Daily Bread

Joseph and the Famine

¹³ There was no food, however, in the whole region because the famine was severe; both Egypt and Canaan wasted away because of the famine.^{(A) 14} Joseph collected all the money that was to be found in Egypt and Canaan in payment for the grain they were buying,^(B) and he brought it to Pharaoh’s palace.^{(C) 15} When the money of the people of Egypt and Canaan was gone,^(D) all Egypt came to Joseph^(E) and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes?^(F) Our money is all gone.”

¹⁶ “Then bring your livestock,^(G)” said Joseph. “I will sell you food in exchange for your livestock, since your money is gone.^(H)” ¹⁷ So they brought their livestock to Joseph, and he gave them food in exchange for their horses,^(I) their sheep and goats, their cattle and donkeys.^(J) And he brought them through that year with food in exchange for all their livestock.

¹⁸ When that year was over, they came to him the following year and said, “We cannot hide from our lord the fact that since our money is gone^(K) and our livestock belongs to you,^(L) there is nothing left for our lord except our bodies and our land. ¹⁹ Why should we perish before your eyes^(M)—we and our land as well? Buy us and our land in exchange for food,^(N) and we with our land will be in bondage to Pharaoh.^(O) Give us seed so that we may live and not die,^(P) and that the land may not become desolate.”

²⁰ So Joseph bought all the land in Egypt for Pharaoh. The Egyptians, one and all, sold their fields, because the famine was too severe^(Q) for them. The land became Pharaoh’s, ²¹ and Joseph reduced the people to servitude,^[a](R) from one end of Egypt to the other. ²² However, he did not buy the land of the priests,^(S) because they received a regular allotment from Pharaoh and had food enough from the allotment^(T) Pharaoh gave them. That is why they did not sell their land.

²³ Joseph said to the people, “Now that I have bought you and your land today for Pharaoh, here is seed^(U) for you so you can plant the ground.^{(V) 24} But when the crop comes in, give a fifth^(W) of it to Pharaoh. The other four-fifths you may keep as seed for the fields and as food for yourselves and your households and your children.”

²⁵ “You have saved our lives,” they said. “May we find favor in the eyes of our lord;^(X) we will be in bondage to Pharaoh.”^(Y)

²⁶ So Joseph established it as a law concerning land in Egypt—still in force today—that a fifth^(Z) of the produce belongs to Pharaoh. It was only the land of the priests that did not become Pharaoh’s.^(AA)