|
Joseph Is Made Governor over Egypt
37 The king  and his officials liked this plan.
38 So the king said to them, “No one could possibly handle this better than Joseph, since the Spirit of God is with him.”
39 The king told Joseph, “God is the one who has shown you these things. No one else is as wise as you are or knows as much as you do.
 I'm putting you in charge of my palace, and everybody will have to obey you. No one will be over you except me.
41 You are now governor of all Egypt!”
Then the king took off his royal ring and put it on Joseph's finger. He gave him fine clothes to wear and placed a gold chain around his neck.
43 He also let him ride in the chariot next to his own, and people shouted, “Make way for Joseph!” So Joseph was governor of Egypt.
44 The king told Joseph, “Although I'm king, no one in Egypt is to do anything without your permission.”
45 He gave Joseph the Egyptian name Zaphenath Paneah. And he let him marry Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera, a priest in the city of Heliopolis. p 41.45 Heliopolis: The Hebrew text has “On,” which is better known by its Greek name “Heliopolis.” Joseph traveled all over Egypt.
46 Joseph was thirty when the king made him governor, and he went everywhere for the king.
47 For seven years there were big harvests of grain.
48 Joseph collected and stored up the extra grain in the cities of Egypt near the fields where it was harvested.
49 In fact, there was so much grain that they stopped keeping record, because it was like counting the grains of sand along the beach.
50 Joseph and his wife had two sons before the famine began.
51 Their first son was named Manasseh, which means, “God has let me forget all my troubles and my family back home.”
52 His second son was named Ephraim, which means “God has made me a success q 41.52 God has made me a success: Or “God has given me children.” in the land where I suffered.” r 41.52 Ephraim ... suffered: In Hebrew “Ephraim” actually means either “fertile land” or “pastureland.”
53 Egypt's seven years of plenty came to an end,
and the seven years of famine began, just as Joseph had said. There was not enough food in other countries, but all over Egypt there was plenty.
When the famine finally struck Egypt, the people asked the king for food, but he said, “Go to Joseph and do what he tells you to do.”
56 The famine became bad everywhere in Egypt, so Joseph opened the storehouses and sold the grain to the Egyptians.
57 People from all over the world came to Egypt, because the famine was severe in their countries.
|
