Holman Christian Standard Bible (18 page)

28
 These are the tribes of Israel, 12 in all, and this was what their father said to them. He blessed them, and he blessed each one with a suitable blessing.

Jacob's Burial Instructions

29
 Then he commanded them: “I am about to be gathered to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave in the field of Ephron the Hittite. 
30
 The cave is in the field of Machpelah near Mamre, in the land of Canaan. This is the field Abraham purchased from Ephron the Hittite as a burial site. 
31
 Abraham and his wife Sarah are buried there, Isaac and his wife Rebekah are buried there, and I buried Leah there. 
32
 The field and the cave in it were purchased from the Hittites.”
33
 When Jacob had finished instructing his sons, he drew his feet into the bed and died. He was gathered to his people.

Genesis

Jacob's Burial

50
Then Joseph, leaning over his father's face, wept and kissed him.
2
 He commanded his servants who were physicians to embalm his father. So they embalmed Israel.
3
 They took 40 days to complete this, for embalming takes that long, and the Egyptians mourned for him 70 days. 

4
 When the days of mourning were over, Joseph said to Pharaoh's household, “If I have found favor with you, please tell Pharaoh that
5
 my father made me take an oath, saying, ‘I am about to die. You must bury me there in the tomb that I made for myself in the land of Canaan.' Now let me go and bury my father. Then I will return.”

6
 So Pharaoh said, “Go and bury your father in keeping with your oath.”

7
 Then Joseph went to bury his father, and all Pharaoh's servants, the elders of his household, and all the elders of the land of Egypt went with him,
8
 along with all Joseph's household, his brothers, and his father's household. Only their children, their sheep, and their cattle were left in the land of Goshen.
9
 Horses and chariots went up with him; it was a very impressive procession.
10
 When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, which is across the Jordan, they lamented and wept loudly, and Joseph mourned seven days for his father.
11
 When the Canaanite inhabitants of the land saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a solemn mourning on the part of the Egyptians.” Therefore the place is named Abel-mizraim. It is across the Jordan.

12
 So Jacob's sons did for him what he had commanded them.
13
 They carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave at Machpelah in the field near Mamre, which Abraham had purchased as a burial site from Ephron the Hittite. 
14
 After Joseph buried his father, he returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone with him to bury his father.

Joseph's Kindness

15
 When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said to one another, “If Joseph is holding a grudge against us, he will certainly repay us for all the suffering we caused him.” 

16
 So they sent this message to Joseph, “Before he died your father gave a command:
17
 ‘Say this to Joseph: Please forgive your brothers' transgression and their sin — the suffering they caused you.' Therefore, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” Joseph wept when their message came to him.
18
 Then his brothers also came to him, bowed down before him, and said, “We are your slaves! ”

19
 But Joseph said to them, “Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God? 
20
 You planned evil against me; God planned it for good to bring about the present result — the survival of many people. 
21
 Therefore don't be afraid. I will take care of you and your little ones.” And he comforted them and spoke kindly to them. 

Joseph's Death

22
 Joseph and his father's household remained in Egypt. Joseph lived 110 years.
23
 He saw Ephraim's sons to the third generation; the sons of Manasseh's son Machir were recognized by Joseph. 

24
 Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will certainly come to your aid and bring you up from this land to the land He promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” 
25
 So Joseph made the sons of Israel take an oath: “When God comes to your aid, you are to carry my bones up from here.” 

26
 Joseph died at the age of 110. They embalmed him and placed him in a coffin in Egypt.

Exodus

Exodus

Israel Oppressed in Egypt

1
These are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob; each came with his family: 

5
 The total number of Jacob's descendants was 70;Joseph was already in Egypt.

6
 Then Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died. 
7
 But the Israelites were fruitful, increased rapidly, multiplied, and became extremely numerous so that the land was filled with them.

8
 A new king, who had not known Joseph, came to power in Egypt.
9
 He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and powerful than we are. 
10
 Let us deal shrewdly with them; otherwise they will multiply further, and if war breaks out, they may join our enemies, fight against us, and leave the country.” 
11
 So the Egyptians assigned taskmasters over the Israelites to oppress them with forced labor. They built Pithom and Rameses as supply cities for Pharaoh.
12
 But the more they oppressed them, the more they multiplied and spread so that the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites.
13
 They worked the Israelites ruthlessly 
14
 and made their lives bitter with difficult labor in brick and mortar and in all kinds of fieldwork. They ruthlessly imposed all this work on them. 

15
 Then the king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah,
16
 “When you help the Hebrew women give birth, observe them as they deliver. If the child is a son, kill him, but if it's a daughter, she may live.”
17
 The Hebrew midwives, however,
•feared
God and did not do as the king of Egypt had told them; they let the boys live.
18
 So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, “Why have you done this and let the boys live? ”

19
 The midwives said to Pharaoh, “The Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women, for they are vigorous and give birth before a midwife can get to them.” 

20
 So God was good to the midwives, and the people multiplied and became very numerous.
21
 Since the midwives feared God, He gave them families. 
22
 Pharaoh then commanded all his people: “You must throw every son born to the Hebrews into the Nile, but let every daughter live.” 

Exodus

Moses' Birth and Adoption

2
Now a man from the family of Levi married a Levite woman. 
2
 The woman became pregnant and gave birth to a son; when she saw that he was beautiful, she hid him for three months. 
3
 But when she could no longer hide him, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with asphalt and pitch. She placed the child in it and set it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile.
4
 Then his sister stood at a distance in order to see what would happen to him.

5
 Pharaoh's daughter went down to bathe at the Nile while her servant girls walked along the riverbank. Seeing the basket among the reeds, she sent her slave girl to get it.
6
 When she opened it, she saw the child — a little boy, crying. She felt sorry for him and said, “This is one of the Hebrew boys.”

7
 Then his sister said to Pharaoh's daughter, “Should I go and call a woman from the Hebrews to nurse the boy for you? ”

8
 “Go,” Pharaoh's daughter told her. So the girl went and called the boy's mother.
9
 Then Pharaoh's daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse him for me, and I will pay your wages.” So the woman took the boy and nursed him.
10
 When the child grew older, she brought him to Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, “Because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.” 

Moses in Midian

11
 Years later, after Moses had grown up, he went out to his own people and observed their forced labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people.
12
 Looking all around and seeing no one, he struck the Egyptian dead and hid him in the sand.
13
 The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you attacking your neighbor? ” 

14
 “Who made you a leader and judge over us? ” the man replied. “Are you planning to kill me as you killed the Egyptian? ”

Then Moses became afraid and thought: What I did is certainly known.
15
 When Pharaoh heard about this, he tried to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in the land of Midian, and sat down by a well. 

16
 Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father's flock.
17
 Then some shepherds arrived and drove them away, but Moses came to their rescue and watered their flock.
18
 When they returned to their father Reuel he asked, “Why have you come back so quickly today? ”

19
 They answered, “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. He even drew water for us and watered the flock.”

20
 “So where is he? ” he asked his daughters. “Why then did you leave the man behind? Invite him to eat dinner.”

21
 Moses agreed to stay with the man, and he gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage.
22
 She gave birth to a son whom he named Gershom, for he said, “I have been a foreigner in a foreign land.” 

23
 After a long time, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned because of their difficult labor, and they cried out; and their cry for help ascended to God because of the difficult labor.
24
 So God heard their groaning, and He remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 
25
 God saw the Israelites, and He took notice. 

Exodus

Moses and the Burning Bush

3
Meanwhile, Moses was shepherding the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 
2
 Then the Angel of the
Lord
appeared to him in a flame of fire within a bush. As Moses looked, he saw that the bush was on fire but was not consumed.
3
 So Moses thought: I must go over and look at this remarkable sight. Why isn't the bush burning up?

4
 When the
Lord
saw that he had gone over to look, God called out to him from the bush, “Moses, Moses! ”

“Here I am,” he answered.

5
 “Do not come closer,” He said. “Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” 
6
 Then He continued, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God.

7
 Then the
Lord
said, “I have observed the misery of My people in Egypt, and have heard them crying out because of their oppressors, and I know about their sufferings.
8
 I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and to bring them from that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey  — the territory of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. 
9
 The Israelites' cry for help has come to Me, and I have also seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them.
10
 Therefore, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh so that you may lead My people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”