5040 verses about Family

The time came near that Israel must die, and he called his son Joseph, and said to him, “If now I have found favor in your sight, please put your hand under my thigh, and deal kindly and truly with me. Please don’t bury me in Egypt,

but when I sleep with my fathers, you shall carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying place.” He said, “I will do as you have said.”

He said, “Swear to me,” and he swore to him. Israel bowed himself on the bed’s head.

After these things, someone said to Joseph, “Behold, your father is sick.” He took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim.

Someone told Jacob, and said, “Behold, your son Joseph comes to you,” and Israel strengthened himself, and sat on the bed.

Jacob said to Joseph, “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and blessed me,

and said to me, ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful, and multiply you, and I will make of you a company of peoples, and will give this land to your offspring after you for an everlasting possession.’

Now your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you into Egypt, are mine; Ephraim and Manasseh, even as Reuben and Simeon, will be mine.

Your issue, whom you become the father of after them, will be yours. They will be called after the name of their brothers in their inheritance.

As for me, when I came from Paddan, Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan on the way, when there was still some distance to come to Ephrath, and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath (also called Bethlehem).”

Israel saw Joseph’s sons, and said, “Who are these?”

Joseph said to his father, “They are my sons, whom God has given me here.” He said, “Please bring them to me, and I will bless them.”

Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he couldn’t see. He brought them near to him; and he kissed them, and embraced them.

Israel said to Joseph, “I didn’t think I would see your face, and behold, God has let me see your offspring also.”

Joseph brought them out from between his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth.

Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel’s left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel’s right hand, and brought them near to him.

Israel stretched out his right hand, and laid it on Ephraim’s head, who was the younger, and his left hand on Manasseh’s head, guiding his hands knowingly, for Manasseh was the firstborn.

He blessed Joseph, and said, “The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has fed me all my life long to this day,

the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads, and let my name be named on them, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac. Let them grow into a multitude upon the earth.”

When Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him. He held up his father’s hand, to remove it from Ephraim’s head to Manasseh’s head.

Joseph said to his father, “Not so, my father; for this is the firstborn; put your right hand on his head.”

His father refused, and said, “I know, my son, I know. He also will become a people, and he also will be great. However, his younger brother will be greater than he, and his offspring will become a multitude of nations.”

He blessed them that day, saying, “In you will Israel bless, saying, ‘God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh’” He set Ephraim before Manasseh.

Israel said to Joseph, “Behold, I am dying, but God will be with you, and bring you again to the land of your fathers.

Moreover I have given to you one portion above your brothers, which I took out of the hand of the Amorite with my sword and with my bow.”

Jacob called to his sons, and said: “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which will happen to you in the days to come.

Assemble yourselves, and hear, you sons of Jacob. Listen to Israel, your father.

“Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength; excelling in dignity, and excelling in power.

Boiling over like water, you shall not excel; because you went up to your father’s bed, then defiled it. He went up to my couch.

“Simeon and Levi are brothers. Their swords are weapons of violence.

My soul, don’t come into their council. My glory, don’t be united to their assembly; for in their anger they killed men. In their self-will they hamstrung cattle.

Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel. I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.

“Judah, your brothers will praise you. Your hand will be on the neck of your enemies. Your father’s sons will bow down before you.

Judah is a lion’s cub. From the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down, he crouched as a lion, as a lioness. Who will rouse him up?

His eyes will be red with wine, his teeth white with milk.

“Zebulun will dwell at the haven of the sea. He will be for a haven of ships. His border will be on Sidon.

“Issachar is a strong donkey, lying down between the saddlebags.

“Naphtali is a doe set free, who bears beautiful fawns.

“Joseph is a fruitful vine, a fruitful vine by a spring. His branches run over the wall.

even by the God of your father, who will help you; by the Almighty, who will bless you, with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lies below, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb.

The blessings of your father have prevailed above the blessings of your ancestors, above the boundaries of the ancient hills. They will be on the head of Joseph, on the crown of the head of him who is separated from his brothers.

“Benjamin is a ravenous wolf. In the morning he will devour the prey. At evening he will divide the plunder.”

All these are the twelve tribes of Israel, and this is what their father spoke to them and blessed them. He blessed everyone according to his blessing.

He instructed them, and said to them, “I am to be gathered to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite,

in the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite as a burial place.

There they buried Abraham and Sarah, his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah, his wife, and there I buried Leah:

the field and the cave that is therein, which was purchased from the children of Heth.”

When Jacob finished charging his sons, he gathered up his feet into the bed, and yielded up the spirit, and was gathered to his people.

Joseph fell on his father’s face, wept on him, and kissed him.

Joseph commanded his servants, the physicians, to embalm his father; and the physicians embalmed Israel.

When the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the house of Pharaoh, saying, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying,

‘My father made me swear, saying, “Behold, I am dying. Bury me in my grave which I have dug for myself in the land of Canaan.” Now therefore, please let me go up and bury my father, and I will come again.’”

Pharaoh said, “Go up, and bury your father, just like he made you swear.”

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

All the house of Joseph, his brothers, and his father’s house. Only their little ones, their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen.

There went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company.

They came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, and there they lamented with a very great and severe lamentation. He mourned for his father seven days.

His sons did to him just as he commanded them,

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, as a possession for a burial site, from Ephron the Hittite, near Mamre.

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

When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “It may be that Joseph will hate us, and will fully pay us back for all the evil which we did to him.”

They sent a message to Joseph, saying, “Your father commanded before he died, saying,

His brothers also went and fell down before his face; and they said, “Behold, we are your servants.”

Now therefore don’t be afraid. I will nourish you and your little ones.” He comforted them, and spoke kindly to them.

Joseph lived in Egypt, he, and his father’s house. Joseph lived one hundred ten years.

Joseph saw Ephraim’s children to the third generation. The children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh, were born on Joseph’s knees.

Joseph took an oath from the children of Israel, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.”

Now these are the names of the sons of Israel, who came into Egypt (every man and his household came with Jacob):

Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah,

Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin,

Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher.

All the souls who came out of Jacob’s body were seventy souls, and Joseph was in Egypt already.

Joseph died, as did all his brothers, and all that generation.

The children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and grew exceedingly mighty; and the land was filled with them.

But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and the more they spread out. They were grieved because of the children of Israel.

The king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, of whom the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah,

and he said, “When you perform the duty of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birth stool; if it is a son, then you shall kill him; but if it is a daughter, then she shall live.”

The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women aren’t like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous, and give birth before the midwife comes to them.”

God dealt well with the midwives, and the people multiplied, and grew very mighty.

Because the midwives feared God, he gave them families.

A man of the house of Levi went and took a daughter of Levi as his wife.

The woman conceived, and bore a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him three months.

When she could no longer hide him, she took a papyrus basket for him, and coated it with tar and with pitch. She put the child in it, and laid it in the reeds by the river’s bank.

His sister stood far off, to see what would be done to him.

Pharaoh’s daughter came down to bathe at the river. Her maidens walked along by the riverside. She saw the basket among the reeds, and sent her servant to get it.

She opened it, and saw the child, and behold, the baby cried. She had compassion on him, and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.”

Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Should I go and call a nurse for you from the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for you?”

Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Go.” The young woman went and called the child’s mother.

Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child away, and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages.” The woman took the child, and nursed it.

The child grew, and she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, and said, “Because I drew him out of the water.”

In those days, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his brothers, and looked at their burdens. He saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his brothers.

Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock.

When they came to Reuel, their father, he said, “How is it that you have returned so early today?”

He said to his daughters, “Where is he? Why is it that you have left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread.”

Moses was content to dwell with the man. He gave Moses Zipporah, his daughter.

She bore a son, and he named him Gershom, for he said, “I have lived as a foreigner in a foreign land.”

God said moreover to Moses, “You shall tell the children of Israel this, ‘Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and this is my memorial to all generations.

But every woman shall ask of her neighbor, and of her who visits her house, jewels of silver, jewels of gold, and clothing; and you shall put them on your sons, and on your daughters. You shall plunder the Egyptians.”

Yahweh’s anger burned against Moses, and he said, “What about Aaron, your brother, the Levite? I know that he can speak well. Also, behold, he comes out to meet you. When he sees you, he will be glad in his heart.

Moses went and returned to Jethro his father-in-law, and said to him, “Please let me go and return to my brothers who are in Egypt, and see whether they are still alive.” Jethro said to Moses, “Go in peace.”