Joseph Buries His Father
Egypt mourns Jacob seventy days, and a state procession carries him to Canaan. With their father gone, the brothers fear payback and invent his dying wish. Joseph weeps and answers: you meant harm, our Father meant good, and I will provide.
50 1Joseph bent over his father's face and wept over him and kissed him. 2Then Joseph ordered the physicians who served him to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. 3Forty days were needed, the usual time for embalming; Egyptians wept for him seventy days.
4When his days of mourning passed, Joseph spoke to Pharaoh's household: "If I have found favor with you, please speak to Pharaoh: 5My father made me swear, "I am dying; bury me in the tomb I cut for myself in Canaan." Please let me go up now and bury my father, then I will return."
6And Pharaoh said, "Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear."
7Joseph went up to bury his father; with him went all Pharaoh's servants, his household's elders, and all the elders of the land of Egypt, 8and all Joseph's household, his brothers, and his father's household. Only their children, flocks, and herds were left in the land of Goshen. 9Chariots also and horsemen went up with him. It was a very great company. 10They came to the threshing floor of Atad, beyond the Jordan, and mourned there with a great, very heavy lament; Joseph observed seven days of mourning for his father. 11When the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, "This is a bitter mourning by the Egyptians." Therefore the place was named Abel-mizraim; it is beyond the Jordan. a a v11 Abel-mizraim means "mourning of Egypt" — the Canaanites named the place for the great lamentation they witnessed there. 12His sons did for him as he had commanded them. 13His sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought from Ephron the Hittite as a burial site, facing Mamre. 14After burying his father, Joseph returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone up with him to bury his father.
The Brothers' Old Fear
15Joseph's brothers, seeing their father was dead, said, "What if Joseph hates us and repays us for all the harm we did to him?" 16So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, "Your father gave this command before he died: 17Tell Joseph: 'Please forgive your brothers' offense and sin—they did evil to you.' Now please forgive the offense of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him. 18His brothers also came and fell down before him and said, "Look, we are your servants." 19But Joseph said to them, "Don't be afraid, for am I in the place of our Father? 20You meant evil against me, but our Father meant it for good, to save the lives of many people, as is happening today. 21Now, don't be afraid; I will provide for you and your children." So he comforted them, speaking to their hearts.
Joseph's Last Years
22So Joseph remained in Egypt, he and his father's family. And Joseph lived 110 years. 23Joseph saw Ephraim's children to the third generation; Machir son of Manasseh's children were also born on Joseph's knees. b b v23 Placing a newborn on a patriarch's knees was an ancient gesture of adoption and belonging — Joseph was formally claiming these children as his own. 24Joseph said to his brothers, "I'm dying, but our Father will surely come to help you and bring you up from this land to the land he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob." c c v24 Joseph's dying words look forward to the Exodus — our Father does not leave his children in slavery; he comes to bring them home. 25Then Joseph made Israel's sons swear: "Our Father will surely come to help you; carry my bones up from here." 26Joseph died at 110 years old. They embalmed him and placed him in a coffin in Egypt.
