Genesis 50
1 Joseph went and hugged his father, weeping over him and kissing him.
Joseph leaned close to his father’s face and cried over him and kissed him.
2 Then Joseph instructed the physicians who worked for him to embalm his father's body. So the physicians embalmed Israel.
Joseph commanded his servants who were morticians to (embalm his father’s body/put spices on his father’s body) to (preserve it/keep it from decaying), and then wrap it with strips of cloth.
3 This took a full 40 days, the normal time for the process, and the Egyptians mourned for him for 70 days.
So the morticians did that. It took 40 days to embalm Jacob’s body, because that is the amount of time that was always required for them to embalm a body. And the people of Egypt mourned for 70 days because of Jacob’s death.
4 Once the time of mourning was over, Joseph said to Pharaoh's officials, “If you'd be so kind, please speak to Pharaoh on my behalf, and explain to him that
When the time of mourning was finished, Joseph said to the king’s officials, “If you are pleased with me, please take this message to the king:
5 my father made me swear an oath, telling me, ‘You must bury me in the tomb I've prepared for myself in Canaan. Please allow me to go and bury my father and then I'll return.’”
‘When my father was about to die, he told me to solemnly promise that I would bury his body in Canaan, in the tomb that he himself had prepared. So please let me go up to Canaan and bury my father’s body. Then I will return.’”
6 Pharaoh replied, “Go and bury your father as he made you swear to do.”
After they gave the king the message, he replied, “Tell Joseph, ‘Go up and bury your father’s body, as you (swore/solemnly promised) that you would do.’”
7 Joseph went to bury his father, and all Pharaoh's officials went with him—all Pharaoh's senior advisors and all the leaders of Egypt—
So Joseph went [up to Canaan] to bury his father’s body. All of the king’s officials, all the king’s advisors, and all the elders in Egypt went with him.
8 as well as Joseph's family, his brothers, and his father's family. They only left the small children and their flocks and herds back in Goshen.
His own family’s small children and their sheep and goats and their cattle stayed in the Goshen region. But all the rest of Joseph’s family and his [older] brothers [and younger brother] and his father’s family went with him.
9 They were accompanied by chariots and horsemen—a really large procession.
Men riding in chariots [MTY] and on horses also went along. It was a huge group.
10 When they got to the threshing floor of Atad, on the other side of the Jordan, they wept loudly in sorrow. Joseph held a seven-day ceremony of mourning for his father there.
They went to the east side of the Jordan [River] and arrived at Atad. There was a place there where people (threshed/beat the grain to separate the wheat from the chaff.) There they mourned loudly for Jacob for a long time. Joseph performed mourning ceremonies for his father for seven days.
11 The Canaanites who lived there watched the ceremony of mourning at the threshing floor of Atad. They said, “This is a very sad time of mourning for the Egyptians,” so they renamed the place Abel-mizraim, which is on the other side of the Jordan.
When the Canaan people-group who lived there saw them mourning like that, they said, “This is a sad mourning place for the people of Egypt!” So they named the place Abel-Mizraim, [which sounds like the Hebrew words that mean ‘mourning of the Egyptians].’
12 Jacob's sons did what he had instructed them to do.
Then Jacob’s sons did for him what their father had commanded.
13 They carried his body to Canaan and buried him in the cave at Machpelah in the field near Mamre, which Abraham had bought from Ephron the Hittite as a burial site.
They [crossed the Jordan River and] carried Jacob’s body to Canaan. They buried it in the cave in the field at Machpelah, east of Mamre [town]. That was the field that Abraham had bought from Ephron, who was one of the Heth people-group, to use as a burial place.
14 After they had buried their father, Joseph and his brothers returned to Egypt along with all those who had gone with them.
After he had buried his father, Joseph and his [older] brothers [and younger brother] and all the others who had gone up to Canaan with him for the funeral returned to Egypt.
15 However, now that their father was dead, Joseph's brothers became worried, saying, “Maybe Joseph is holding a grudge against us, and he'll pay us back for all the bad things we did to him.”
After Jacob died, Joseph’s brothers became worried. They realized what might happen. They said, “Suppose Joseph hates us and tries to get revenge for all the evil things that we did to him many years ago?”
16 So they sent a message to Joseph to tell him, “Before your father died, he gave this order,
So they sent someone to tell this to Joseph for them: “Before our father died, he told us this:
17 ‘This is what you are to tell Joseph: Forgive your brothers their sins, the bad things they did to you, treating you in such a nasty way.’ Now please forgive us our sins, we who are servants of the God of your father.” When Joseph received their message, he cried.
‘Say to Joseph, “Please forgive your [older] brothers for the evil thing that they did to you, for their terrible sin against you, because what they did to you was very wrong.”’ So now we, who are servants of your father’s God, ask you, please forgive us for what we did to you.” But Joseph just cried when he received their message.
18 Then his brothers themselves came and fell down before Joseph and said, “We are your slaves!”
Then his [older] brothers themselves came and threw themselves on the ground in front of Joseph, and one of them said, “Please listen. We will just be your servants.”
19 “You don't need to be afraid!” he told them. “I don't stand in the place of God, do I?
But Joseph replied to them, “Do not be afraid! [God is the one who punishes people]; (am I God?/I am not God!) [RHQ]
20 While you planned bad things for me, God planned it for good so that in the end many lives could be saved.
As for you, yes, you wanted to do something very evil to me. But God caused something good to come from it! He wanted to save many people from dying of hunger, and that is what happened! Today they are alive!
21 So don't worry. I'll go on taking care of you and your children.” Speaking kindly like this he calmed them down.
So I say [again], do not be afraid! I will make sure that you and your children have enough to eat.” In that way he reassured them and made made them feel much better.
22 Joseph remained in Egypt, together with his father's whole family. He lived to be 110,
Joseph lived with his father’s family in Egypt until he was 110 years old.
23 and saw three generations of his son Ephraim, and the sons of Makir, Manasseh's son, were placed in his lap when they were born.
He lived long enough to see Ephraim’s children and grandchildren. The children of Joseph’s grandson Machir, who was Manasseh’s son, were born before Joseph died, and were adopted by Joseph to be his own children [IDM].
24 “I'm going to die soon,” Joseph told his brothers, “but God will be with you, and he will lead you out of this country to the land that he swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
One day Joseph said to his [older] brothers, “I am about to die. But God will certainly (help/take care of) you. And [some day] he will lead your [descendants] up out of this land and take them to Canaan, the land that he solemnly promised to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
25 Joseph made the sons of Israel swear an oath, saying, “When God comes to be with you, you must take my bones with you when you leave.”
Then Joseph said, “When God enables you to do that, you must take my body back to Canaan.” He made his older brothers solemnly promise to do that.
26 Joseph died when he was 110. After his body was embalmed, he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.
So Joseph died in Egypt when he was 110 years old. His body was embalmed and put in a coffin there.
