Genesis 42:1-5
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
Chapter 42
The Brothers’ First Journey to Egypt.[a] 1 When Jacob learned that grain rations were for sale in Egypt, he said to his sons: “Why do you keep looking at one another?” 2 He went on, “I hear that grain is for sale in Egypt. Go down there and buy some for us, that we may stay alive and not die.”(A) 3 So ten of Joseph’s brothers went down to buy grain from Egypt. 4 But Jacob did not send Joseph’s brother Benjamin with his brothers, for he thought some disaster might befall him. 5 And so the sons of Israel were among those who came to buy grain, since there was famine in the land of Canaan.(B)
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- 42:1–38 The first journey of the brothers to Egypt. Its cause is famine, which was also the reason Abraham and Sarah undertook their dangerous journey to Egypt. The brothers bow to Joseph in v. 6, which fulfills Joseph’s dream in 37:5–11. Endowed with wisdom, Joseph begins a process of instruction or “discipline” for his brothers that eventually forces them to recognize the enormity of their sin against him and the family. He controls their experience of the first journey with the result that the second journey in chaps. 43–44 leads to full acknowledgment and reconciliation.
Genesis 46:1-7
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
Chapter 46
Migration to Egypt. 1 [a]Israel set out with all that was his. When he arrived at Beer-sheba, he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. 2 There God, speaking to Israel in a vision by night, called: Jacob! Jacob! He answered, “Here I am.” 3 Then he said: I am God,[b] the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for there I will make you a great nation. 4 I will go down to Egypt with you and I will also bring you back here, after Joseph has closed your eyes.
5 So Jacob departed from Beer-sheba, and the sons of Israel put their father and their wives and children on the wagons that Pharaoh had sent to transport him. 6 They took with them their livestock and the possessions they had acquired in the land of Canaan. So Jacob and all his descendants came to Egypt.(A) 7 His sons and his grandsons, his daughters and his granddaughters—all his descendants—he took with him to Egypt.
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- 46:1–47:26 Jacob and his family settle in Egypt. Joseph’s economic policies.
- 46:3 I am God: more precisely according to the Hebrew text, “I am El.” “El” is here a divine name, not the common noun “god.”
Exodus 1:7
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
7 But the Israelites were fruitful and prolific. They multiplied and became so very numerous that the land was filled with them.[a]
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- 1:7 Fruitful…multiplied…the land was filled with them: the language used here to indicate the fecundity of the Israelite population echoes the divine blessing bestowed upon humanity at creation (Gn 1:28) and after the flood (Gn 9:1) as well as suggesting fulfillment of the promises to the ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Gn 12:2; 13:16; 15:5; 28:14; passim).
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