Genesis 37-38

Common English Bible

Joseph dreams of power

37 Jacob lived in the land of Canaan where his father was an immigrant. ² This is the account of Jacob’s descendants. Joseph was 17 years old and tended the flock with his brothers. While he was helping the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives, Joseph told their father unflattering things about them. ³ Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons because he was born when Jacob was old. Jacob had made for him a long^[a] robe. ⁴ When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of his brothers, they hated him and couldn’t even talk nicely to him.

⁵ Joseph had a dream and told it to his brothers, which made them hate him even more. ⁶ He said to them, “Listen to this dream I had. ⁷ When we were binding stalks of grain in the field, my stalk got up and stood upright, while your stalks gathered around it and bowed down to my stalk.”

⁸ His brothers said to him, “Will you really be our king and rule over us?” So they hated him even more because of the dreams he told them.

⁹ Then Joseph had another dream and described it to his brothers: “I’ve just dreamed again, and this time the sun and the moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.”

¹⁰ When he described it to his father and brothers, his father scolded him and said to him, “What kind of dreams have you dreamed? Am I and your mother and your brothers supposed to come and bow down to the ground in front of you?” ¹¹ His brothers were jealous of him, but his father took careful note of the matter.

Joseph’s brothers take revenge

¹² Joseph’s brothers went to tend their father’s flocks near Shechem. ¹³ Israel said to Joseph, “Aren’t your brothers tending the sheep near Shechem? Come, I’ll send you to them.”

And he said, “I’m ready.”

¹⁴ Jacob said to him, “Go! Find out how your brothers are and how the flock is, and report back to me.”

So Jacob sent him from the Hebron Valley. When he approached Shechem, ¹⁵ a man found him wandering in the field and asked him, “What are you looking for?”

¹⁶ Joseph said, “I’m looking for my brothers. Tell me, where are they tending the sheep?”

¹⁷ The man said, “They left here. I heard them saying, ‘Let’s go to Dothan.’” So Joseph went after his brothers and found them in Dothan.

¹⁸ They saw Joseph in the distance before he got close to them, and they plotted to kill him. ¹⁹ The brothers said to each other, “Here comes the big dreamer. ²⁰ Come on now, let’s kill him and throw him into one of the cisterns, and we’ll say a wild animal devoured him. Then we will see what becomes of his dreams!”

²¹ When Reuben heard what they said, he saved him from them, telling them, “Let’s not take his life.” ²² Reuben said to them, “Don’t spill his blood! Throw him into this desert cistern, but don’t lay a hand on him.” He intended to save Joseph from them and take him back to his father.

²³ When Joseph reached his brothers, they stripped off Joseph’s long robe, ²⁴ took him, and threw him into the cistern, an empty cistern with no water in it. ²⁵ When they sat down to eat, they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with camels carrying sweet resin, medicinal resin, and fragrant resin on their way down to Egypt. ²⁶ Judah said to his brothers, “What do we gain if we kill our brother and hide his blood? ²⁷ Come on, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites. Let’s not harm him because he’s our brother; he’s family.” His brothers agreed. ²⁸ When some Midianite traders passed by, they pulled Joseph up out of the cistern. They sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver, and they brought Joseph to Egypt.

²⁹ When Reuben returned to the cistern and found that Joseph wasn’t in it, he tore his clothes. ³⁰ Then he returned to his brothers and said, “The boy’s gone! And I—where can I go now?”

³¹ His brothers took Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a male goat, and dipped the robe in the blood. ³² They took the long robe, brought it to their father, and said, “We found this. See if it’s your son’s robe or not.”

³³ He recognized it and said, “It’s my son’s robe! A wild animal has devoured him. Joseph must have been torn to pieces!” ³⁴ Then Jacob tore his clothes, put a simple mourning cloth around his waist, and mourned for his son for many days. ³⁵ All of his sons and daughters got up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted, telling them, “I’ll go to my grave mourning for my son.” And Joseph’s father wept for him. ³⁶ Meanwhile the Midianites had sold Joseph to the Egyptians, to Potiphar, Pharaoh’s chief officer, commander of the royal guard.

Tamar’s place in Judah’s family

38 At that time, Judah moved away from his brothers and settled near an Adullamite named Hirah. ² There Judah saw the daughter of a Canaanite whose name was Shua, and he married her. After he slept with her, ³ she became pregnant and gave birth to a son, whom she^[b] named Er. ⁴ She became pregnant again, gave birth to a son, and named him Onan. ⁵ Then she gave birth to one more son and named him Shelah. She was in Chezib when she gave birth to him.

⁶ Judah married his oldest son Er to a woman named Tamar. ⁷ But the Lord considered Judah’s oldest son Er immoral, and the Lord put him to death. ⁸ Judah said to Onan, “Go to your brother’s wife, do your duty as her brother-in-law, and provide children for your brother.” ⁹ Onan knew the children wouldn’t be his so when he slept with his brother’s wife, he wasted his semen on the ground, so he wouldn’t give his brother children. ¹⁰ The Lord considered what he did as wrong and put him to death too. ¹¹ Judah said to Tamar his daughter-in-law, “Stay as a widow in your father’s household until my son Shelah grows up.” He thought Shelah would die like his brothers had. So Tamar went and lived in her father’s household.

¹² After a long time, Judah’s wife the daughter of Shua died. Then, after a period of mourning, he and his neighbor Hirah the Adullamite went up to Timnah, to those who were shearing his sheep. ¹³ Tamar was told, “Your father-in-law is now on his way up to Timnah to shear his sheep.” ¹⁴ So Tamar took off the clothing she wore as a widow, covered herself with a veil, put on makeup,^[c] and sat down at the entrance to Enaim on the road to Timnah, since she realized that although Shelah had already grown up, she hadn’t been given to him as a wife.

¹⁵ Judah saw her and thought she was a prostitute because she had covered her face. ¹⁶ He turned to her beside the road and said, “Let me sleep with you,” because he didn’t know she was his daughter-in-law.

She said, “What will you give me for sleeping with you?”

¹⁷ He said, “I will give you a kid goat from my flock.”

She said, “Only if you give me some deposit, as security to guarantee that you will send it.”

¹⁸ He said, “What kind of deposit should I give you?”

And she said, “Your seal, its cord, and the staff in your hand.” He gave these to her, slept with her, and she became pregnant by him.

¹⁹ Then she got up, left, and took off her veil, dressing once again in the clothing she wore as a widow. ²⁰ Judah sent the kid goat with his neighbor Hirah the Adullamite so he could take back the deposits from the woman, but he couldn’t find her. ²¹ He asked the locals of that place, “Where’s the consecrated worker^[d] who was at Enaim on the road?”

But they said, “There’s no consecrated worker here.”

²² So he went back to Judah and said, “I couldn’t find her. The locals even said, ‘There’s no holy woman here.’”

²³ Judah said, “Let her keep everything so we aren’t laughed at. I did send this kid goat, but you couldn’t find her.”

²⁴ About three months later, Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law Tamar has become a prostitute and is now pregnant because of it.”

And Judah said, “Bring her out so that she may be burned.”

²⁵ When she was brought out, she sent this message to her father-in-law, “I’m pregnant by the man who owns these things. See if you recognize whose seal, cord, and staff these are.”

²⁶ Judah recognized them and said, “She’s more righteous than I am, because I didn’t allow her to marry my son Shelah.” Judah never knew her intimately again.

²⁷ When she gave birth, she discovered she had twins in her womb. ²⁸ At birth, one boy put out his hand, and the midwife took it and tied a red thread on his hand, saying, “This one came out first.” ²⁹ As soon as he pulled his hand back, his brother came out, and she said, “You’ve burst out on your own.” So he was named Perez.^{[e] 30} Afterward, his brother with the red thread on his hand came out, and he was named Zerah.^[f]