1Then Joseph threw himself upon his father, weeping and kissing his face. 2He ordered the physicians in his service to embalm his father Israel, and they did so, 3finishing the task in forty days, which was the usual time for embalming. The Egyptians mourned him for seventy days; 4and then, when the days of mourning for Israel were over, Joseph approached members of Pharaoh's household and said, 'If I can count on your goodwill, then speak for me to Pharaoh; tell him that 5my father made me take an oath, saying, "I am dying. Bury me in the grave that I bought for myself in Canaan." Ask him to let me go up and bury my father, and afterwards I will return.' 6Pharaoh answered, 'Go and bury your father, as he has made you swear to do.' 7So Joseph went to bury his father, accompanied by all Pharaoh's courtiers, the elders of his household, and all the elders of Egypt, 8together with all Joseph's own household, his brothers, and his father's household; only their dependants, with the flocks and herds, were left in Goshen. 9He took with him chariots and horsemen ; they were a very great company. 10When they came to the threshing-floor of Atad beside the river Jordan, they raised a loud and bitter lament; and there Joseph observed seven days' mourning for his father. 11When the Canaanites who lived there saw this mourning at the threshing-floor of Atad, they said, 'How bitterly the Egyptians are mourning!'; accordingly they named the place beside the Jordan Abel-mizraim .
12Thus Jacob's sons did what he had told them to do. 13They took him to Canaan and buried him in the cave on the plot of land at Machpelah, the land which Abraham had bought as a burial-place from Ephron the Hittite, to the east of Mamre. 14Then, after he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone up with him.
15When their father was dead Joseph's brothers were afraid and said, 'What if Joseph should bear a grudge against us and pay us out for all the harm that we did to him?' 16They therefore approached Joseph with these words: 'In his last words to us before he died, your father gave us 17this message for you: "I ask you to forgive your brothers' crime and wickedness; I know they did you harm." So now forgive our crime, we beg; for we are servants of your father's God.' When they said this to him, Joseph wept. 18His brothers also wept and prostrated themselves before him; they said, 'You see, we are your slaves.' 19But Joseph said to them, 'Do not be afraid. Am I in the place of God? 20You meant to do me harm; but God meant to bring good out of it by preserving the lives of many people, as we see today. 21Do not be afraid. I will provide for you and your dependants.' Thus he comforted them and set their minds at rest.
22Joseph remained in Egypt, he and his father's household. He lived there to be a hundred and ten years old 23and saw Ephraim's children to the third generation; he also recognized as his the children of Manasseh's son Machir. 24He said to his brothers, 'I am dying; but God will not fail to come to your aid and take you from here to the land which he promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.' 25He made the sons of Israel take an oath, saying, 'When God thus comes to your aid, you must take my bones with you from here.' 26So Joseph died at the age of a hundred and ten. He was embalmed and laid in a coffin in Egypt.
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