³ There were also those who said, “We are having to pledge our fields, our vineyards, and our houses in order to get grain during the famine.”

Do Not Rob God

⁸ Will anyone rob God? Yet you are robbing me! But you say, “How are we robbing you?” In your tithes and offerings!^{(A) 9} You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me—the whole nation of you! ¹⁰ Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in my house, and thus put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts; see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing.^{(B) 11} I will rebuke the locust^[a] for you, so that it will not destroy the produce of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not be barren, says the Lord of hosts.

⁷ “If there is among you anyone in need, a member of your community in any of your towns within the land that the Lord your God is giving you, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor.^(A)

³⁵ “If any of your kin fall into difficulty and become dependent on you,^[a] you shall support them; they shall live with you as though resident aliens.^{(A) 36} Do not take interest in advance or otherwise make a profit from them, but fear your God; let them live with you.^{(B) 37} You shall not lend them your money at interest taken in advance or provide them food at a profit. ³⁸ I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, to be your God.^(C)

³⁹ “If any who are dependent on you become so impoverished that they sell themselves to you, you shall not make them serve as slaves.^(D)

¹⁵ When the money from the land of Egypt and from the land of Canaan was spent, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us food! Why should we die before your eyes? For our money is gone.”^{(A) 16} And Joseph answered, “Give me your livestock, and I will give you food in exchange for your livestock, if your money is gone.” ¹⁷ So they brought their livestock to Joseph, and Joseph gave them food in exchange for the horses, the flocks, the herds, and the donkeys. That year he supplied them with food in exchange for all their livestock. ¹⁸ When that year was ended, they came to him the following year and said to him, “We cannot hide from my lord that our money is all spent, and the herds of cattle are my lord’s. There is nothing left in the sight of my lord but our bodies and our lands. ¹⁹ Shall we die before your eyes, both we and our land? Buy us and our land in exchange for food. We with our land will become slaves to Pharaoh; just give us seed, so that we may live and not die and that the land may not become desolate.”

²⁰ So Joseph bought all the land of Egypt for Pharaoh. All the Egyptians sold their fields, because the famine was severe upon them, and the land became Pharaoh’s. ²¹ As for the people, he made slaves of them^[a] from one end of Egypt to the other. ²² Only the land of the priests he did not buy, for the priests had a fixed allowance from Pharaoh and lived on the allowance that Pharaoh gave them; therefore they did not sell their land.^{(B) 23} Then Joseph said to the people, “Now that I have this day bought you and your land for Pharaoh, here is seed for you; sow the land. ²⁴ And at the harvests you shall give one-fifth to Pharaoh, and four-fifths shall be your own, as seed for the field and as food for yourselves and your households and as food for your little ones.”^{(C) 25} They said, “You have saved our lives; may it please my lord, we will be slaves to Pharaoh.”^(D)