Genesis 37:1-11

Contemporary English Version

Joseph and His Brothers

37 Jacob lived in the land of Canaan, where his father Isaac had lived, ² and this is the story of his family.

When Jacob's son Joseph was 17 years old, he took care of the sheep with his brothers, the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah.^[a] But he was always telling his father all sorts of bad things about his brothers.

³ Jacob loved Joseph more than he did any of his other sons, because Joseph was born when Jacob was very old. Jacob had even given Joseph a fancy coat^{[b] 4} which showed that Joseph was his favorite son, and so Joseph's brothers hated him and would not be friendly to him.

⁵ One day, Joseph told his brothers what he had dreamed, and they hated him even more. ⁶ Joseph said, “Let me tell you about my dream. ⁷ We were out in the field, tying up bundles of wheat. Suddenly my bundle stood up, and your bundles gathered around and bowed down to it.”

⁸ His brothers asked, “Do you really think you are going to be king and rule over us?” Now they hated Joseph more than ever because of what he had said about his dream.

⁹ Joseph later had another dream, and he told his brothers, “Listen to what else I dreamed. The sun, the moon, and eleven stars bowed down to me.”

¹⁰ When he told his father about this dream, his father became angry and said, “What's that supposed to mean? Are your mother and I and your brothers all going to come and bow down to you?” ^11 (A) Joseph's brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept wondering about the dream.