Genesis 47, a visual study: Joseph presents five brothers to Pharaoh who settles them in Goshen; Jacob blesses Pharaoh twice and says few and evil have been the days of his life; Joseph administers the famine by taking money then livestock then land as payment for grain; the people sell themselves as servants to Pharaoh; Israel multiplies greatly in Goshen; Jacob makes Joseph swear to bury him not in Egypt but with his fathers in Canaan, from The Lampstand Project.
The old man before the throne.
Jacob is one hundred and thirty years old. He stands before the most powerful man in the world. He has nothing — no land, no home, a borrowed life in Egypt. He blesses Pharaoh. The lesser is blessed by the greater.
“Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life.”Genesis 47:9 ESV
A chapter of two stories.
Genesis 47 runs two narratives in parallel. In one, Joseph manages the famine across Egypt and accumulates all the land for Pharaoh. In the other, Israel settles in Goshen and multiplies greatly. Egypt is impoverished. Israel is fruitful. The contrast is not accidental.
Two stories running in opposite directions.
Genesis 47 runs two narratives simultaneously. Egypt loses its money, livestock, land, and freedom. Israel in Goshen gains possessions, fruitfulness, and numbers. The contrast is the chapter’s argument: what famine takes from the world, God gives back to his people.
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“Your servants are shepherds, as our fathers were.”
So Joseph went in and told Pharaoh, “My father and my brothers, with their flocks and herds and all that they possess, have come from the land of Canaan. They are now in the land of Goshen.” And from among his brothers he took five men and presented them to Pharaoh. Pharaoh said to his brothers, “What is your occupation?” And they said to Pharaoh, “Your servants are shepherds, as our fathers were.” They said to Pharaoh, “We have come to sojourn in the land, for there is no pasture for your servants’ flocks, for the famine is severe in the land of Canaan. And now, please let your servants dwell in the land of Goshen.” Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Your father and your brothers have come to you. The land of Egypt is before you. Settle your father and your brothers in the best of the land. Let them dwell in the land of Goshen.”
Joseph presents five brothers, not all eleven. The number may be strategic — enough to represent the family without showing full strength. Their answer is perfect because it is true: we are shepherds. Pharaoh grants everything. The best of the land, Goshen, and even a role managing Pharaoh’s own livestock for the capable among them. This Pharaoh is in Joseph’s debt. The contrast with the Pharaoh who does not know Joseph — the one of Exodus — will shadow every subsequent verse.
“A man’s gift makes room for him and brings him before great men.”
“Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life.”
Then Joseph brought in Jacob his father and stood him before Pharaoh, and Jacob blessed Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said to Jacob, “How many are the days of the years of your life?” And Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The days of the years of my sojourning are 130 years. Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their sojourning.” And Jacob blessed Pharaoh and went out from the presence of Pharaoh.
Jacob blessed Pharaoh when he came in, and blessed him again when he went out. The writer of Hebrews notices this: “By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph” — blessing is Jacob’s characteristic act. He has nothing to offer Pharaoh except what flows from the God who has walked with him. His answer about his years is startling: 130 years and he calls them few and evil. He is not performing humility. He means it. He has been a fugitive, a deceived husband, a father who buried his son. The man with the promise has lived a harder life than the man with the throne.
“Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life.”
Money, then livestock, then land.
Now there was no food in all the land, for the famine was very severe, so that the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan languished by reason of the famine. And Joseph gathered up all the money that was found in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan, in exchange for the grain that they bought. And Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh’s house. And when the money was all spent in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? For our money is gone.” And Joseph answered, “Give your livestock, and I will give you food in exchange for your livestock, if your money is gone.”
The famine administration is presented without editorial comment. Joseph takes money, then livestock, then land itself, then the labor of the people — a fifth of every harvest to Pharaoh in perpetuity. By the end, all Egypt belongs to Pharaoh except the priests’ land. The people say: you have saved our lives; we will be servants to Pharaoh. What looks like exploitation is framed as rescue. This is not the last time a powerful man will use famine to consolidate power over a people. But the narrator is not quite condemning Joseph — he is describing a world where only the one with grain survives, and Joseph has managed the grain for exactly this purpose.
“For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?”
“They gained possessions in it and were fruitful and multiplied greatly.”
Thus Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the land of Goshen. And they gained possessions in it and were fruitful and multiplied greatly. And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years. So the days of Jacob, the years of his life, were 147 years.
While Egypt loses its land and its freedom, Israel multiplies. The language is deliberate — fruitful and multiplied greatly are the words of Genesis 1, the blessing of creation. God’s people are living out the creation mandate in the middle of the worst famine in history. And they do it in seventeen years. Seventeen is the number of years Joseph was with Jacob before he was sold. Jacob lost seventeen years of Joseph’s presence to grief; he gains seventeen years of his son’s presence back before he dies. The symmetry is the narrator’s way of saying: God was keeping count.
“But the people of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them.”
“Do not bury me in Egypt.”
When the time drew near that Israel must die, he called his son Joseph and said to him, “If now I have found favor in your sight, put your hand under my thigh and promise to deal kindly and truly with me. Do not bury me in Egypt, but let me lie with my fathers. Carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burying place.” He answered, “I will do as you have said.” And he said, “Swear to me.” And he swore to him. Then Israel bowed himself upon the head of his bed.
The hand under the thigh is the most solemn oath gesture in the ancient world — the same gesture Abraham used when sending his servant to find Isaac’s wife (Genesis 24:2). Jacob is not simply expressing a preference about where to be buried. He is making a theological statement: Egypt is not home. The land of Canaan is the address of God’s promise. Even in death, Jacob is refusing to let Egypt have the last word. When Joseph swears and Jacob bows his head upon the bed, it is an old man’s act of faith: the land is still there, and I will lie in it.
“By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones.”
Jacob is standing before the throne of Egypt. He has survived famine, the loss of his wife, the assumed death of his son. He could say anything. He says: my years have been few and evil. It is not despair — it is honesty. The man with the promise has had a harder life than the man with the palace. But the promise is still operative. The oath Jacob extracts from Joseph is not the act of a man who has lost his faith. It is the act of a man who still believes in the land, who refuses to be buried outside of it, who will not let his bones lie in Egypt even when all the rest of him has had to.
The sojourner’s confession.
Genesis 47 ends with an oath sworn by a dying man who still believes in a land he has not stood on in seventeen years. Jacob knows he will not leave Egypt alive. But he refuses to leave it dead, in the ground of a foreign country. The oath he makes Joseph swear — hand under the thigh, the oldest covenant gesture in the book — is his last act of resistance against Egypt’s power to claim him permanently.
Meanwhile, Israel is fruitful in Goshen, multiplying greatly. The contrast with Egypt’s impoverishment is the narrator’s quiet argument: the people who have the promise have something Pharaoh’s grain cannot buy. They are not conformed to the land around them. They are living by a different logic. Jacob’s insistence on being buried in Canaan is the visible sign of a deeper conviction: this is not our home. We are passing through.
“Do not bury me in Egypt, but let me lie with my fathers.”Genesis 47:29–30 ESV
All scripture quoted from the English Standard Version (ESV). A study from The Lampstand Project.