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Genesis 44:23-33

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23 "You said to your servants, however, '1Unless * your youngest brother comes down with you, you will not see my face again.'
24 "Thus it came about when we went up to your servant my father, we told him the words of my lord.
25 "2Our father said, 'Go back, buy us a little food.'
26 "But we said, 'We cannot * go down. If our youngest brother is with us, then we will go down; for we cannot * see the man's face unless our youngest brother is with us.'
27 "Your servant my father said to us, 'You know that 3my wife bore me two sons;
28 and the one went out from me, and 4I said, "Surely he is torn in pieces," and I have not seen him since *.
29 'If you take this one also from me, and harm befalls him, you will 5bring my gray hair down to Sheol in sorrow.'
30 "Now, therefore, when I come to your servant my father, and the lad is not with us, since 6his life is bound up in the lad's life,
31 when he sees that the lad is not with us, he will die. Thus your servants will 7bring the gray hair of your servant our father down to Sheol in sorrow.
32 "For your servant 8became surety for the lad to my father, saying, 'If I do not bring him back to you, then let me bear the blame before my father forever *.'
33 "Now, therefore, please let your servant remain instead of the lad a slave to my lord, and let the lad go up with his brothers.
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Genesis 44:23-33 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS 44

This chapter relates the policy of Joseph in making an experiment of his brethren's regard and affection for Benjamin; he ordered his steward to put every man's money into his sack, and his silver cup in Benjamin's, and when they were got out of the city, to follow after them, and charge them with the theft, as he did; and having searched their sacks, as they desired he would, found the cup with Benjamin, which threw them into the utmost distress, and obliged them to return to Joseph, Ge 44:1-14; who charged them with their ill behaviour towards him; they acknowledge it, and propose to be his servants; but he orders them to depart to their father, retaining Benjamin in servitude, Ge 44:15-17; upon which Judah addressed him in a very polite and affectionate manner, and relates the whole story, both of what passed between Joseph and them, concerning Benjamin, the first time they were in Egypt, and between their father and them upon the same subject, when he directed them to go a second time thither to buy corn, and how he became a surety to his father for him, and therefore proposed to be his bondman now, not being able to see his father's face without Benjamin, Ge 44:18-34.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Cross References 8

Footnotes 4

  • [a]. Lit "my face"
  • [b]. Lit "evil"
  • [c]. Lit "his soul is bound with his soul"
  • [d]. Lit "and I shall have sinned for all the days before my father"
New American Standard Bible Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, California.  All rights reserved.