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90  |  Genesis 42:20
and take ­grain back for your starv­ing house­holds. 20 But you must ­bring your youn­gest
brother to me,  m so that your ­words may be ver­i­fied and that you may not die.” This they
pro­ceeded to do.
21 They said to one an­other, “Surely we are be­ing pun­ished be­cause of our brother.  n We
saw how dis­tressed he was when he pleaded with us for his life, but we ­would not lis­ten;
that’s why this dis­tress  o has come on us.”
22 Reu­ben re­plied, “Didn’t I tell you not to sin a
­ gainst the boy?  p But you ­wouldn’t lis­ten!
­ lood.”  r 23 They did not re­al­ize that Jo­seph ­could
Now we must give an ac­count­ing  q for his b
un­der­stand them, ­since he was us­ing an ­in­ter­preter.
24 He t ­ urned away from them and be­gan to weep, but then came back and s ­ poke to them
again. He had Sim­eon taken from them and ­bound be­fore ­their ­eyes.  s
25 Jo­seph gave or­ders to fill t ­ heir bags with g
­ rain,  t to put each m
­ an’s sil­ver back in his
sack,  u and to give them pro­vi­sions for ­their jour­ney.  v Af­ter this was done for them, 26 they
loaded t ­ heir ­grain on ­their don­keys and ­left.
27 At the ­place ­where they ­stopped for the ­night one of them ­opened his sack to get feed
for his don­key, and he saw his sil­ver in the ­mouth of his sack.  w 28 “My sil­ver has been re­
turned,” he said to his broth­ers. “Here it is in my ­sack.”
Their ­hearts sank and they ­turned to each other trem­bling and said, “What is this that
God has done to us?”  x
29 When they came to ­their fa­ther Ja­cob in the land of Ca­naan, they told him all that had
hap­pened to them. They said, 30 “The man who is lord over the land ­spoke harshly to us  y
and treated us as t ­ hough we were spy­ing on the land. 31 But we said to him, ‘We are hon­est
men; we are not ­spies.  z 32 We were t ­ welve broth­ers, sons of one fa­ther. One is no more, and
the youn­gest is now with our fa­ther in ­Ca­naan.’
33 “Then the man who is lord over the land said to us, ‘This is how I will know whether
you are hon­est men: ­Leave one of your broth­ers here with me, and take food for your
­ ring your youn­gest brother to me so I will know that
starv­ing house­holds and go.  a 34 But b
you are not ­spies but hon­est men. Then I will give your brother back to you, and you can
trade  a in the ­land.  b ’ ”
35 As they were emp­ty­ing ­their ­sacks, ­there in each ­man’s sack was his ­pouch of sil­ver!
When they and t ­ heir fa­ther saw the money pouches, they were fright­ened.  c 36  Their fa­ther
Ja­cob said to them, “You have de­prived me of my chil­dren. Jo­seph is no more and Sim­eon
is no more, and now you want to take Ben­ja­min.  d Ev­ery­thing is ­against me!”
37 Then Reu­ben said to his fa­ther, “You may put both of my sons to ­death if I do not
bring him back to you. En­trust him to my care, and I will ­bring him ­back.”
38 But Ja­cob said, “My son will not go down ­there with you; his brother is dead  e and he
is the only one left. If harm c ­ omes to him  f on the jour­ney you are tak­ing, you will ­bring
my gray head down to the ­grave  g in ­sor­row.  h ”
42:20 m   ver  15, ​34;
Ge 43:5; 44:23
42:21 n  Ge  37:26-28
o  Hos  5:15
42:22 p  Ge  37:21-22
q  Ge  9:5 r  1Ki  2:32;
2Ch 24:22; Ps 9:12
42:24 s  ver  13;
Ge 43:14, ​23; 45:14‑15
42:25 t  Ge  43:2
u  Ge  44:1, ​8 v  Ro  12:17, ​
20‑21
42:27 w  Ge  43:21‑22
42:28 x  Ge  43:23
42:30 y  ver  7
42:31 z  ver  11
42:33 a   ver  19, ​20
42:34 b  Ge  34:10
42:35 c  Ge  43:12, ​15, ​18
42:36 d  Ge  43:14
42:38 e  Ge  37:33
f  ver  4 g  Ge  37:35
h  Ge  44:29, ​34
43:1 i  Ge  12:10;
41:56‑57
43:3 j  Ge 42:15; 44:23
43:5 k  Ge  42:15;
2Sa 3:13
The Second Journey to Egypt
43
Now the fam­ine was s ­ till se­vere in the land.  i 2 So when they had eaten all the ­grain
they had ­brought from ­Egypt, ­their fa­ther said to them, “Go back and buy us a lit­tle
more ­food.”
3 But Ju­dah said to him, “The man ­warned us sol­emnly, ‘You will not see my face a
­ gain
un­less your brother is with you.’  j 4 If you will send our brother ­along with us, we will go
down and buy food for you. 5 But if you will not send him, we will not go down, be­cause the
man said to us, ‘You will not see my face ­again un­less your brother is with ­you.  k ’ ”
6 Is­rael a
­ sked, “Why did you ­bring this trou­ble on me by tell­ing the man you had an­
other ­brother?”
a  34 Or
move about freely   
42:21 – 23  The brothers view their “misfor-
tune” as God’s punishment for treating Joseph
callously. They are unaware that Joseph under-
stands what they are saying, and he is moved
to tears but hides them from his brothers.
42:25 – 28 Unexpectedly discovering in a sack
one of the payments they brought for the
grain fills the men with apprehension. Trem-
bling, they attribute this to divine providence,
sensing that this may bring them additional
trouble. Even after 20 years, their treatment
of Joseph troubles their consciences.
42:35  Discovering the money pouches dis-
mays Jacob and his sons. It appears that the
brothers have not paid for the Egyptian grain.
42:36 – 37  The unfolding sequence of events
appears ominous. Reuben’s willingness to put
to death his own sons fails to reassure Jacob.
Benjamin is unlikely to be safe in the care of
someone who would even consider killing
his own sons. Unjustly, th