Chronological Plan

¹Then God said to Jacob, “Get ready and move to Bethel and settle there. Build an altar there to the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother, Esau.”

²So Jacob told everyone in his household, “Get rid of all your pagan idols, purify yourselves, and put on clean clothing.

³We are now going to Bethel, where I will build an altar to the God who answered my prayers when I was in distress. He has been with me wherever I have gone.”

⁴So they gave Jacob all their pagan idols and earrings, and he buried them under the great tree near Shechem.

⁵As they set out, a terror from God spread over the people in all the towns of that area, so no one attacked Jacob’s family.

⁶Eventually, Jacob and his household arrived at Luz (also called Bethel) in Canaan.

⁷Jacob built an altar there and named the place El-bethel (which means “God of Bethel”), because God had appeared to him there when he was fleeing from his brother, Esau.

⁸Soon after this, Rebekah’s old nurse, Deborah, died. She was buried beneath the oak tree in the valley below Bethel. Ever since, the tree has been called Allon-bacuth (which means “oak of weeping”).

⁹Now that Jacob had returned from Paddan-aram, God appeared to him again at Bethel. God blessed him,

¹⁰saying, “Your name is Jacob, but you will not be called Jacob any longer. From now on your name will be Israel.” So God renamed him Israel.

¹¹Then God said, “I am El-Shaddai — ‘God Almighty.’ Be fruitful and multiply. You will become a great nation, even many nations. Kings will be among your descendants!

¹²And I will give you the land I once gave to Abraham and Isaac. Yes, I will give it to you and your descendants after you.”

¹³Then God went up from the place where he had spoken to Jacob.

¹⁴Jacob set up a stone pillar to mark the place where God had spoken to him. Then he poured wine over it as an offering to God and anointed the pillar with olive oil.

¹⁵And Jacob named the place Bethel (which means “house of God”), because God had spoken to him there.

¹⁶Leaving Bethel, Jacob and his clan moved on toward Ephrath. But Rachel went into labor while they were still some distance away. Her labor pains were intense.

¹⁷After a very hard delivery, the midwife finally exclaimed, “Don’t be afraid — you have another son!”

¹⁸Rachel was about to die, but with her last breath she named the baby Ben-oni (which means “son of my sorrow”). The baby’s father, however, called him Benjamin (which means “son of my right hand”).

¹⁹So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).

²⁰Jacob set up a stone monument over Rachel’s grave, and it can be seen there to this day.

²¹Then Jacob traveled on and camped beyond Migdal-eder.

²²While he was living there, Reuben had intercourse with Bilhah, his father’s concubine, and Jacob soon heard about it. These are the names of the twelve sons of Jacob:

²³The sons of Leah were Reuben (Jacob’s oldest son), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun.

²⁴The sons of Rachel were Joseph and Benjamin.

²⁵The sons of Bilhah, Rachel’s servant, were Dan and Naphtali.

²⁶The sons of Zilpah, Leah’s servant, were Gad and Asher. These are the names of the sons who were born to Jacob at Paddan-aram.

²⁷So Jacob returned to his father, Isaac, in Mamre, which is near Kiriath-arba (now called Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac had both lived as foreigners.

²⁸Isaac lived for 180 years.

²⁹Then he breathed his last and died at a ripe old age, joining his ancestors in death. And his sons, Esau and Jacob, buried him.

¹This is the account of the descendants of Esau (also known as Edom).

²Esau married two young women from Canaan: Adah, the daughter of Elon the Hittite; and Oholibamah, the daughter of Anah and granddaughter of Zibeon the Hivite.

³He also married his cousin Basemath, who was the daughter of Ishmael and the sister of Nebaioth.

⁴Adah gave birth to a son named Eliphaz for Esau. Basemath gave birth to a son named Reuel.

⁵Oholibamah gave birth to sons named Jeush, Jalam, and Korah. All these sons were born to Esau in the land of Canaan.

⁶Esau took his wives, his children, and his entire household, along with his livestock and cattle — all the wealth he had acquired in the land of Canaan — and moved away from his brother, Jacob.

⁷There was not enough land to support them both because of all the livestock and possessions they had acquired.

⁸So Esau (also known as Edom) settled in the hill country of Seir.

⁹This is the account of Esau’s descendants, the Edomites, who lived in the hill country of Seir.

¹⁰These are the names of Esau’s sons: Eliphaz, the son of Esau’s wife Adah; and Reuel, the son of Esau’s wife Basemath.

¹¹The descendants of Eliphaz were Teman, Omar, Zepho, Gatam, and Kenaz.

¹²Timna, the concubine of Esau’s son Eliphaz, gave birth to a son named Amalek. These are the descendants of Esau’s wife Adah.

¹³The descendants of Reuel were Nahath, Zerah, Shammah, and Mizzah. These are the descendants of Esau’s wife Basemath.

¹⁴Esau also had sons through Oholibamah, the daughter of Anah and granddaughter of Zibeon. Their names were Jeush, Jalam, and Korah.

¹⁵These are the descendants of Esau who became the leaders of various clans: The descendants of Esau’s oldest son, Eliphaz, became the leaders of the clans of Teman, Omar, Zepho, Kenaz,

¹⁶Korah, Gatam, and Amalek. These are the clan leaders in the land of Edom who descended from Eliphaz. All these were descendants of Esau’s wife Adah.

¹⁷The descendants of Esau’s son Reuel became the leaders of the clans of Nahath, Zerah, Shammah, and Mizzah. These are the clan leaders in the land of Edom who descended from Reuel. All these were descendants of Esau’s wife Basemath.

¹⁸The descendants of Esau and his wife Oholibamah became the leaders of the clans of Jeush, Jalam, and Korah. These are the clan leaders who descended from Esau’s wife Oholibamah, the daughter of Anah.

¹⁹These are the clans descended from Esau (also known as Edom), identified by their clan leaders.

²⁰These are the names of the tribes that descended from Seir the Horite. They lived in the land of Edom: Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah,

²¹Dishon, Ezer, and Dishan. These were the Horite clan leaders, the descendants of Seir, who lived in the land of Edom.

²²The descendants of Lotan were Hori and Hemam. Lotan’s sister was named Timna.

²³The descendants of Shobal were Alvan, Manahath, Ebal, Shepho, and Onam.

²⁴The descendants of Zibeon were Aiah and Anah. (This is the Anah who discovered the hot springs in the wilderness while he was grazing his father’s donkeys.)

²⁵The descendants of Anah were his son, Dishon, and his daughter, Oholibamah.

²⁶The descendants of Dishon were Hemdan, Eshban, Ithran, and Keran.

²⁷The descendants of Ezer were Bilhan, Zaavan, and Akan.

²⁸The descendants of Dishan were Uz and Aran.

²⁹So these were the leaders of the Horite clans: Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah,

³⁰Dishon, Ezer, and Dishan. The Horite clans are named after their clan leaders, who lived in the land of Seir.

³¹These are the kings who ruled in the land of Edom before any king ruled over the Israelites :

³²Bela son of Beor, who ruled in Edom from his city of Dinhabah.

³³When Bela died, Jobab son of Zerah from Bozrah became king in his place.

³⁴When Jobab died, Husham from the land of the Temanites became king in his place.

³⁵When Husham died, Hadad son of Bedad became king in his place and ruled from the city of Avith. He was the one who defeated the Midianites in the land of Moab.

³⁶When Hadad died, Samlah from the city of Masrekah became king in his place.

³⁷When Samlah died, Shaul from the city of Rehoboth-on-the-River became king in his place.

³⁸When Shaul died, Baal-hanan son of Acbor became king in his place.

³⁹When Baal-hanan son of Acbor died, Hadad became king in his place and ruled from the city of Pau. His wife was Mehetabel, the daughter of Matred and granddaughter of Me-zahab.

⁴⁰These are the names of the leaders of the clans descended from Esau, who lived in the places named for them: Timna, Alvah, Jetheth,

⁴¹Oholibamah, Elah, Pinon,

⁴²Kenaz, Teman, Mibzar,

⁴³Magdiel, and Iram. These are the leaders of the clans of Edom, listed according to their settlements in the land they occupied. They all descended from Esau, the ancestor of the Edomites.

¹So Jacob settled again in the land of Canaan, where his father had lived as a foreigner.

²This is the account of Jacob and his family. When Joseph was seventeen years old, he often tended his father’s flocks. He worked for his half brothers, the sons of his father’s wives Bilhah and Zilpah. But Joseph reported to his father some of the bad things his brothers were doing.

³Jacob loved Joseph more than any of his other children because Joseph had been born to him in his old age. So one day Jacob had a special gift made for Joseph — a beautiful robe.

⁴But his brothers hated Joseph because their father loved him more than the rest of them. They couldn’t say a kind word to him.

⁵One night Joseph had a dream, and when he told his brothers about it, they hated him more than ever.

⁶“Listen to this dream,” he said.

⁷“We were out in the field, tying up bundles of grain. Suddenly my bundle stood up, and your bundles all gathered around and bowed low before mine!”

⁸His brothers responded, “So you think you will be our king, do you? Do you actually think you will reign over us?” And they hated him all the more because of his dreams and the way he talked about them.

⁹Soon Joseph had another dream, and again he told his brothers about it. “Listen, I have had another dream,” he said. “The sun, moon, and eleven stars bowed low before me!”

¹⁰This time he told the dream to his father as well as to his brothers, but his father scolded him. “What kind of dream is that?” he asked. “Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow to the ground before you?”

¹¹But while his brothers were jealous of Joseph, his father wondered what the dreams meant.

¹²Soon after this, Joseph’s brothers went to pasture their father’s flocks at Shechem.

¹³When they had been gone for some time, Jacob said to Joseph, “Your brothers are pasturing the sheep at Shechem. Get ready, and I will send you to them.” “I’m ready to go,” Joseph replied.

¹⁴“Go and see how your brothers and the flocks are getting along,” Jacob said. “Then come back and bring me a report.” So Jacob sent him on his way, and Joseph traveled to Shechem from their home in the valley of Hebron.

¹⁵When he arrived there, a man from the area noticed him wandering around the countryside. “What are you looking for?” he asked.

¹⁶“I’m looking for my brothers,” Joseph replied. “Do you know where they are pasturing their sheep?”

¹⁷“Yes,” the man told him. “They have moved on from here, but I heard them say, ‘Let’s go on to Dothan.’” So Joseph followed his brothers to Dothan and found them there.

¹⁸When Joseph’s brothers saw him coming, they recognized him in the distance. As he approached, they made plans to kill him.

¹⁹“Here comes the dreamer!” they said.

²⁰“Come on, let’s kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns. We can tell our father, ‘A wild animal has eaten him.’ Then we’ll see what becomes of his dreams!”

²¹But when Reuben heard of their scheme, he came to Joseph’s rescue. “Let’s not kill him,” he said.

²²“Why should we shed any blood? Let’s just throw him into this empty cistern here in the wilderness. Then he’ll die without our laying a hand on him.” Reuben was secretly planning to rescue Joseph and return him to his father.

²³So when Joseph arrived, his brothers ripped off the beautiful robe he was wearing.

²⁴Then they grabbed him and threw him into the cistern. Now the cistern was empty; there was no water in it.

²⁵Then, just as they were sitting down to eat, they looked up and saw a caravan of camels in the distance coming toward them. It was a group of Ishmaelite traders taking a load of gum, balm, and aromatic resin from Gilead down to Egypt.

²⁶Judah said to his brothers, “What will we gain by killing our brother? We’d have to cover up the crime.

²⁷Instead of hurting him, let’s sell him to those Ishmaelite traders. After all, he is our brother — our own flesh and blood!” And his brothers agreed.

²⁸So when the Ishmaelites, who were Midianite traders, came by, Joseph’s brothers pulled him out of the cistern and sold him to them for twenty pieces of silver. And the traders took him to Egypt.

²⁹Some time later, Reuben returned to get Joseph out of the cistern. When he discovered that Joseph was missing, he tore his clothes in grief.

³⁰Then he went back to his brothers and lamented, “The boy is gone! What will I do now?”

³¹Then the brothers killed a young goat and dipped Joseph’s robe in its blood.

³²They sent the beautiful robe to their father with this message: “Look at what we found. Doesn’t this robe belong to your son?”

³³Their father recognized it immediately. “Yes,” he said, “it is my son’s robe. A wild animal must have eaten him. Joseph has clearly been torn to pieces!”

³⁴Then Jacob tore his clothes and dressed himself in burlap. He mourned deeply for his son for a long time.

³⁵His family all tried to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “I will go to my grave mourning for my son,” he would say, and then he would weep.

³⁶Meanwhile, the Midianite traders arrived in Egypt, where they sold Joseph to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. Potiphar was captain of the palace guard.