The Book of Genesis 26 Verses

Genesis 50

Mourning and Burial for Jacob

Chapter 50 Overview · 26 Verses

1Then Joseph fell upon his father’s face, wept over him, and kissed him.

2And Joseph directed the physicians in his service to embalm his father Israel. So they embalmed him, 3taking the forty days required to complete the embalming. And the Egyptians mourned for him seventy days.

Genesis 50:1–3 Commentary

Egypt Mourns a Foreign Shepherd for Seventy Days:

Joseph falls upon his deceased father’s face, weeping and kissing him, then directs the royal physicians to embalm Jacob. The process required forty days, followed by seventy full days of official national mourning — an extraordinary display of imperial grief for a foreign Hebrew shepherd, testifying to Joseph’s immense stature and respect in Egypt.

4When the days of mourning had passed, Joseph said to Pharaoh’s court, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please tell Pharaoh, all of you, that 5my father made me swear an oath when he said, ‘I am about to die. You must bury me in the tomb that I dug for myself in the land of Canaan.’ Now let me go and bury my father, and then return.”

6Pharaoh replied, “Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear to do.”

7Then Joseph went to bury his father, and all the servants of Pharaoh accompanied him—the elders of Pharaoh’s household and all the elders of the land of Egypt— 8along with all of Joseph’s household, and his brothers, and his father’s household. Only their children and flocks and herds were left in Goshen.

9Chariots and horsemen alike went up with him, and it was an exceedingly large procession.

Genesis 50:5–9 Commentary

Pharaoh Sends an Honor Guard:

Joseph formally petitions Pharaoh for leave to honor the sacred oath sworn to Jacob, and Pharaoh grants it without hesitation. The funeral procession that rolls out of Egypt looks like a state procession for an imperial emperor: senior cabinet ministers, palace elders, royal courtiers, and a formidable cavalry escort flanking the sons of Israel all the way into Canaan.

10When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, which is across the Jordan, they lamented and wailed loudly, and Joseph mourned for his father seven days.

11When the Canaanites of the land saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a solemn ceremony of mourning by the Egyptians.” (Thus the place across the Jordan is called Abel-mizraim.)

Genesis 50:10–11 Commentary

Abel-mizraim — Pagan Witness to National Grief:

In Genesis 50:10–11⁠, Jacob's funeral cortege halts at the threshing floor of Atad, observing seven days of deep lamentation. The display was so massive that the Canaanite onlookers renamed the place Abel-mizraim (meaning "the mourning of Egypt"). Even pagan observers recognized that a patriarch of extraordinary spiritual stature had passed.

12So Jacob’s sons did as he had charged them. 13They carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave at Machpelah in the field near Mamre, which Abraham had purchased from Ephron the Hittite as a burial site.

Genesis 50:13 Commentary

Jacob Is Buried in the Promised Land, Not Egypt:

Jacob’s sons bear him into Canaan and entomb him precisely as charged: in the Cave of Machpelah, the family plot purchased outright by Abraham twenty-seven chapters earlier from Ephron the Hittite (Genesis 23:16–20)⁠. The patriarch who enjoyed royal Egyptian comfort during his twilight years refused to be buried there. He was entombed in the soil of covenant promise — a tangible testimony that Egypt was never their permanent home.

14After Joseph had buried his father, he returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone with him to bury his father.

Joseph Comforts His Brothers

15When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “What if Joseph bears a grudge? Then he will surely repay us for all the evil that we did to him.”

16So they sent word to Joseph, saying, “Before he died, your father commanded, 17‘This is what you are to say to Joseph: I beg you, please forgive the transgression and sin of your brothers, for they did you wrong.’ So now, Joseph, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” When their message came to him, Joseph wept. 18His brothers also came to him, bowed down before him, and said, “We are your servants!”

Genesis 50:15–18 Commentary

The Brothers Panic the Moment Their Father Is Gone:

The brothers plunge into sheer panic the moment Jacob is buried, terrified that Joseph had merely been biding his time until their father was gone to execute retribution for their past treachery. Desperate to protect themselves, they send word claiming their father had commanded Joseph before his death to forgive their transgression. It is highly likely the brothers fabricated this message out of guilty desperation, knowing Jacob had never mentioned such a command during his extensive deathbed charges in the preceding chapters. Yet it remains possible that Jacob did indeed privately urge them to seek formal reconciliation, even though the text never explicitly records the conversation. In either case, their lingering fear demonstrates how deeply guilt haunted their consciences decades after the crime.

Joseph’s Sheaves Dream Fulfilled Four Times:

The brothers throw themselves at Joseph’s feet, pleading, “Behold, we are your servants!” This marks the fourth and final fulfillment of Joseph’s boyhood vision of the bowing sheaves thirteen chapters earlier (Genesis 37:7⁠, previously fulfilled in Genesis 42:6, 43⁠:26, 44:14, and now here). The prophetic dream that originally provoked his brothers to murderous hatred was brought to complete, literal fulfillment across twenty-two years.

19But Joseph replied, “Do not be afraid, all of you. Am I in the place of God? 20As for all of you, what all of you intended against me for evil, God intended for good, in order to accomplish a day like this—to preserve the lives of many people.

21Therefore do not be afraid. I will provide for you and your little ones.” So Joseph reassured his brothers and spoke kindly to them.

Genesis 50:19–21 Commentary

God Overrules Human Wickedness for Good:

Joseph does not sanitize or excuse the wickedness done to him; kidnapping and enslaving a teenage brother remained heinous sins. Rather, he perceives how divine sovereignty overrules human malice without ever authoring it, transforming treachery, slavery, and unjust imprisonment into the preservation of the covenant family. Nearly two millennia later, the Apostle Paul would articulate that exact truth in Romans 8:28⁠: “And we know that all things work together for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose.” Joseph never abandoned that unshakeable conviction — not in the pit, not in Potiphar’s estate, and not in the royal dungeon.

Tests Designed for Repentance, Not Revenge:

Joseph comforts his trembling brothers with words of peace, promising to sustain them and their little ones. Every calculated pressure he applied earlier — the espionage accusation, the silver returned in sacks, the planted cup, Simeon bound in custody — now shines in true perspective. They were never acts of spiteful retaliation; they were divine diagnostic tests engineered to awaken conscience and produce genuine repentance. Once that repentance was manifest, mercy flowed without restraint.

22Now Joseph and his father’s household remained in Egypt, and Joseph lived to the age of 110.

23He saw Ephraim’s sons to the third generation, and indeed the sons of Machir son of Manasseh were brought up on Joseph’s knees.

Genesis 50:22–23 Commentary

Machir’s Line Conquers the Land of Rephaim:

Genesis 50:23 records that the children of Machir, son of Manasseh, were brought up on Joseph’s knees. Machir would become a mighty warrior line whose descendants, over four centuries later during the wilderness conquest, would conquer Gilead and Bashan (Numbers 32:39–40)⁠. As recorded over four centuries later in Deuteronomy 3:13 and Joshua 17:1⁠, Moses and Joshua would assign this northern territory to the half-tribe of Manasseh: all of Bashan, the ancient realm of giant King Og, explicitly designated “the land of the Rephaim.” Genesis thus concludes with the future conquerors of the giants’ mountain territory being cradled as infants in Joseph’s loving arms! The dark realm of Mount Hermon and Bashan — the epic battleground against the seed of the serpent introduced forty-four chapters earlier in Genesis 6 — was already being prophetically prepared for conquest by Joseph’s seed.

24Then Joseph said to his brothers: “I am about to die, but God will surely visit all of you and bring you all up from this land to the land He promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

Genesis 50:24 Commentary

The Covenant Stands Intact at Joseph’s Death:

Gathering his brethren on his deathbed, Joseph proclaims with unshakeable conviction: “I am dying; but God will surely visit you and bring you out of this land to the land of which He swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” The foundational covenant promises sworn centuries earlier to Abraham in Genesis 12:1–3⁠, 15:18–21, and 17:7–8 remained vibrant and unbroken.

25And Joseph made the sons of Israel take an oath and said: “God will surely attend to all of you, and then all of you must carry my bones up from this place.”

Genesis 50:25 Commentary

Moses Honors the Oath Centuries Later at Exodus:

Over three centuries later, Moses remembered the sacred trust and carried Joseph’s bones out of Egypt (Exodus 13:19)⁠. Nearly two millennia downstream, Hebrews 11 in the New Testament singles out this specific command as Joseph’s crowning act of faith: “By faith Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the exodus of the Israelites and gave instructions about his bones” (Hebrews 11:22)⁠. Without seeing the Exodus, he anchored his resurrection hope in the promised land.

Joseph Entombed at Shechem in Purchased Soil:

That sacred journey culminated nearly five centuries after Joseph's death, during the conquest under Joshua: as the book of Joshua will triumphantly record over four centuries later in Joshua 24:32⁠: “The bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought up out of Egypt, were buried at Shechem, in the plot of land that Jacob had bought from the sons of Hamor” (Genesis 33:19)⁠. That parcel was the very tract where Abram had built his first altar in the land thirty-eight chapters earlier (Genesis 12:6–7) and where Jacob had buried his household’s pagan idols fifteen chapters back (Genesis 35:4)⁠. Joseph’s burial completed a sacred generational circle: the bones of the beloved son finally rested in the covenant soil purchased by his father.

26So Joseph died at the age of 110. And they embalmed his body and placed it in a coffin in Egypt.

Genesis 50:26 Commentary

Genesis Ends With the Seed Still Coming:

Trace the royal promise from the garden to the coffin: In Genesis 3:15⁠, YAHWEH declared cosmic war over the Seed, decreeing that the Seed of the woman would crush the serpent’s head. When rebellious Sons of God crossed forbidden boundaries in Genesis 6, plunging the ancient world into dark supernatural rebellion, violence, and total corruption to derail that messianic promise, God cleansed the earth through a global Flood while preserving Noah’s blameless household. When human apostasy united at Babel, YAHWEH shattered the rebel nations and summoned Abraham, narrowing that eternal covenant to his bloodline in Genesis 12:3 and 22:18⁠—identified nearly two millennia later in Galatians 3:16 as the Messiah Himself. Through barren matriarchs, homicidal brothers, Egyptian slavery, and empire-wide famine, the powers of darkness repeatedly assaulted the chosen line — yet every weapon formed against the Seed failed. Then, on his deathbed just a chapter earlier in Genesis 49:10⁠, Jacob unveiled the royal crown over Judah, decreeing that the scepter and ruler’s staff would never depart until Shiloh comes — the rightful King to whom the allegiance of all nations belongs. The book closes not with the promise finished, but with the royal Seed protected, marching forward to the coming of Yeshua the Messiah, and His triumphant return!

Genesis 50 Footnotes

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1103 (Genesis 50:10–11): Genesis 50:10–11 — 10When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, which is across the Jordan, they lamented and wailed loudly, and Joseph mourned for his father seven days. 11When the Canaanites of the land saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a solemn ceremony of mourning by the Egyptians.” (Thus the place across the Jordan is called Abel-mizraim.)

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1104 (Genesis 23:16–20): Genesis 23:16–20 — 16Abraham agreed to Ephron’s terms and weighed out for him the price he had named in the hearing of the Hittites: four hundred shekels of silver, according to the standard of the merchants. 17So Ephron’s field at Machpelah near Mamre, the cave that was in it, and all the trees within the boundaries of the field were deeded over 18to Abraham’s possession in the presence of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of his city. 19After this, Abraham buried his wife Sarah in the cave of the field at Machpelah near Mamre (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan. 20So the field and its cave were deeded by the Hittites to Abraham as a burial site.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1105 (Genesis 37:7): Genesis 37:7 — We were binding sheaves of grain in the field, and suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around and bowed down to mine.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1106 (Genesis 42:6, 43): Genesis 42:6, 43 — 6Now Joseph was the ruler of the land; he was the one who sold grain to all its people. So when his brothers arrived, they bowed down before him with their faces to the ground.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1107 (Romans 8:28): Romans 8:28 — And we know that all things work together for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1108 (Genesis 50:23): Genesis 50:23 — He saw Ephraim’s sons to the third generation, and indeed the sons of Machir son of Manasseh were brought up on Joseph’s knees.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1109 (Numbers 32:39–40): Numbers 32:39–40 — 39The descendants of Machir son of Manasseh went to Gilead, captured it, and drove out the Amorites who were there. 40 So Moses gave Gilead to the clan of Machir son of Manasseh, and they settled there.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1110 (Deuteronomy 3:13): Deuteronomy 3:13 — To the half-tribe of Manasseh I gave the rest of Gilead and all of Bashan, the kingdom of Og. (The entire region of Argob, the whole territory of Bashan, used to be called the land of the Rephaim.)

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1111 (Joshua 17:1): Joshua 17:1 — Now this was the allotment for the tribe of Manasseh as Joseph’s firstborn son, namely for Machir the firstborn of Manasseh and father of the Gileadites, who had received Gilead and Bashan because Machir was a man of war.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1112 (Genesis 12:1–3): Genesis 12:1–3 — 1Then YAHWEH said to Abram: “Leave your country, your kindred, and your father’s household, and go to the land I will show you. 2I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you; and all the families of the earth will be blessed through you.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1113 (Exodus 13:19): Exodus 13:19 — Moses took the bones of Joseph with him because Joseph had made the sons of Israel swear a solemn oath when he said, “God will surely attend to you, and then you must carry my bones with you from this place.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1114 (Hebrews 11:22): Hebrews 11:22 — By faith Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the exodus of the Israelites and gave instructions about his bones.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1115 (Joshua 24:32): Joshua 24:32 — And the bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought up out of Egypt, were buried at Shechem in the plot of land that Jacob had purchased from the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for a hundred pieces of silver. So it became an inheritance for Joseph’s descendants.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1116 (Genesis 33:19): Genesis 33:19 — And the plot of ground where he pitched his tent, he purchased from the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for a hundred pieces of silver.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1117 (Genesis 12:6–7): Genesis 12:6–7 — 6Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the Oak of Moreh at Shechem. (At that time the Canaanites were in the land.) 7Then YAHWEH appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your offspring.” So Abram built an altar there to YAHWEH, who had appeared to him.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1118 (Genesis 35:4): Genesis 35:4 — So they gave Jacob all their foreign gods and all their earrings, and Jacob buried them under the oak near Shechem.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1119 (Genesis 3:15): Genesis 3:15 — And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed. He will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1120 (Genesis 12:3): Genesis 12:3 — I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you; and all the families of the earth will be blessed through you.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1121 (Genesis 22:18): Genesis 22:18 — And through your offspring all nations of the earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1122 (Galatians 3:16): Galatians 3:16 — The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his Seed. The Scripture does not say, “and to seeds,” meaning many, but “and to your Seed,” meaning One, who is Messiah.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1123 (Genesis 49:10): Genesis 49:10 — The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes, and the allegiance of the nations is His.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1594 (Genesis 50:1–3): Genesis 50:1–3 — 1Then Joseph fell upon his father’s face, wept over him, and kissed him. 2And Joseph directed the physicians in his service to embalm his father Israel. So they embalmed him, 3taking the forty days required to complete the embalming. And the Egyptians mourned for him seventy days.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1595 (Genesis 50:5–9): Genesis 50:5–9 — 5my father made me swear an oath when he said, ‘I am about to die. You must bury me in the tomb that I dug for myself in the land of Canaan.’ Now let me go and bury my father, and then return.” 6Pharaoh replied, “Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear to do.” 7Then Joseph went to bury his father, and all the servants of Pharaoh accompanied him—the elders of Pharaoh’s household and all the elders of the land of Egypt— 8along with all of Joseph’s household, and his brothers, and his father’s household. Only their children and flocks and herds were left in Goshen. 9Chariots and horsemen alike went up with him, and it was an exceedingly large procession.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1596 (Genesis 50:10–11): Genesis 50:10–11 — 10When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, which is across the Jordan, they lamented and wailed loudly, and Joseph mourned for his father seven days. 11When the Canaanites of the land saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a solemn ceremony of mourning by the Egyptians.” (Thus the place across the Jordan is called Abel-mizraim.)

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1597 (Genesis 50:13): Genesis 50:13 — They carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave at Machpelah in the field near Mamre, which Abraham had purchased from Ephron the Hittite as a burial site.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1598 (Genesis 50:15–18): Genesis 50:15–18 — 15When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “What if Joseph bears a grudge? Then he will surely repay us for all the evil that we did to him.” 16So they sent word to Joseph, saying, “Before he died, your father commanded, 17‘This is what you are to say to Joseph: I beg you, please forgive the transgression and sin of your brothers, for they did you wrong.’ So now, Joseph, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” When their message came to him, Joseph wept. 18His brothers also came to him, bowed down before him, and said, “We are your servants!”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1599 (Genesis 50:19–21): Genesis 50:19–21 — 19But Joseph replied, “Do not be afraid, all of you. Am I in the place of God? 20As for all of you, what all of you intended against me for evil, God intended for good, in order to accomplish a day like this—to preserve the lives of many people. 21Therefore do not be afraid. I will provide for you and your little ones.” So Joseph reassured his brothers and spoke kindly to them.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1600 (Genesis 50:22–23): Genesis 50:22–23 — 22Now Joseph and his father’s household remained in Egypt, and Joseph lived to the age of 110. 23He saw Ephraim’s sons to the third generation, and indeed the sons of Machir son of Manasseh were brought up on Joseph’s knees.

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1601 (Genesis 50:24): Genesis 50:24 — Then Joseph said to his brothers: “I am about to die, but God will surely visit all of you and bring you all up from this land to the land He promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1602 (Genesis 50:25): Genesis 50:25 — And Joseph made the sons of Israel take an oath and said: “God will surely attend to all of you, and then all of you must carry my bones up from this place.”

Genesis 50 · Footnote 1603 (Genesis 50:26): Genesis 50:26 — So Joseph died at the age of 110. And they embalmed his body and placed it in a coffin in Egypt.