Genesis 41: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Pharaoh has two dreams that none of his magicians or wise men can interpret, and the chief cupbearer remembers Joseph, who is brought out of the dungeon. Joseph says God will give Pharaoh an answer, and tells him the dreams mean seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine; he advises Pharaoh to appoint a wise man and store up a fifth of the harvest. Pharaoh puts Joseph over all Egypt, gives him a new name and a wife, and Joseph stores grain through the plentiful years. When the famine comes, Egypt has food, and people from every country come to Joseph to buy grain.

Claim by Claim

1. 41:1
   • Two full years came to an end.
   • Pharaoh dreamed.
   • In the dream Pharaoh was standing by the Nile.
2. 41:2
   • Seven cows came up out of the Nile.
   • The seven cows were beautiful in appearance.
   • The seven cows were fat of flesh.
   • The seven cows grazed in the reed grass.
3. 41:3
   • Seven other cows came up out of the Nile after them.
   • These seven cows were ugly in appearance.
   • These seven cows were thin of flesh.
   • These seven cows stood beside the first cows on the bank of the Nile.
4. 41:4
   • The ugly, thin-fleshed cows ate up the seven beautiful, fat cows.
   • Pharaoh woke up.
5. 41:5
   • Pharaoh slept again.
   • Pharaoh dreamed a second time.
   • Seven heads of grain came up on one stalk.
   • The seven heads of grain were plump and good.
6. 41:6
   • Seven other heads of grain sprouted up after them.
   • These seven heads of grain were thin.
   • These seven heads of grain were scorched by the east wind.
7. 41:7
   • The thin heads of grain swallowed the seven plump and full heads of grain.
   • Pharaoh woke up.
   • It was a dream.
8. 41:8
   • In the morning Pharaoh's spirit was troubled.
   • Pharaoh sent and summoned all the magicians of Egypt.
   • Pharaoh summoned all the wise men of Egypt.
   • Pharaoh told them his dream.
   • No one could interpret the dreams for Pharaoh.
9. 41:9
   • The chief cupbearer spoke to Pharaoh.
   • The chief cupbearer said he was calling his own offenses to mind that day.
10. 41:10
    • The cupbearer said Pharaoh had been angry with his servants.
    • The cupbearer said Pharaoh put him in custody in the house of the captain of the guard.
    • The cupbearer said the chief baker was put in custody with him.
11. 41:11
    • The cupbearer said he and the other man dreamed a dream on one night.
    • The cupbearer said each of them dreamed according to the interpretation belonging to his own dream.
12. 41:12
    • The cupbearer said a Hebrew young man was there with them.
    • The cupbearer said the young man was a servant of the captain of the guard.
    • The cupbearer said they told him their dreams.
    • The cupbearer said he interpreted their dreams for them.
    • The cupbearer said he interpreted to each man according to his own dream.
13. 41:13
    • The cupbearer said it happened just as the young man had interpreted to them.
    • The cupbearer said he himself was restored to his office.
    • The cupbearer said the other man was hanged.
14. 41:14
    • Pharaoh sent and summoned Joseph.
    • They hurried Joseph out of the pit.
    • Joseph shaved.
    • Joseph changed his clothes.
    • Joseph came in to Pharaoh.
15. 41:15
    • Pharaoh said to Joseph that he had dreamed a dream.
    • Pharaoh said there was no one to interpret it.
    • Pharaoh said he had heard it said of Joseph that when Joseph hears a dream he can interpret it.
16. 41:16
    • Joseph answered Pharaoh.
    • Joseph said the interpreting was not in himself.
    • Joseph said God would give Pharaoh an answer of welfare.
17. 41:17
    • Pharaoh spoke to Joseph.
    • Pharaoh said that in his dream he was standing on the bank of the Nile.
18. 41:18
    • Pharaoh said seven cows came up out of the Nile.
    • Pharaoh said the cows were fat of flesh.
    • Pharaoh said the cows were beautiful in form.
    • Pharaoh said the cows grazed in the reed grass.
19. 41:19
    • Pharaoh said seven other cows came up after them.
    • Pharaoh said these cows were poor and very ugly in form.
    • Pharaoh said these cows were thin of flesh.
    • Pharaoh said he had never seen any so bad in all the land of Egypt.
20. 41:20
    • Pharaoh said the thin and ugly cows ate the first seven fat cows.
21. 41:21
    • Pharaoh said the thin cows went into their bellies.
    • Pharaoh said it could not be known that they had gone into their bellies.
    • Pharaoh said their appearance was as bad as at the beginning.
    • Pharaoh said he woke up.
22. 41:22
    • Pharaoh said he saw in his dream seven heads of grain coming up on one stalk.
    • Pharaoh said those heads of grain were full and good.
23. 41:23
    • Pharaoh said seven other heads of grain sprouted up after them.
    • Pharaoh said these heads of grain were shriveled and thin.
    • Pharaoh said these heads of grain were scorched by the east wind.
24. 41:24
    • Pharaoh said the thin heads of grain swallowed the seven good heads of grain.
    • Pharaoh said he told this to the magicians.
    • Pharaoh said no one could declare it to him.
25. 41:25
    • Joseph said to Pharaoh that Pharaoh's dream is one dream.
    • Joseph said God had told Pharaoh what he is about to do.
26. 41:26
    • Joseph said the seven good cows are seven years.
    • Joseph said the seven good heads of grain are seven years.
    • Joseph said the dream is one dream.
27. 41:27
    • Joseph said the seven thin and ugly cows that came up after them are seven years.
    • Joseph said the seven empty heads of grain scorched by the east wind will be seven years of famine.
28. 41:28
    • Joseph said this is the thing he had spoken to Pharaoh.
    • Joseph said God has shown Pharaoh what he is about to do.
29. 41:29
    • Joseph said seven years of great plenty are coming throughout all the land of Egypt.
30. 41:30
    • Joseph said seven years of famine will arise after them.
    • Joseph said all the plenty will be forgotten in the land of Egypt.
    • Joseph said the famine will consume the land.
31. 41:31
    • Joseph said the plenty will not be known in the land because of the famine that follows.
    • Joseph said that famine will be very severe.
32. 41:32
    • Joseph said the dream was repeated to Pharaoh twice.
    • Joseph said the repetition means the matter is fixed by God.
    • Joseph said God will do it soon.
33. 41:33
    • Joseph said Pharaoh should now look for a discerning and wise man.
    • Joseph said Pharaoh should set that man over the land of Egypt.
34. 41:34
    • Joseph said Pharaoh should act.
    • Joseph said Pharaoh should appoint overseers over the land.
    • Joseph said Pharaoh should take a fifth of the land of Egypt during the seven years of plenty.
35. 41:35
    • Joseph said they should gather all the food of the coming good years.
    • Joseph said they should heap up grain under Pharaoh's authority.
    • Joseph said the food should be kept in the cities.
    • Joseph said they should guard it.
36. 41:36
    • Joseph said the food will be a reserve for the land for the seven years of famine.
    • Joseph said the seven years of famine will be in the land of Egypt.
    • Joseph said the land will not be cut off by the famine.
37. 41:37
    • The proposal was good in Pharaoh's eyes.
    • The proposal was good in the eyes of all Pharaoh's servants.
38. 41:38
    • Pharaoh spoke to his servants.
    • Pharaoh asked whether they could find such a man as this, a man in whom the spirit of God is.
39. 41:39
    • Pharaoh said to Joseph that God had made all this known to Joseph.
    • Pharaoh said there is no one as discerning and wise as Joseph.
40. 41:40
    • Pharaoh said Joseph would be over his house.
    • Pharaoh said all his people would submit to Joseph's command; the Hebrew verb is uncertain and may mean they would do homage at his word.
    • Pharaoh said only in the throne would he be greater than Joseph.
41. 41:41
    • Pharaoh said to Joseph that he had set Joseph over all the land of Egypt.
42. 41:42
    • Pharaoh took off his signet ring from his hand.
    • Pharaoh put the ring on Joseph's hand.
    • Pharaoh clothed Joseph in garments of fine linen.
    • Pharaoh put a gold chain around Joseph's neck.
43. 41:43
    • Pharaoh had Joseph ride in his second chariot.
    • They called out before Joseph a cry of homage, whose meaning is uncertain and is rendered 'bow the knee'.
    • Pharaoh set Joseph over all the land of Egypt.
44. 41:44
    • Pharaoh said to Joseph, I am Pharaoh.
    • Pharaoh said that without Joseph no man would lift his hand or his foot in all the land of Egypt.
45. 41:45
    • Pharaoh named Joseph Zaphnath-paaneah.
    • Pharaoh gave Joseph Asenath as a wife.
    • Asenath was the daughter of Potipherah.
    • Potipherah was priest of On.
    • Joseph went out over the land of Egypt.
46. 41:46
    • Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt.
    • Joseph went out from Pharaoh's presence.
    • Joseph passed through all the land of Egypt.
47. 41:47
    • During the seven years of plenty the land produced abundantly, by handfuls.
48. 41:48
    • Joseph gathered all the food of the seven years that were in the land of Egypt.
    • Joseph put the food in the cities.
    • Joseph put the food of the fields surrounding each city inside that city.
49. 41:49
    • Joseph heaped up grain like the sand of the sea, very much.
    • Joseph stopped counting the grain.
    • The grain was beyond number.
50. 41:50
    • Two sons were born to Joseph before the year of famine came.
    • Asenath daughter of Potipherah, priest of On, bore them to Joseph.
51. 41:51
    • Joseph named the firstborn Manasseh.
    • Joseph said God had made him forget all his toil.
    • Joseph said God had made him forget all his father's house.
52. 41:52
    • Joseph named the second son Ephraim.
    • Joseph said God had made him fruitful in the land of his affliction.
53. 41:53
    • The seven years of plenty that were in the land of Egypt came to an end.
54. 41:54
    • The seven years of famine began to come.
    • The famine came just as Joseph had said.
    • There was famine in all the lands.
    • In all the land of Egypt there was bread.
55. 41:55
    • All the land of Egypt became hungry.
    • The people cried out to Pharaoh for bread.
    • Pharaoh told all Egypt to go to Joseph.
    • Pharaoh told them to do whatever Joseph said to them.
56. 41:56
    • The famine was over all the face of the land.
    • Joseph opened all the storehouses.
    • Joseph sold grain to the Egyptians.
    • The famine grew severe in the land of Egypt.
57. 41:57
    • All the earth came to Egypt to Joseph to buy grain.
    • The famine was severe in all the earth.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

41:1

The two years are counted from the events of the previous chapter, where Joseph interpreted the cupbearer's dream and asked to be remembered, and was forgotten. "The river" throughout this chapter is the Nile, Egypt's single source of water and the thing on which every harvest depended; a dream set on its bank was already a dream about the food supply.

41:2

Cattle wading in the Nile shallows to graze and escape insects was an everyday Egyptian sight. The word behind "meadow" is an Egyptian loanword for the reedy marsh grass along the river's edge.

41:5

"Corn" in the King James Version means grain of any kind, here Egyptian wheat or barley, not maize, which Europeans had not yet met when the translation was made. It carries this general sense everywhere it appears in this chapter.

41:6

The east wind is the khamsin, a scorching wind off the desert that can shrivel a standing crop in a day. It was the standard image for ruined grain.

41:8

Egypt's "magicians" were not stage conjurers but a recognized professional class of temple scholars, the word behind it suggests engravers or keepers of sacred writing. Interpreting dreams and omens was part of their training, and Egyptian dream manuals listing images and their meanings have survived. The point of the verse is that the accredited experts failed.

41:9

The cupbearer ("butler" in the King James) tasted and served the king's wine. Because the job guarded the king against poison it went to a trusted intimate, and such men often became powerful court figures with the king's ear, which is why his word carries weight here.

41:10

"Wroth" means angry. "In ward" means in custody. Officials of rank were held in the household of the captain of the guard rather than in a common prison.

41:12

"Hebrew" is the label outsiders used for Joseph's people rather than the name they used for themselves. In an Egyptian court it marked him as a foreigner of no standing, which is part of what makes the cupbearer's recommendation surprising.

41:13

The Hebrew verb covers hanging, but more likely impaling or hanging the body on a pole or stake after execution, a public display, standard practice in the ancient Near East.

41:14

"Dungeon" is literally "the pit," the same word used for the cistern his brothers threw him into. The shaving matters: Egyptians shaved their faces and heads and regarded beards as barbarian, so a Semite entering the royal presence had to be made to look presentable by Egyptian standards.

41:16

"An answer of peace" translates the Hebrew shalom, which means well-being and wholeness more than the absence of conflict. Joseph is promising an answer that will settle the matter and do Pharaoh good, not necessarily good news.

41:27

A famine is a long stretch when the crops fail and there is not enough food anywhere. With no trucks, no ships full of cargo, and no way to keep food cold, a region could not simply order more from somewhere else.

41:32

In the ancient world a dream that repeated itself in two forms was read as confirmed and imminent, not merely as one dream told twice. Joseph is explaining the doubling as part of the message.

41:33

"Discreet" in the King James means discerning and perceptive, able to size a situation up. It does not mean tight-lipped or tactful, the sense the word has taken on since.

41:34

A fifth is twenty percent. Egypt already levied a tax on harvests, usually reckoned at around a tenth, so this is a doubling of the normal state claim on grain, imposed only during the good years.

41:35

"Under the hand of Pharaoh" means under his authority. Hand standing for power or control is standard Hebrew idiom.

41:38

The phrase can be read either as "the Spirit of God" or, on the lips of an Egyptian king, as "a spirit of the gods", the Hebrew word for God is plural in form and the sentence does not settle which is meant. Pharaoh is recognizing that some divine power is at work in Joseph.

41:40

The Hebrew of the middle clause is difficult: the verb usually means "kiss" and is variously understood as the people ordering themselves, submitting, or paying homage at Joseph's command. The overall sense, that Joseph's word governs everyone below the throne, is not in doubt.

41:42

The ring is a signet: its engraved face pressed into clay or wax stamped a document with the king's own authority. Handing it over is the legal transfer of power, not a gift of jewelry. Fine linen was the dress of the Egyptian official class, and a heavy gold collar was the standard royal award for high service, Egyptian tomb paintings show the ceremony.

41:43

"Bow the knee" translates the Hebrew abrek, a word that appears nowhere else and whose meaning is genuinely unknown. It has been explained as a Hebrew command to kneel, as an Egyptian or Akkadian title of respect, and as a herald's cry to clear the way. Translators pick one; the original is uncertain.

41:44

"Lift up his hand or foot" is an idiom for taking any action at all. Pharaoh is saying nothing happens in Egypt without Joseph's authorization.

41:45

Zaphnath-paaneah is an Egyptian name whose exact form is disputed; the most common reconstruction means something like "the god speaks and he lives." Renaming a man was the mark of a new master or a new office, and marks Joseph's absorption into the Egyptian establishment. On is Heliopolis, the great center of the sun god's worship, and its chief priest stood among the most powerful men in Egypt, so this is a marriage into the top of Egyptian society.

41:46

Joseph was seventeen when his brothers sold him, so thirteen years have passed. "Stood before Pharaoh" is a set phrase for entering royal service, not simply for being in the room.

41:47

"By handfuls" renders the Hebrew literally: the land produced grain in gathered heaps, more than could be dealt with in the usual way.

41:49

"Like the sand of the sea" was a common way of saying "more than anyone could ever count." It is a picture, not a measurement.

41:51

Manasseh sounds like the Hebrew verb "to make forget." Hebrew names in these narratives are usually given for the way they echo a word in the parent's explanation, not as translations of it.

41:52

Ephraim echoes the Hebrew word for being fruitful. "The land of my affliction" is Egypt, the same country that has now made him rich.

41:54

"Dearth" in the King James simply means famine; the two words translate the same Hebrew term and are used interchangeably here.

41:55

"Bread" translates a Hebrew word that commonly means food in general, not only baked loaves. The people are crying out for something to eat.

41:56

"Waxed sore" means grew severe. In the King James, wax means grow or become, and sore means harsh or grievous. Note also that Joseph sells the stored grain rather than giving it away; what follows in later chapters depends on this.

41:57

Coins had not been invented yet. To buy grain, people paid with weighed pieces of silver or traded animals, goods, or land.