King James Version · The patriarchs
Genesis 37
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And dwelt in the land wherein his was a , in the land of . These are the generations of . , being seventeen years old, was feeding the flock with his brethren; and the lad was with the sons of , and with the sons of , his ’s wives: and brought unto his their evil report. Now Israel loved more than all his children, because he was the son of his old age: and he made him a coat of many colours. And when his brethren saw that their loved him more than all his brethren, they hated him, and could not speak peaceably unto him. And dreamed a , and he told it his brethren: and they hated him yet the more. And he said unto them, Hear, I you, this which I have dreamed: For, behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and, lo, my sheaf arose, and also stood upright; and, behold, your sheaves stood round about, and made obeisance to my sheaf. And his brethren said to him, Shalt thou indeed reign over us? or shalt thou indeed over us? And they hated him yet the more for his , and for his words. And he dreamed yet another , and told it his brethren, and said, Behold, I have dreamed a more; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his , and to his brethren: and his rebuked him, and said unto him, What is this that thou hast dreamed? Shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to ourselves to thee to the earth? And his brethren envied him; but his observed the saying. And his brethren went to feed their ’s flock in . And Israel said unto , Do not thy brethren feed the flock in ? come, and I will send thee unto them. And he said to him, Here am I. And he said to him, Go, I thee, see whether it be well with thy brethren, and well with the flocks; and bring me word again. So he sent him out of the vale of , and he came to . And a certain man found him, and, behold, he was wandering in the field: and the man asked him, saying, What seekest thou? And he said, I seek my brethren: tell me, I thee, where they feed their flocks. And the man said, They are departed hence; for I heard them say, Let us go to . And went after his brethren, and found them in . And when they saw him afar off, even before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to him. And they said one to another, Behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now therefore, and let us him, and cast him into some pit, and we will say, Some evil beast hath devoured him: and we shall see what will become of his . And heard it, and he him out of their hands; and said, Let us not kill him. And said unto them, Shed no , but cast him into this pit that is in , and lay no hand upon him; that he might rid him out of their hands, to him to his again. And it came to pass, when was come unto his brethren, that they stript out of his coat, his coat of many colours that was on him; And they took him, and cast him into a pit: and was empty, there was no water in it. And they sat down to eat bread: and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and, behold, a company of Ishmeelites came from with their camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh, going to carry it down to . And Judah said unto his brethren, What profit is it if we our brother, and conceal his ? Come, and let us sell him to the Ishmeelites, and let not our hand be upon him; for he is our brother and our . And his brethren were content. Then there passed by merchantmen; and they drew and lifted up out of , and sold to the Ishmeelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they brought into . And returned unto ; and, behold, was not in ; and he rent his clothes. And he returned unto his brethren, and said, The child is not; and I, whither shall I go? And they took ’s coat, and killed a kid of the goats, and dipped the coat in ; And they sent the coat of many colours, and they brought it to their ; and said, This have we found: know now whether it be thy son’s coat or no. And he knew it, and said, It is my son’s coat; an evil beast hath devoured him; is without doubt rent in pieces. And rent his clothes, and put upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days. And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and he said, For I will go down into the unto my son . Thus his wept for him. And sold him into unto , an officer of ’s, and captain of the guard.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The patriarchs, 2000 BC to 1600 BC ›
Abraham's family as herdsmen among settled Canaanite city-states, in a world where Egypt and Mesopotamia are the great powers and Canaan is the corridor between them.
- Mesopotamia
- Abraham's own century is Hammurabi's. The great empire of Ur has already fallen, and Babylon rises under a king who published a law code on a stone pillar for everyone to see. Reading Genesis alongside Hammurabi's laws is illuminating in both directions: some provisions are strikingly similar, and the places where Israel's later law diverges are the places worth stopping at.
- Egypt
- The Middle Kingdom, wealthy, bureaucratic, and organised around the Nile flood. Egyptian tomb paintings from this period show Semitic traders arriving with donkeys and striped cloaks, which is more or less the picture Genesis gives of a family going down to Egypt in a famine. Toward the end of the era the Hyksos, rulers of Semitic origin, take the delta.
- Anatolia and the Aegean
- Assyrian merchants run a long-distance trading colony at Kanesh in Anatolia, leaving thousands of clay letters about copper, tin, and debt. On Crete the Minoan palaces are at their height, with plumbing, frescoes, and a script nobody has yet read.
- Further afield
- The Indus Valley cities are in decline after centuries of grid-planned streets and drains. In China the Erlitou culture is building the first palace complexes. Stonehenge is standing and already old.
All of Genesis