] it is beyond the Jordan.

Burial at Machpelah

¹² Thus his sons did for him as he had commanded them, ¹³ for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, which field Abraham had bought as a burial place from Ephron the Hittite before Mamre. ¹⁴ After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt, he and his brothers, and all who had gone up with him to bury his father.

Joseph Confirms His Forgiveness

¹⁵ When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead,[344] they said, “It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him.” ¹⁶ So they sent a instructions to Joseph,[345] saying, “Your father gave this command before he died, saying, ¹⁷ ‘Thus you must say to Joseph, ‘O, please now forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, for they did evil to you.’ So now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” And Joseph wept when they spoke to him. ¹⁸ His brothers also came and fell down before him and said, “Look, we are your slaves.” ¹⁹ But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? ²⁰ As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. ²¹ So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones.” Thus, he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.

Death of Joseph

²² So Joseph remained in Egypt, he and the house of his father. And Joseph dwelt one hundred and ten years. ²³ And Joseph saw Ephraim’s children to the third generation. Moreover, the children of Machir, son of Manasseh, were born on the knees of Joseph. ²⁴ And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will certainly visit you and bring you up from this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” 

Joseph’s Command about His Bones

²⁵ Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.” ²⁶ Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear an oath, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.”

[1] That is, watery deep, an area below the surface of bodies of water

[2] Expanse: (רָקִיעַ raqia) The earth is covered with water and a thick blanket (cover) of vapor. These two features are divided, which creates a separation between the watery surface and the cover of vapor. The Bible explains this area as “a separation between the waters and the waters.” The atmosphere surrounding the earth is the space above the earth where the birds fly. God began to call the expanse heaven (or sky). In this atmosphere surrounding the earth, the space above the earth containing clouds, God also placed planets, the moon, sun, and other stars. So, this included more than just the atmosphere surrounding the earth. The Psalmist tells us ‘The heavens are telling of the glory of God, and the expanse is declaring the work of his hands.’ – Gen. 1:6-8, 14-15, 17, 20; Ps. 19:1; 150:1.

[3] The Hebrew Qal verb (וַיַּעַשַּׂ) wayyaʿaś in v.16 is a wayyiqtōl (waw-consecutive + imperfect). This construction generally conveys past tense/time. It is commonly referred to by grammarians as the “waw-consecutive” form. The traditional rendering is the simple past tense, “God made.” The preferable rendering should be “God had made the two great lights.” The Hebrew grammarian Gleason L. Archer writes, “The Hebrew has no special form for the pluperfect tense but uses the perfect tense, or the conversive imperfect as here, to express either the English past or the English pluperfect, depending on the context.” (Archer, 1982, pp. 61-62) The pluperfect tense denotes an action completed before some past point of time specified or implied, formed in English by had, as in “God had made” (past perfect).

[4] Progressive action indicated by the imperfect state

[5] The SYR has “over all the wild animals of the earth” instead of “over all the earth.” Codex Leningrad B 19A is the earliest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Scriptures (c. 1008 C.E.), which serves as a primary source for the recovery of details in the missing parts of the Aleppo Codex. The Aleppo Codex is an important Hebrew Masoretic manuscript from about 930 C.E. Codex Leningrad and the Aleppo Codex are the two most important Hebrew Old Testament manuscripts. These two Hebrew texts are the most significant manuscripts of the Old Testament to be discovered so far and as far as usefulness and significance. The Targums or the Vulgate have their own fair share of textual variants, but the Syriac Old Testament Peshitta has even more textual variants like the one we find above in Genesis 1:26. Thus, clearly, undoubtedly, the original reading was “and over all the earth,”

[6] The BHS has the original reading “on the seventh day God finished his work,” while we have a variant in the LXX, QT, SP, and SYR “on the sixth day God finished his work.” The versions are noted for their variants, especially the Syriac Old Testament Peshitta. It might be that the scribes were attempting to make the reference to the seventh day clearer at the end of the verse. And God finished on the sixth day his works which he made, and he ceased on the seventh day from all his works which he made.

[7] Or the generation of … The Greek word genesis is used in the Greek Septuagint (LXX) to render the Hebrew term tohledhohth, which generally has a similar meaning, denoting the history in numerous places within the book of Genesis, which is usually rendered “generations” in the book of Genesis (ASV, ESV, LEB, NASB) or “history.” It is used as a heading to set up the historical account that is to follow. – Gen. 2:4; 5:1; 6:9; 10:1; 11:10, 27; 25:12, 19; 36:1, 9; 37:2.

[8] The first occurrence of God’s personal name, יהוה (JHVH/YHWH), which is found in the Hebrew Old Testament 6,828 times.

[9] Or cultivate the ground

[10] Or spring

[11] “Man” occurs with the definite article (i.e., “the man” and indicates the noun is singular

[12] Heb., neshamah [“breath”] chaiyim [“of life”]

[13] Lit was going out; Hebrew participle refers to a continuous stream

[14] Lit became four heads

[15] Assyria Heb., Ashshur

[16] Lit eat from it

[17] Lit dying you [singular] shall die. Heb moth tamuth; the first reference to death in the Scriptures

[18] Lit as his opposite; counterpart or complement, something that completes or perfects him

[19] Lit female man

[20] In Hebrew you is plural in verses 1–5

[21] MT “to make one wise” LXX SYR VG. “To look upon”

[22] Was Adam standing beside Eve when she had the conversation with the serpent, was deceived, and chose to rebel against God? The Bible shows no indication that this is the case. Other translations make it appear as though that is the case, “she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.” The Hebrew verb translated “gave” is in the imperfect waw consecutive; as a result, it points to a temporal or logical sequence (usually called an “imperfect sequential”). Hence, a Bible translator or committee can translate the several occurrences of the waw, which tie together the chain of events in verse 6, with “and” as well as other transitional words, such as “subsequently,” “then,” “after that,” afterward,” and “so.” One must ask themselves, would Adam have passively stood beside his wife Eve, listening to the conversation between her and the serpent, as Satan spewed forth lies and malicious talk through this serpent, especially when Paul tells us explicitly that he was not deceived by the serpent? Supposedly, Adam just stood there and remained silent? Adam just chose not to interrupt the peddling of lies.

[23] Lit the voice

[24] Or (לְרוּחַ הַיּוֹם) in the breezy part of the day

[25] A form of hendiadys in which two words are connected by “and,” but one idea is meant. (e.g., nice and warm).

[26] Personal name meaning “life.” (Heb., Chawwah)

[27] Meaning Adam had sexual relations with Eve

[28] That is, gotten one

[29] That is, gave birth; Lit And she added to bear

[30] Lit of days

[31] Or his countenance fell

[32]  This is a shortening of the Hebrew idiom “to lift up the face,” which means “to accept” favorably

[33] Likely Genesis 4:8 originally included two consecutive clauses that end with the expression “in(to) the field” (bassadeh). It is most likely that the scribe’s eye skipped over the earlier expression ending with the expression “into the field” to the same word in the second instance; therefore, accidentally omitting the quotation. Clearly, the LXX, as well as the SP, SYR, and the VG have been useful in identifying this error in the Hebrew text. The odds are increased greatly that “let us go over into the field” was in the original because of it being found in such a wide number of versions, especially with the Septuagint being one of those versions.

[34] The Tetragrammaton, God’s personal name, יהוה (JHVH/YHWH), which is found in the Hebrew Old Testament 6,828 times.

[35] The BHS/MT, along with the KJV, ASV, NASB, and the LEB has the reading “Therefore whoever kills Cain.” This reading would suggest that God is agreeing with Cain that his punishment is too severe (vv. 13–14). On the other hand, we have a variant in the LXX, SYR, and VG, along with the ESV, NIV, NRSV, REB, and the UASV that reads “Not so! Whoever kills Cain.” In this reading, God is correcting Cain’s fearful rant in his response, not dealing with his being expelled, telling him that his punishment is not too severe. The external evidence is found in such a wide number of versions (SYR, VG), especially with the Septuagint being one of those versions.

[36] That is, wandering

[37] Meaning Cain had sexual relations with his wife

[38] Meaning Adam had sexual relations with his wife

[39] Lit Adam

[40] Lit begot

[41] The BHS/MT has the reading “walked with God” in both verse 22 and 24 of chapter 5. On the other hand, we have a variant in the Greek Septuagint (LXX) that reads “Enoch was pleasing to God” in both verse 22 and 24 of chapter 5. The metaphor “walked with God” would have been deemed offensive to the devoted worshippers, irreverence, or disrespect for God, audacious in that a human could walk with God or worse still that God was being lowered to a human level, an imperfect one at that. Clearly, the Septuagint rendered the metaphor “walked with God” as a paraphrase “Enoch was pleasing to God.”

[42] See note on 5:22

[43] Septuagint was not found

[44] God took Enoch so as to not see death; See Hebrews 11:5

[45] Meaning Rest

[46] Or rest or relief

[47] Curse: (Heb. אָרַר arar; Gr ἐπικατάρατος epikataratos; from ἐπικαταράομαι epikataraomai) This should not be confused an offensive word or phrase used to express anger or annoyance. It means to threaten or pronounce to invoke supernatural divine power to inflict harm, punishment, or evil upon someone or something. A curse is frequently a formal statement of a pronouncement or prediction of evil, and it is prophetic if it is made by God or one of his representatives. – Gen. 5:29; 12:3; Nu 5:18, 19, 22, 24^(2x), 27; 22:12; Ga 3:10.

[48] Septuagint angels

[49] This refers to angelic sons of God. See Job 1:6; 38:7; 2 Peter 2:4; Jude 1:6

[50] Lit good

[51] Or contend

[52] He is a reference to man

[53] The Nephilim were giant offspring resulting from the sexual relations between sons of God (i.e., angels) and the daughters of men (i.e., human women).

[54] Thus, in verse 4, we see that the Nephilim was in the earth “in those days.” “In those days” was obviously referring to when God made the statement in conjunction with the context of 6:3, which reads “his [man’s] days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” So, the understanding of 6:4 is that “The Nephilim were on the earth in those days [at the time the rebel angels began to have sexual relations with women and giving birth to the Nephilim], and also afterward [the 120 years up unto the time of the flood.]” All of the Nephilim were destroyed in the flood of Genesis 7.

[55] American Translation: “the whole bent of his thinking was anything but evil.” In other words, all imperfect humans are mentally bent toward evil.

[56] The Hebrew word (נִחוּם nichum or נִחֻם nichum) has the sense of feel regret over. It can be translated as “be sorry,” “grieved,” “repent,” “regret,” “be comforted, “compassion,” “comfort,” “reconsider,” and “change one’s mind.” It can pertain to a change of attitude or intention. God is perfect and therefore does not make mistakes in his dealings with his creation. However, he can have a change of attitude or intention regarding how humans react to his warnings. God can go from the Creator of humans to that of a destroyer of them because of their unrepentant wickedness and failure to heed his warnings. On the other hand, if they repent and turn from their wicked ways, the Father can be compassionate and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in loyal love. He will “reconsider” the calamity that he may have intended. (Genesis 6:6; Exodus 32:14; Joel 2:13) This is not really God changing his mind per se but rather his altering circumstances once persons with free will brought those altered circumstances about so God could carry out his will and purposes. Second, draw comfort in the fact that we can be sure that God will never change his standards of love and justice regardless of what created beings do with their free will. Nevertheless, just as any of us might change our mind about someone who has altered the way they treat us, God does change in the way that he deals with humans to the evolving circumstances, situations, and conditions. There are also times when God has changed his commands, laws, and instructions according to his people’s situation and needs. We should not be astonished by this because God has foreknowledge, and he is well aware of conditions that will come where he will have to change or alter circumstances. The English word “regret” means ‘to feel sorry and sad about something previously done or said that now appears wrong, mistaken, or hurtful to others.’ The Hebrew word (nacham here translated as “regretted” relates to a change of attitude or intention. The Hebrew could not be used to suggest that God felt that he had made a mistake in creating man.

[57] Or sky

[58] Blameless: (Heb. תָּם tam; תָּמִים tamim; Gr. ἄμωμος amōmos; ἀμώμητος amōmētos; ἀπρόσκοπος aproskopos) means, “perfect, blameless, sincerity, entire, whole, complete, and full.” Of course, Noah, Jacob, and Job were not literally perfect. When used of imperfect humans, the terms are relative, not absolute. However, if one is fully committed to following a life course based on God’s will and purposes, fully living by his laws, repents when he falls short, God will credit his righteousness. – Gen. 6:6; 25:27; Job 9:20-22l Ps. 119:1; Pro. 11:20; Phil 2:15; 1 Thess. 5:23.

[59] Walk: (הָלַךְ halak) in integrity (Heb. tōm) a state of blamelessness being free of guilt. (Prov. 2:7) In the Bible, the expression “to walk” is figurative and illustrative and can mean to follow a certain course of action, as “Noah walked with God.” (Gen. 6:9; 5:22) Those who walk with God follow the life course outlined by God’s Word and will find his favor, that is, be pleasing to him. Pursuing such a life course makes you different from most unbelievers. The Greek New Testament uses the same illustrative expression, contrasting two different courses of action sought by one before and after becoming a servant of God. (Eph. 2:2, 10; 4:17; 5:2) Similarly, “running” is also used to symbolize a course of action. (1 Pet. 4:4) God tells us that the prophets in Judah “ran” though he did not send them, yet they took the prophetic course, prophesied falsely. (Jer. 23:21) Paul gives us a visual picture of the Christian course in terms of “running.” He compares it to a race that a person must run while also obeying the rules of the race if they are to win the prize. – 1 Cor. 9:24; Gal. 2:2; 5:7.

[60] Lit begot

[61] A resinous wood, possibly cypress (wood). The exact identity of the wood is unknown; “gopher wood” is simply a transliteration of the Hebrew.

[62] That is, one cubit equals approx. 45 cm or 18 in.

[63] That is, one cubit equals approx. 45 cm or 18 in.

[64] That is one cubit equals approx. 45 cm or 18 in.

[65] Or window, that is, an opening for the provision of light.

[66] That is, one cubit equals approx. 45 cm or 18 in.

[67] That is, top

[68] Lit seven seven

[69] Lit seven seven

[70] Lit was

[71] That is, by twos

[72] Lit were

[73] That is, surface

[74] Lit very very

[75] A cubit equaled 44.5 cm (17.5 in.).

[76] Lit creatures of all flesh

[77] American Translation: “the bent of man’s mind may be evil from his very youth.” In other words, all imperfect humans are mentally bent toward evil.

[78] That is, life

[79] That is, your lifeblood

[80] That is, life

[81] That is, living creature

[82] The BHS/MT has the reading “to all the beasts of the earth” in verse 10 of chapter 9. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) does not include “to all the beasts of the earth” in verse 10 of chapter 9. The verbal repetition in the Hebrew test is obviously for emphasis. The Septuagint continues to be very much important today and is used by textual scholars to help uncover copyists’ errors that might have crept into the Hebrew manuscripts either intentionally or unintentionally. However, it cannot do it alone without the support of other sources. While the Septuagint is the second most important tool after the original language texts for ascertaining the original words of the original Hebrew text, it is also true that the LXX translators took liberties at times, embellishing the text, deliberate changes, harmonizations, and completing of details. It could be here that the translators felt the repetition of “every beast of the earth” was redundant, or it was simply accidentally dropped from the text.

[83] That is, populated

[84] That is, turned away

[85] That is, drunkenness

[86] Or servant of servants

[87] Most of the MT has the reading “Dodanim” in verse 4 of chapter 10. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) and the Samaritan Pentateuch (SP), and some Hebrew MSS have “Rodanim” in verse 4 of chapter 10. “Rodanim” is also found in the Masoretic Text (MT) at 1 Chronicles 1:7. However, many of the Hebrew manuscripts, as well as the Syriac Peshitta and the Latin Vulgate read “Dodanim.” In Hebrew, the letter resh “r” (ר) and the letter dalet “d” (ד) are very similar graphically and were often confused by a copyist. (e.g., “Riphath” in Gen. 10:3 appears as “Diphath” at 1 Chron. 1:6 in the MT) Most translations present Dodanim in Genesis 10:4 and Rodanim at 1 Chronicles 1:7. Dodanim is the more difficult reading to explain, which usually means the preferred reading if the change was intentional. Biblica Hebraica by Rudolf Kittel (1905) gives דודנים (“Dodanim”) in Genesis 10:4 with רודנים (“Rodanim”) listed as a textual variant in the critical apparatus. Assyriologist Pinhas Artzi writes, “It is possible that the Rodanim should be equated with the Dananians (?) who are mentioned in the El-Amarna letters (J.A. Knudtzon, Die El-Amarna Tafeln, 1 (1907), 151, lines 48–58, letter from Tyre) and in the Karatepe Inscriptions (see Donner and Roellig, in bibl.) or with Yadnâna, perhaps Cyprus (cf. Elishah). However, the most plausible, although not entirely satisfactory, explanation remains that the Rodanim were inhabitants of Rhodes.”

[88] That is, He was a mighty hunter in opposition to Jehovah. Lit in front of or before, but in the sense of defiance of and opposition to, as in the case of the same expression in Num. 16:2; Josh. 7:12-13; 1 Ch 14:8; 2 Ch 14:10; Job 23:4. Some Bible scholars attach a favorable sense to the Hebrew preposition meaning in front of or before, the Jewish Targums, the writings of the historian Josephus, and also the context of Genesis chapter 10 suggest that Nimrod was a mighty hunter in opposition to Jehovah.

[89] The MT has the reading “Mash” in verse 23 of chapter 10. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) has “Meshech” in verse 23 of chapter 10. “Meshech.” is also found in the Masoretic Text (MT) at 1 Chronicles 1:17.

[90] The MT has the reading “Arpachshad fathered Shelah” in verse 24 of chapter 10. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) has “Arpachshad fathered Cainan, and Cainan fathered Sala [Shelah]” in verse 24 of chapter 10. “Arphaxad fathered Shelah” is also found in the Masoretic Text (MT) at 1 Chronicles 1:18. It would seem that Luke followed the Septuagint reading. (Luke 3:35–36) Evidently, Arpachshad was the father of Shelah.

[91] Peleg means division

[92] LXX 11:12-13 read: “¹² And Arpachshad lived a hundred and thirty-five years, and begot Cainan. ¹³ And Arpachshad lived after he had begotten Cainan, four hundred years, and begot sons and daughters, and died. And Cainan lived a hundred and thirty years and begot Sala; and Canaan lived after he had begotten Sala, three hundred and thirty years, and begot sons and daughters, and died.” Here in the Greek Septuagint, we find the name Cainan inserted between the names Shelah and Arpachshad. See Lu 3:36.

[93] The Hebrew MT has the reading “thirty-five-years” in verse 12 of chapter 11. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) has “a hundred and thirty-five years” in verse 12 of chapter 11. While we are focused on the LXX here, in the entirety of the genealogy both the LXX and the SP are making attempts at harmonizing the ages of the patriarchs. They may very well be doing this to have this genealogy list agree with the one at Genesis 5:3-32.

[94] The Hebrew has the reading “And Arpachshad lived four hundred and three years after he fathered Shelah, and he fathered other sons and daughters.” in verse 13 of chapter 11. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) differs tremendously “And Arpachshad lived after he had begotten Cainan, four hundred years, and begot sons and daughters, and died. And Cainan lived a hundred and thirty years and begot Sala; and Canaan lived after he had begotten Sala, three hundred and thirty years, and begot sons and daughters, and died.” in verse 13 of chapter 11.

[95] Chaldea; Chaldeans: (Arm. כַּשְׂדָּי Kasday; Gr Χαλδαῖος Chaldaios) This is a member of an ancient people who lived in an ancient region of Mesopotamia lying between the Euphrates delta and the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Desert. Eventually, the term was used in reference to all of Babylonia and its people. The term was also used in reference to an educated class of people who studied science, history, languages, and astronomy. They also have magic and astrology as well. – Ezra 5:12; Dan. 4:7; Ac 7:4.

[96] MT “they went out with them,” SYR “he went out with them” SP LXX VG “he led them out.”

[97] We have chosen kindred and kinsmen over relatives, family, and clan. The Hebrew can refer to an extended family that could number to a large extended family to in the thousands.

[98] Curse: (Heb. אָרַר arar; Gr ἐπικατάρατος epikataratos; from ἐπικαταράομαι epikataraomai) This should not be confused an offensive word or phrase used to express anger or annoyance. It means to threaten or pronounce to invoke supernatural divine power to inflict harm, punishment, or evil upon someone or something. A curse is frequently a formal statement of a pronouncement or prediction of evil, and it is prophetic if it is made by God or one of his representatives. – Gen. 5:29; 12:3; Nu 5:18, 19, 22, 24^(2x), 27; 22:12; Ga 3:10.

[99] Or terebinth

[100] Or the south. That is the southern part of the Promised Land. The Negev was an arid region in the southern part of Palestine, and its name came to mean south.

[101] That is, that I may live

[102] LXX SYR VG “Paradise”

[103] This was a selfless act on the part of Lot for two reasons: (1) the land was inhospitable to humans, (2) it allowed the elder Abraham not to pick up and have to move yet again. If the Valley of the Jordan was so great, why had it not been chosen beforehand?

[104] LXX VG “Nations”

[105] That is, defeated; to win a victory over and in this case, a military conflict

[106] Or the plain of Kiriathaim

[107] Lit owners or masters of the covenant of

[108] Lit brother

[109] That is, defeated; to win a victory over and in this case, a military conflict

[110] Lit on the left

[111] Lit brother

[112] Heb עֶלְיוֹן elyon

[113] MT “maker of” LXX VG “who made” Vs 22 VG reads, “Possessor.”

[114] Adversaries: (צַר tsar) An enemy, foe, adversary, opponent, or oppressor, i.e., a personal enemy, in a state of open hostility or conflict. – Gen. 14:20; Num. 10:9; Ezra 4:1; Ps 44:5, 7.

[115] MT SYR VG “the souls,” (Heb. הַנֶּפֶשׁ, han·nephesh), albeit singular, it is used collectively; LXX “men”

[116] That is, I have taken an oath

[117] The Hebrew word (אֲדֹנָי Adonay) that does not have an added suffix always refers to Jehovah, indicating his authority and majesty, his sovereignty. Therefore, it is justifiable to render it as “Sovereign Lord.” In addition (אֲדֹנָי יהוה) as “the Sovereign Lord Jehovah.” Adonay appears 439 times in BHK and BHS.

[118] That is your own son will be your heir

[119] Sojourner: The Hebrew term (גֵּר ger) refers to a person who comes from a foreign country (or a different geographical or cultural group), and so they are a foreign resident, who has no allegiance to the other country and usually does not speak the language. The sojourner has fewer rights than the citizens of the land.

[120] Israel would become enslaved to the Egyptians.

[121] The Egyptians would oppress the Israelites, who would become their slaves some four hundred years later.

[122] That is, the Israelites

[123] That is, has not yet reached its full measure

[124] Despise: (בָּזָה bazah; בּוּז buz) show contempt for, think lightly, i.e., pertaining to feeling of contempt for an object, because it is regarded to be bad, or of little value, often with behaviors toward the object (including speaking scorn and ridicule) which correspond to that contempt (Ge 25:34); be despised (Ps 22:7); be despised, be contemptible (1Sa 15:9); cause to despise – Est 1:17.

[125] “And you.” in the MT is marked with extraordinary points by the Sopherim (scribes) to show that the reading “and you” is uncertain and should read, “and her.”

[126] That is, under her authority

[127] Or presence

[128] Angel: (מַלְאָךְ malak; Gr. ἄγγελος aggelos) A supernatural spirit person who attends upon or serves as a messenger or worker for the Father and the Son. These spirit persons are far wiser and more powerful than humans, but their power and knowledge are absolutely nothing compared to their Creator. (Ps. 103:20; Matt. 24:36; 1 Pet. 1:1-12) Angels have the power to be able to materialize in human form. (Gen. 18:1-2, 8, 20-22; 19:1-11; Josh. 5:13-15) Some of these angels became rebels, as they rejected the sovereignty, power, and supremacy of their Creator. Jude tells us “The angels who did not keep to their own domain but deserted their proper dwelling place [heaven]” (1:6), to take on human form, and have relations that were contrary to nature with the “the daughters of man.” (Gen 6:1-4; Dan. 7:9-10) The Bible intimates that these rebel angels were stripped of their power to take on human form, as you never hear of it taking place again after the Flood, only spirit possession after that. These disobedient angels are now “spirits in prison,” who have been thrown into “eternal chains under gloomy darkness [Tartarus],” which is more of a condition of limited powers (1 Pet. 3:19; 2 Pet. 2:4; Jude 6), not so much a place, like a maximum-security prison. – Matt. 28:2; Rev. 22:8.

[129] That is, submit yourself to her authority

[130] Meaning God hears

[131] Affliction; Afflicted: (עֳנִי oni) The Hebrew word means to do or be evil or bad, treat badly, harm, and do wrong. The sense is to afflict distress, cause serious harm, or be in the state of being afflicted, distressed, disturbed, or miserable. – Ruth 1:21; 1 Ki 8:35; Ps. 9:13; 119:67, 71; Isa. 48:10; 53:7; Lam. 3:3.

[132] Meaning  the well of the Living One who sees me

[133] Almighty (Heb. אֵל שַׁדַּי El Shaddai; Gr. παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) convey the idea of strength or power. This is a title for the true God, often with a focus on the power to complete promises of blessing and prosperity. In the Hebrew text, Shaddai is used seven times with God (אֵל el), giving us the title “God Almighty.” (Ge 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; Ex 6:3; Eze 10:5) There are another 41 occurrences where it is used alone and is translated as “the Almighty” or “the Almighty One.” In the Christian Greek New Testament, the word (παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) occurs ten times, nine of which are found in the book of Revelation. – Ge 49:25; Nu 24:4, 16; Ru 1:20, 21; Job 5:17; 6:4, 14; 8:3, 5; 11:7; 13:3; 15:25; 21:15, 20; 22:3, 17, 23, 25, 26; 23:16; 24:1; 27:2, 10, 11, 13; 29:5; 31:2, 35; 32:8; 33:4; 34:10, 12; 35:13; 37:23; 40:2; Ps 68:14; 91:1; Isa 13:6; Eze 1:24; Joel 1:15; 2Co 6:18; Rev 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:6, 15; 21:22.

[134] Blameless: (Heb. תָּם tam; תָּמִים tamim; Gr. ἄμωμος amōmos; ἀμώμητος amōmētos; ἀπρόσκοπος aproskopos) means, “perfect, blameless, sincerity, entire, whole, complete, and full.” Of course, Noah, Jacob, and Job were not literally perfect. When used of imperfect humans, the terms are relative, not absolute. However, if one is fully committed to following a life course based on God’s will and purposes, fully living by his laws, repents when he falls short, God will credit his righteousness. – Gen. 6:6; 25:27; Job 9:20-22l Ps. 119:1; Pro. 11:20; Phil 2:15; 1 Thess. 5:23.

[135] Circumcision: (Heb. מוּל mul; Gr περιτομή peritomē) This is the removal of the foreskin of the male’s genital organ for ceremonial, social, or ritual purposes. Abraham and his descendants were under mandatory circumcision. However, it is not a requirement for Christians. Circumcision is also used figuratively in the Bible in many different contexts. For example, the removal of the old person and the putting on the new person (Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:22-23; Col. 3:9-11), removing the flesh so to speak, acquiring the mind of Christ (1 Cor. 3:1), and being regenerated by the Holy Spirit, identifies one as a true Christian, separating him or her from the world. – Gen. 17:10; Rom. 2:26-29; 1 Cor. 7:19; Gal. 2:7-9; Phil. 3:3.

[136] Sarai and Sarah mean princess

[137] This is the first of the 134 places where the Jewish Sopherim changed JHVH to Adonai. They made the change based on misapplied reverence for the personal name of God.

[138] Lit sustain your heart

[139] A seah was equal to 7.33 L (6.66 dry qt).

[140] Lit a son of a herd

[141] That is, chosen

[142] Lit heavy

[143] MT “Abraham was still standing before Jehovah” This the first of one of the Eighteen Emendations: In the Masoretic text margin, some notes read: “This is one of the eighteen emendations of the Sopherim” or similar words. The scribe who made these revisions had good intentions as he saw the original reading as though it showed a lack of respect for God or his people.

[144] Or forgive

[145] Hebrew idiom for sexual intercourse

[146] Hebrew idiom for sexual intercourse (See Gen 4:1) That is, had intercourse

[147] That is, whatever you want

[148] That is, under the shelter (protection) of my roof (house)

[149] That is, as an alien, a foreigner

[150] That is, to marry

[151] Or iniquity

[152] MT “he or one said” LXX SYR VG. “They”

[153] That is, life

[154] That is, that my life may be saved

[155] That is, request or favor

[156] That is, smallness

[157] The Negev was an arid region in the southern part of Palestine, and its name came to mean south.

[158] That is, what were you thinking of

[159] SP “he caused to wander”

[160] That is, vindicated, cleared; cleared of reproach

[161] That is, promised

[162] The name Isaac means laughter

[163] Or will laugh at me, will laugh over me, will laugh for me

[164] The Hebrew MT has the reading “mocking and laughing” in verse 9 of chapter 21. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) and the Latin Vulgate (VG) have added “her son Isaac” in verse 9 of chapter 21. It seems that both the Septuagint (LXX) and the Latin Vulgate (VG) were taking liberties with the text, embellishing it to be more specific as to who is being taunted or mocked by Ishmael.

[165] That is, an animal skin used as a bottle

[166] Lit cast

[167] The Hebrew MT has the reading “she lifted up her voice and wept” in verse 16 of chapter 21. On the other hand, the Greek Septuagint (LXX) has “and the child cried aloud and wept” (referring to Ishmael) in verse 16 of chapter 21. The next verse says, “And God heard the voice of the boy, … for God has heard the voice of the boy there where he is.” Thus, it seems that the Septuagint (LXX) was taking liberties with the text, embellishing it to harmonize it, to specify that it was the boy’s cries that were being heard.

[168] That is, an animal skin used as a bottle

[169] That is, an expert with a bow and arrow

[170] That is, God-fearing (not dreadful fear), reverential fear of displeasing God out of one’s love for God.

[171] The Masoretic Text MT has the reading “behind him” (אַחַר, ’akhar) in verse 13 of chapter 22. On the other hand, a number of Hebrew MSS, the Septuagint (LXX), Syriac (SYR), and Samaritan Pentateuch (SP) have “one” (Heb. אֶחָד, ’ekhad; Gr. εἷς,  heis) in verse 13 of chapter 22. The Hebrew word (אַחַר, ’akhar) rendered “behind him” simply means “behind,” which is the difficult reading because “a ram behind caught” makes no sense. The ASV, RSV, ESV, NASB, and the UASV render it “behind him was a ram,” which explains where the ram was in relation to Abraham. Thus, it is likely that the copyists of the Hebrew manuscripts were moved to change the final “r” in the Hebrew word meaning behind (אַחַר, ’akhar) to a final “d” (אֶחָד, ’ekhad), as they are both very similar in shape. This Hebrew word with the final “d” would mean “a ram” was caught or “one ram” was caught in the thicket by the horns. (LEB, CSB) The translators of Septuagint (LXX), Syriac (SYR), and Samaritan Pentateuch (SP) could have been similarly motivated.

[172] Meaning Jehovah will provide; Jehovah will see to it

[173] Or the Hittites. They were the sons of the second son of Canaan (Heth), who was a great-grandson of Noah through Ham.

[174] Or the Hittites. They were the sons of the second son of Canaan (Heth), who was a great-grandson of Noah through Ham.

[175] Or the Hittites. They were the sons of the second son of Canaan (Heth), who was a great-grandson of Noah through Ham.

[176] Lit ears

[177] Lit ears

[178] A shekel equaled 11.4 g (0.367 oz)

[179] Lit ears

[180] Or the Hittites. They were the sons of the second son of Canaan (Heth), who was a great-grandson of Noah through Ham.

[181] Or the Hittites. They were the sons of the second son of Canaan (Heth), who was a great-grandson of Noah through Ham.

[182] LXX VG “Mesopotamia” (between the rivers) MT Aram-Naharaim (Aram of the Two Rivers)

[183] A shekel equaled 11.4 g (0.367 oz t)

[184] Like this is a reference to Laban.

[185] Or “cursing” in which the one swearing the oath makes himself accountable by disobeying his oath.

[186] The Negev was an arid region in the southern part of Palestine, and its name came to mean south.

[187] MT “after his mother” LXX “concerning Sarah his mother” VG “he loved [her] so greatly as to temper the grief that resulted from the death of [his] mother”

[188] This was a poetic expression for death.

[189] This was a poetic expression for death

[190] Or Asshur

[191] MT “he fell” LXX “he dwelt (settled)” VG “he died”

[192] Or He settled  in hostility to all his brothers. This means “to raid” or “to attack”

[193] Aram; Aramaeans: (אֲרַמִּי Arammi) These were the descendants of Shem’s son Aram, who mainly lived in various regions N of Israel, running from the Lebanon Mountains across to Mesopotamia and from the Taurus Mountains in the north down to Damascus. The Aramaeans hardly ever formed any kind of nation-state; instead, they lived as self-governing, autonomous towns and tribes settled by nomads before 1000 B.C.E. However, if they were threatened, they were quick to form alliances with neighboring towns of Aramaeans and even other countries. However, once the threat was over, they went back to their independence, fighting amongst themselves. In Hebrew, the area known as Aram would later be referred to as Syria, and its people as the Syrians. – Gen. 25:20; Deut. 26:5; Hos 12:12.

[194] Meaning “hairy”

[195] Meaning “he grasps the heel;” “he supplants”

[196] Lit game was in his mouth

[197] Meaning “Red”

[198] Despise: (בָּזָה bazah; בּוּז buz) show contempt for, think lightly, i.e., pertaining to feeling of contempt for an object, because it is regarded to be bad, or of little value, often with behaviors toward the object (including speaking scorn and ridicule) which correspond to that contempt (Ge 25:34); be despised (Ps 22:7); be despised, be contemptible (1Sa 15:9); cause to despise – Est 1:17.

[199] That is, Isaac was embracing Rebekah, caressing her lovingly, intimately

[200] Lit the man became great and went on growing great until he became very great

[201] MT “That they had dug in the days of Abraham his father” Sam. LXX VG “that the servants of Abraham his father had dug.”

[202] Meaning Contention

[203] Meaning Enmity

[204] Meaning broad places, or room

[205] That is, wife 1

[206] That is, wife 2, also named Adah

[207] Meaning one seizing the heel; supplanter or cheater

[208] Almighty (Heb. אֵל שַׁדַּי El Shaddai; Gr. παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) convey the idea of strength or power. This is a title for the true God, often with a focus on the power to complete promises of blessing and prosperity. In the Hebrew text, Shaddai is used seven times with God (אֵל el), giving us the title “God Almighty.” (Ge 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; Ex 6:3; Eze 10:5) There are another 41 occurrences where it is used alone and is translated as “the Almighty” or “the Almighty One.” In the Christian Greek New Testament, the word (παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) occurs ten times, nine of which are found in the book of Revelation. – Ge 49:25; Nu 24:4, 16; Ru 1:20, 21; Job 5:17; 6:4, 14; 8:3, 5; 11:7; 13:3; 15:25; 21:15, 20; 22:3, 17, 23, 25, 26; 23:16; 24:1; 27:2, 10, 11, 13; 29:5; 31:2, 35; 32:8; 33:4; 34:10, 12; 35:13; 37:23; 40:2; Ps 68:14; 91:1; Isa 13:6; Eze 1:24; Joel 1:15; 2Co 6:18; Rev 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:6, 15; 21:22.

[209] That is, wife 4

[210] That is, the house of God

[211] Lit brother

[212] Lit brother

[213] That is, had no brightness, radiance, or glow

[214] That is, my time

[215] That is, unloved

[216] That is, enabled her to become pregnant

[217] Meaning See, a Son!

[218] Affliction; Afflicted: (עֳנִי oni) The Hebrew word means to do or be evil or bad, treat badly, harm, and do wrong. The sense is to afflict distress, cause serious harm, or be in the state of being afflicted, distressed, disturbed, or miserable. – Ruth 1:21; 1 Ki 8:35; Ps. 9:13; 119:67, 71; Isa. 48:10; 53:7; Lam. 3:3.

[219] That is, unloved

[220] Meaning Hearing

[221] Meaning Attached; Joined

[222] Meaning Praised

[223] That is, have relations with Bilhah in order that she may bear children for Rachel

[224] Meaning Judge

[225] Meaning My wrestlings

[226] The Masoretic Text MT has the reading “with good fortune” (בְּגָד) in verse 11 of Genesis chapter 30. The Septuagint (LXX) has “by good fortune” (Ἐν τύχῃ) in verse 11 of Genesis chapter 30. Other sources, the SP and AT have “troops.”

[227] Meaning Good fortune

[228] Meaning Happy; Happiness

[229] A small perennial herb of the potato family, native to the Middle East. It grows low, like lettuce, which its leaves somewhat resemble, except that they are of a dark green. The flowers are purple, and the root is usually forked. Its fruit, when ripe, (early in May), is about the size of a small apple, 24 inches in diameter, ruddy or yellow, and of a most agreeable odor, and an equally agreeable taste.

[230] Meaning He is wages

[231] Meaning Honor

[232] Meaning Judged, that is, acquitted; vindicated

[233] A shortened form of Josiphiah, which means Jah adds to

[234] Or honesty

[235] LXX “I am the God that appeared to you at Bethel”

[236] These were household gods, idols

[237] That is, the Euphrates River

[238] Lit steal me

[239] VG “And thus for twenty years I have served you in your house”

[240] An Aramaic expression meaning the heap of witness

[241] A Hebrew expression meaning the heap of witness

[242] LXX lacks “the God of their father.”

[243] Meaning two camps

[244] Lit field

[245] Lit what came to his hand

[246] Meaning he contends with God

[247] Meaning face of God

[248] That is, Jacob

[249] MT SP LXX VG “And kiss him” In the MT the Sopherim, Jewish scribes who copied the Hebrew Scriptures from the days of Ezra to the time of Jesus Christ, marked this expression with extraordinary points because they felt that the words should be omitted. The footnotes of both the BHK and BHS imply that they were possibly added to the text.

[250] That is, Esau

[251] Meaning Booths; Shelters

[252] Or pieces of money; money of unknown value

[253] Meaning God, the God of Israel

[254] MT “and humbled her: LXX “humiliated”

[255] That is, He became infatuated with or attracted to Dinah

[256] Lit wide of hands before them; that is, large enough

[257] A massive tree that was likely an oak tree

[258] Meaning God of Bethel

[259] Meaning Oak of Weeping

[260] Almighty (Heb. אֵל שַׁדַּי El Shaddai; Gr. παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) convey the idea of strength or power. This is a title for the true God, often with a focus on the power to complete promises of blessing and prosperity. In the Hebrew text, Shaddai is used seven times with God (אֵל el), giving us the title “God Almighty.” (Ge 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; Ex 6:3; Eze 10:5) There are another 41 occurrences where it is used alone and is translated as “the Almighty” or “the Almighty One.” In the Christian Greek New Testament, the word (παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) occurs ten times, nine of which are found in the book of Revelation. – Ge 49:25; Nu 24:4, 16; Ru 1:20, 21; Job 5:17; 6:4, 14; 8:3, 5; 11:7; 13:3; 15:25; 21:15, 20; 22:3, 17, 23, 25, 26; 23:16; 24:1; 27:2, 10, 11, 13; 29:5; 31:2, 35; 32:8; 33:4; 34:10, 12; 35:13; 37:23; 40:2; Ps 68:14; 91:1; Isa 13:6; Eze 1:24; Joel 1:15; 2Co 6:18; Rev 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:6, 15; 21:22.

[261] MT “A nation” LXX VG “Nations”

[262] Meaning Son of My Mourning

[263] That is, had sexual relations with

[264] This was a poetic expression for death

[265] Either the same person as Basemath or her sister.

[266] SP LXX SYR “son of Zibeon” as opposed to MT “daughter of Zibeon” (also verse 14). Compare vs 24.

[267] That is, all the persons of his household

[268] MT “a land” SYR “the land of Seir”

[269] LXX SP SYR “son of Zibeon” as opposed to “daughter of Zibeon” (also verse 2).

[270] LXX “chiefs; leaders; governors” VG “leaders; dukes.” The Heb. word is אַלּוּפֵי allupheh and is derived from eleph, “thousand.” Therefore, the basic meaning of אַלּוּף alluph is “leader of a thousand.” This corresponds with the Greek chiliarch (commander of a thousand soldiers). See Mark 6:21 footnote.

[271] MT LXX SYR VG “Korah” SP lacks Vss 5, 14, 18 show Korah was Esau’s son by Oholibamah, not Eliphaz.

[272] SYR “water”

[273] SP LXX SYR VG^c and 1Ch 1:41 “Dishon” MT VG “Dishan”

[274] SP SYR and some Hebrew MSS have “Hadad” instead of “Hadar.” See 1 Chronicles 1:50.

[275] The Hebrew kuttoneth is a type of robe, which corresponds to the Greek chiton and the Roman tunic. Both terms are most widely used to refer to a tunic or long shirt like article of clothing that was worn next to the body. It was long-sleeved or half-sleeved, which could hang to the knees or as low as the ankles. The Septuagint (LXX) and Vulgate (VG) have a “robe of many colors” rather than “robe with long sleeves,” the reading of the Syriac (SYR). The meaning of the Hebrew term is uncertain (Also verses 23, 32).

[276] MT LXX SYR VG “The flock of their father,”  In the MT the Sopherim, Jewish scribes who copied the Hebrew Scriptures from the days of Ezra to the time of Jesus Christ, marked the Heb. particle (אֶת) ʼeth (a modifier) with extraordinary points, meaning that they felt the words were doubtful and should be omitted.

[277] That is, take his life

[278] Sheol: (שְׁאֹל sheol) Sheol occurs sixty-six times in the UASV. The Greek Septuagint renders Sheol as Hades. It is the grave. It has the underlying meaning of a place of the dead, where they are conscious of nothing, awaiting a resurrection, for both the righteous and the unrighteous. (Gen. 37:35; Psa. 16:10; Ac 2:31; John 5:28-29; Acts 24:15) It corresponds to “Hades” in the NT. It does not involve torment and punishment.

[279] MT “Medanites” rather than “Midianites,” which was almost certainly a scribal error.

[280] MT “his” LXX SYR “her”

[281] SP AT “she called” instead of MT “he called”

[282] MT “he,” that is, Judah; LXX “she”

[283][283] Brother-In-Law Marriage: (יָבַם yabam) The Hebrew term literally means “and perform the duty of a husband’s brother to her.” This was a custom that would later be added into the Mosaic Law, whereby a man would marry his deceased brother’s widow if she were sonless to continue the lineage of the brother. This is also known as levirate marriage. – Gen. 38:8; Deut. 25:5.

[284] Lit seed

[285] Lit waste it

[286] Lit the days multiplied

[287] AT^O LXX SYR VG “cord” MT “cords” Some cords made from several twisted strands of string were sometimes used as pieces of attire. Judah, it would seem carried his signet ring on a “cord.” (Heb., פָּתִיל pathil [Ge 38:18, 25])

[288] That is, he had no further sexual relations with her again

[289] Meaning a breach

[290] Meaning a sunrise or brightness

[291] That is, looked at joseph with desires

[292] Lit does not know what is with me in the house

[293] LXX adds: “and he said to me, ‘I am going to cohabit with you.’”

[294] Lit according to the former judgment

[295] That is, Nile River

[296] MT “him he hanged” LXX “that one was hanged” VG “that one was hanged on a tree [Lat., cruce (from crux)].”

[297] Lit the cistern, the pit

[298] VG “Without me God will announce”

[299] LXX SYR VG begins this verse with: “I fell asleep a second time”

[300] Lit mouth

[301] Lit upon your mouth all my people will kiss

[302] Or necklace

[303] Abrek: An Egyptian word which is a Semitic loan word (related to בָּרַךְ barak and בֶּרֶךְ berek) meaning attention or a Hebrew word (אַבְרֵךְ abrek) meaning to kneel, bow the knee, make way, public acclamation of high status, used as a command or interjection, suggesting that honor and dignity are to be shown. – Genesis 41:43.

[304] Egyptian possibly meaning the god has said, he will live

[305] MT “On” LXX VG Heliopolis, meaning city of the sun

[306] Lit by handfuls

[307] LXX SP adds “of abundance” after the phrase “seven years”

[308] Meaning one who makes forget

[309] Meaning twice as fruitful

[310] LXX SYR “opened all the storehouses” MT “opened all that was in them”

[311] That is, forever

[312] Almighty (Heb. אֵל שַׁדַּי El Shaddai; Gr. παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) convey the idea of strength or power. This is a title for the true God, often with a focus on the power to complete promises of blessing and prosperity. In the Hebrew text, Shaddai is used seven times with God (אֵל el), giving us the title “God Almighty.” (Ge 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; Ex 6:3; Eze 10:5) There are another 41 occurrences where it is used alone and is translated as “the Almighty” or “the Almighty One.” In the Christian Greek New Testament, the word (παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) occurs ten times, nine of which are found in the book of Revelation. – Ge 49:25; Nu 24:4, 16; Ru 1:20, 21; Job 5:17; 6:4, 14; 8:3, 5; 11:7; 13:3; 15:25; 21:15, 20; 22:3, 17, 23, 25, 26; 23:16; 24:1; 27:2, 10, 11, 13; 29:5; 31:2, 35; 32:8; 33:4; 34:10, 12; 35:13; 37:23; 40:2; Ps 68:14; 91:1; Isa 13:6; Eze 1:24; Joel 1:15; 2Co 6:18; Rev 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:6, 15; 21:22.

[313] That is, for his heart yearned

[314] Abomination: (תּוֹעֵבָה toebah or תֹּעֵבָה toebah) It is a repulsion, abhorrence, that is, an object or person that is loathsome or repulsive. The sense of toebah is a detestable thing or person, which causes horror and disgust in another person. – Dt 32:16; 2Ch 34:33; Jer 16:18; Eze 5:9; 7:20; 11:18, 21; 16:36.

[315] LXX adds “Why have you stolen my silver cup?” at the end of the verse.

[316] Blameless: (Heb. תָּם tam; תָּמִים tamim; Gr. ἄμωμος amōmos; ἀμώμητος amōmētos; ἀπρόσκοπος aproskopos) means, “perfect, blameless, sincerity, entire, whole, complete, and full.” Of course, Noah, Jacob, and Job were not literally perfect. When used of imperfect humans, the terms are relative, not absolute. However, if one is fully committed to following a life course based on God’s will and purposes, fully living by his laws, repents when he falls short, God will credit his righteousness. – Gen. 6:6; 25:27; Job 9:20-22l Ps. 119:1; Pro. 11:20; Phil 2:15; 1 Thess. 5:23.

[317] That is, his life is bound up with his life

[318] That is, to close them at Jacob’s death

[319] SP SYR read “Puah” rather than “Puvah.” This is the reading found in 1 Chron. 7:1. SP some LXX MSS have “Jashub” rather than “Iob,” which is the reading found in Num. 26:24 and 1 Chron. 7:1.

[320] LXX SP have “Zephon” instead of “Ziphion,” which is the reading found in Num. 26:15.

[321] After “Ephraim” LXX adds five more names, which reads: “But there were sons born to Manasseh, whom his Syrian concubine bore to him, namely, Machir. And Machir became father to Galaad. But the sons of Ephraim, Manasseh’s brother, were Sutalaam and Taam. And the sons of Sutalaam were Edem.” This could possibly explain why the LXX, in Gen. 46:27 and Ex. 1:5, and Stephen, in Acts 7:14, counts 75 souls rather than 70.

[322] LXX has “Hashum” Instead of “Hushim”

[323] That is, metaphor for his own descendants

[324] LXX has “nine souls” instead of “two souls,” which might be the inclusion of the grandsons of Joseph that were born to Ephraim and Manasseh (1 Chron. 7:14–20)

[325] LXX has “seventy-five” as opposed to “seventy,” which is the number given by Stephen as written by Luke in Acts 7:14.

[326] Abomination: (תּוֹעֵבָה toebah or תֹּעֵבָה toebah) It is a repulsion, abhorrence, that is, an object or person that is loathsome or repulsive. The sense of toebah is a detestable thing or person, which causes horror and disgust in another person. – Dt 32:16; 2Ch 34:33; Jer 16:18; Eze 5:9; 7:20; 11:18, 21; 16:36.

[327] VG “Industrious men”

[328] Lit bread

[329] The Masoretic Text MT has the reading “he removed them to the cities” (הֶעֱבִ֥יר אֹת֖וֹ לֶעָרִ֑ים) in verse 21 of Genesis chapter 47. The Septuagint (LXX) has “he enslaved the people to himself as slaves” (κατεδουλώσατο αὐτῷ εἰς παῖδας) in verse 27 of Genesis chapter 47. In addition, the SP and VG have “he made slaves of them.”

[330] MT “the bed.” Heb., הַמִּטָּה hammittah LXX “And Israel worshiped while leaning on the top of his staff.” “Staff” or “rod” (Heb., מַטֶּה matteh, as in Gen. 38:25) and “bed” (Heb., mittah, as in 48:2) have the same consonants, and without the vowel points, it could be “bed” or “Staff.”

[331] Almighty (Heb. אֵל שַׁדַּי El Shaddai; Gr. παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) convey the idea of strength or power. This is a title for the true God, often with a focus on the power to complete promises of blessing and prosperity. In the Hebrew text, Shaddai is used seven times with God (אֵל el), giving us the title “God Almighty.” (Ge 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; Ex 6:3; Eze 10:5) There are another 41 occurrences where it is used alone and is translated as “the Almighty” or “the Almighty One.” In the Christian Greek New Testament, the word (παντοκράτωρ pantokratōr) occurs ten times, nine of which are found in the book of Revelation. – Ge 49:25; Nu 24:4, 16; Ru 1:20, 21; Job 5:17; 6:4, 14; 8:3, 5; 11:7; 13:3; 15:25; 21:15, 20; 22:3, 17, 23, 25, 26; 23:16; 24:1; 27:2, 10, 11, 13; 29:5; 31:2, 35; 32:8; 33:4; 34:10, 12; 35:13; 37:23; 40:2; Ps 68:14; 91:1; Isa 13:6; Eze 1:24; Joel 1:15; 2Co 6:18; Rev 1:8; 4:8; 11:17; 15:3; 16:7, 14; 19:6, 15; 21:22.

[332] MT SP SYR VG “you” singular AT^P LXX “you” plural

[333] MT “He went up to my couch” LXX SYR AT “You went up to my couch.” The second person is used throughout 49:3-4 where Jacob is dealing with Reuben.

[334] MT “swords.” Some consider the Heb. word here (מְכֵרָה mekerah) as an uncertain type of weapon. LXX “Simeon and Levi, brothers, accomplished the injustice of their cutting off.”

[335] MT VG “My glory” LXX “my liver”

[336] MT Shiloh. That is, that which belongs to him; he whose it is. LXX “the things stored up for him” VG “he who is to be sent.”

[337] LXX VG “And he will be the expectation of nations”

[338] Lit fat: MT “From Asher food shall be rich” LXX SYR VG “Asher’s food shall be rich” or Asher’s bread shall be fat” (Brenton)

[339] Or he gives beautiful words

[340] That is, daughters

[341] MT “of my ancestors” LXX “of the eternal mountains”

[342] Lit the thorny bush Heb., (הָאָטָד) ha·ʾā·ṭāḏ

[343] Meaning mourning of the Egyptians

[344] MT “When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead,” SYR VG “Now that he was dead, his brothers were afraid.”

[345] MT “they sent instructions to Joseph” LXX SYR “they came to Joseph”