Genesis 44:24-34

24 "When we returned to our father, we told him everything you said to us.

25 So when our father said, 'Go back and buy some more food,'

26 we told him flatly, 'We can't. The only way we can go back is if our youngest brother is with us. We aren't allowed to even see the man if our youngest brother doesn't come with us.'

27 "Your servant, my father, told us, 'You know very well that my wife gave me two sons.

28 One turned up missing. I concluded that he'd been ripped to pieces. I've never seen him since.

29 If you now go and take this one and something bad happens to him, you'll put my old gray, grieving head in the grave for sure.'

30 "And now, can't you see that if I show up before your servant, my father, without the boy, this son with whom his life is so bound up,

31 the moment he realizes the boy is gone, he'll die on the spot. He'll die of grief and we, your servants who are standing here before you, will have killed him.

32 And that's not all. I got my father to release the boy to show him to you by promising, 'If I don't bring him back, I'll stand condemned before you, Father, all my life.'

33 "So let me stay here as your slave, not this boy. Let the boy go back with his brothers.

34 How can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me? Oh, don't make me go back and watch my father die in grief!"

Genesis 44:24-34 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.