Joseph – PB

Joseph

JosephJoseph was the first son of the patriarch Jacob and his wife Rachel.
She named him Joseph, meaning, “The Lord shall add to me another son” (Gen 30:24).

Joseph was the full brother of Benjamin and his half-brothers were Judah, Issachar, Reuben, Levi, Simeon, and Zebulun, the sons of Leah, Jacob’s first wife and Rachel’s older sister (both sisters were both alive and both married to Jacob).  Gad and Asher were sons of Zilpah (Leah’s handmaid) and Dan and Naphtali were the sons of Bilhah (Rachel’s handmaid). His one half-sister, Dinah was the daughter of Leah (Gen 30:1-23).

After the birth of Joseph Jacob returned with his family to the land of Canaan and Rachel died there giving birth to her son Benjamin.

Jacob loved Joseph more than any of his other sons and when the boy became 17 years old he gave him a beautiful coat of many colors which made his brother’s jealous and envious and they hated Joseph (Gen 37:3-4).  One day while all of Joseph’s brothers, except Benjamin, were out taking care of the sheep Jacob sent Joseph to make sure all was well (Gen 37:14).

Joseph’s brothers despised him not only because Jacob loved him more, but also because he had told them of two dreams he had where they would all basically bow down to him (Gen 37:-7 & 9).  When they saw him coming they began to plot against him and when he arrived they threw him into a pit and then sold him to slave drivers.

Joseph had a most horrible and exciting life in Egypt as a slave, but no matter what happened he had a tremendous amount of faith in God (Gen 41:14-16) and he went from slave to prisoner to the second in command of all of Egypt, he answered only to Pharaoh.

The story of Joseph is told in Genesis, chapter 37 to 50.

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