Genesis Chapter 50

¹ And Joseph fell upon his father’s face, and wept upon him, and kissed him.

Joseph truly loved his father, and losing him was grievous. He could have become bitter and angry with his brothers for taking all those years he could have had with his father away from him, but he wasn’t. Joseph trusted in the plans of God.

² And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father: and the physicians embalmed Israel.

Embalming in Egypt back then and what we call embalming today are very different processes. In Egypt, the bodies are processed so they become what we call mummies. It seems to me that doing this with Jacobs and later Josephs bodies allow them to travel with it to their burial place without the body decaying.

³ And forty days were fulfilled for him; for so are fulfilled the days of those which are embalmed: and the Egyptians mourned for him threescore and ten days.

Embalming back in Egypt took a long time…but there was also a time of mourning that Pharaoh decreed for Jacob. For 70 days, people in Egypt mourned Jacob. This was a great honor.

⁴ And when the days of his mourning were past, Joseph spake unto the house of Pharaoh, saying, If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh, saying,

⁵ My father made me swear, saying, Lo, I die: in my grave which I have digged for me in the land of Canaan, there shalt thou bury me. Now therefore let me go up, I pray thee, and bury my father, and I will come again.

In Genesis 23 the Word documents Abraham purchasing land in a place before Mamre in Hebron called the cave of Machpelah to bury his beloved wife Sarah. In Genesis 49:31 the Word states that Isaac and Rebekah are also buried there as well as Jacobs wife Leah.
Note: Reading this I was kind of shocked a bit that Rachel wasn’t buried there. I know she died during travel, but just as Josephs bones were relocated, I figured they would have done the same with Rachel. I wonder though if there was an order to who was buried with Jacob and that order indicated his first wife Leah. It’s certainly something to look into.

⁶ And Pharaoh said, Go up, and bury thy father, according as he made thee swear.

Pharaoh was very kind to Joseph…because God had given Joseph favor with him. I do remember the baker lost his head… so… Pharaoh was not a man to take lightly.

⁷ And Joseph went up to bury his father: and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt,

This was a massive funeral procession…with 2 different people taking part of it.

⁸ And all the house of Joseph, and his brethren, and his father’s house: only their little ones, and their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen.

⁹ And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen: and it was a very great company.

¹⁰ And they came to the threshingfloor of Atad, which is beyond Jordan, and there they mourned with a great and very sore lamentation: and he made a mourning for his father seven days.

¹¹ And when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning in the floor of Atad, they said, This is a grievous mourning to the Egyptians: wherefore the name of it was called Abelmizraim, which is beyond Jordan.

The mourning process was so profound to the people in Canaan they renamed the treshing floor of Atad to a new name meaning Abelmizrain (Meadow of Egypt).

¹² And his sons did unto him according as he commanded them:

¹³ For his sons carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought with the field for a possession of a buryingplace of Ephron the Hittite, before Mamre.

¹⁴ And Joseph returned into Egypt, he, and his brethren, and all that went up with him to bury his father, after he had buried his father.

¹⁵ And when Joseph’s brethren saw that their father was dead, they said, Joseph will peradventure hate us, and will certainly requite us all the evil which we did unto him.

This is what guilt does to a person… it keeps them waiting for their sins to catch up to them. Here they project an act of revenge coming for them from Joseph. I look back and see that when they sold Joseph, they were in charge, they had the power, and they used that power horribly and sold their brother to be a slave in Egypt. Then they had to watch their father grieve the loss of his beloved son for those years, knowing they are the reason their father was in such pain. Then Joseph ends up saving them, but he did so in such a way that he got them to bring his brother Benjamin to him and then his father. I’m thinking the brothers thought this was the only reason Joseph was tolerating them, for his father Jacob and Benjamin’s sake. They still had not wrapped their head around the forgiveness Joseph had for them or that Joseph realized in the depth of his soul that the whole thing was God moving on the behalf of his family to preserve them during a severe famine that was coming. The brothers were still living in the mindset of guilt, shame and fear. The power had shifted, Joseph was over them and they were afraid they would get what they deserved.

¹⁶ And they sent a messenger unto Joseph, saying, Thy father did command before he died, saying,

THE SENT A MESSENGER…the fear was thick with these guys.

¹⁷ So shall ye say unto Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of thy brethren, and their sin; for they did unto thee evil: and now, we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy father. And Joseph wept when they spake unto him.

¹⁸ And his brethren also went and fell down before his face; and they said, Behold, we be thy servants.

The brothers finally apologize for what they did.
Note: Maybe I’m being carnal here, but I think after everything that happened I would have cried too… because my brothers STILL didn’t understand that I had no malice and that all I ever wanted from them was their love….and here they are fearing I would get revenge as if I was a petty person. I’d be hurt they still saw me that way after everything I had done for them out of love. But that’s just me, Joseph understood and inspite of everything they did to him, he comforted them and turned their eyes towards God.

¹⁹ And Joseph said unto them, Fear not: for am I in the place of God?

“Relax my brothers, I’m not God, it’s not my place to pass judgment on you.”

²⁰ But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.

• Romans 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

²¹ Now therefore fear ye not: I will nourish you, and your little ones. And he comforted them, and spake kindly unto them.

• 1Peter 4:8  And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.

²² And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father’s house: and Joseph lived an hundred and ten years.

²³ And Joseph saw Ephraim’s children of the third generation: the children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were brought up upon Joseph’s knees.

²⁴ And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die: and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.

Even thought Joseph didn’t see the Exodus of the children of Israel with his own eyes, he still knew God was going to do it and he reminds his brothers before he dies.

²⁵ And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence.

Joseph made them promise to carry his bones out when they leave Egypt.

²⁶ So Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old: and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.

Joseph was also embalmed like Jacob. His bones were placed in a coffin awaiting the Exodus.