Genesis 41:56

41:56 While the famine was over all the earth, ¹  Joseph opened the storehouses ²  and sold grain to the Egyptians. The famine was severe throughout the land of Egypt.

Genesis 42:2

42:2 He then said, “Look, I hear that there is grain in Egypt. Go down there and buy grain for us ³  so that we may live ⁴  and not die.” ⁵ 

Genesis 42:6

42:6 Now Joseph was the ruler of the country, the one who sold grain to all the people of the country. ⁶  Joseph’s brothers came and bowed down ⁷  before him with ⁸  their faces to the ground.

Genesis 43:2

43:2 When they finished eating the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Return, buy us a little more food.”

[41:56]  ¹ tn Or “over the entire land”; Heb “over all the face of the earth.” The disjunctive clause is circumstantial-temporal to the next clause.

[41:56]  ² tc The MT reads “he opened all that was in [or “among”] them.” The translation follows the reading of the LXX and Syriac versions.

[42:2]  ³ tn Heb “and buy for us from there.” The word “grain,” the direct object of “buy,” has been supplied for clarity, and the words “from there” have been omitted in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[42:2]  ⁴ tn Following the imperatives, the prefixed verbal form with prefixed vav expresses purpose of result.

[42:2]  ⁵ tn The imperfect tense continues the nuance of the verb before it.

[42:6]  ⁵ tn The disjunctive clause either introduces a new episode in the unfolding drama or provides the reader with supplemental information necessary to understanding the story.

[42:6]  ⁶ sn Joseph’s brothers came and bowed down before him. Here is the beginning of the fulfillment of Joseph’s dreams (see Gen 37). But it is not the complete fulfillment, since all his brothers and his parents must come. The point of the dream, of course, was not simply to get the family to bow to Joseph, but that Joseph would be placed in a position of rule and authority to save the family and the world (41:57).

[42:6]  ⁷ tn The word “faces” is an adverbial accusative, so the preposition has been supplied in the translation.