Their hearts sank, and trembling, they turned to one another and said, “What is this that God has done to us?”
29 When they reached their father Jacob in the land of Canaan, they described to him all that had happened to them: 30 “The man who is lord of the land spoke harshly to us and accused us of spying on the country.
31 But we told him, ‘We are honest men, not spies. 32 We are twelve brothers, sons of one father. One is no more, and the youngest is now with our father in the land of Canaan.’
33 Then the man who is lord of the land said to us, ‘This is how I will know whether you are honest: Leave one brother with me, take food to relieve the hunger of your households, and go. 34 But bring your youngest brother back to me so I will know that you are not spies but honest men. Then I will give your brother back to you, and you can trade in the land.’”
35 As they began emptying their sacks, there in each man’s sack was his bag of silver! And when they and their father saw the bags of silver, they were dismayed.
36 Their father Jacob said to them, “You have deprived me of my sons. Joseph is gone and Simeon is no more. Now you want to take Benjamin. Everything is going against me!”
37 Then Reuben said to his father, “You may kill my two sons if I fail to bring him back to you. Put him in my care, and I will return him.”
38 But Jacob replied, “My son will not go down there with you, for his brother is dead, and he alone is left. If any harm comes to him on your journey, you will bring my gray hair down to Sheol in sorrow.”
The Return to Egypt with Benjamin
43 Now the famine was still severe in the land. 2 So when Jacob’s sons had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us a little more food.”
3 But Judah replied, “The man solemnly warned us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’ 4 If you will send our brother with us, we will go down and buy food for you. 5 But if you will not send him, we will not go; for the man told us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’”
6 “Why did you bring this trouble upon me?” Israel asked. “Why did you tell the man you had another brother?”
7 They replied, “The man questioned us in detail about ourselves and our family: ‘Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?’ And we answered him accordingly. How could we possibly know that he would say, ‘Bring your brother here’?”
8 And Judah said to his father Israel, “Send the boy with me, and we will go at once, so that we may live and not die—neither we, nor you, nor our children. 9 I will guarantee his safety. You may hold me personally responsible. If I do not bring him back and set him before you, then may I bear the guilt before you all my life. 10 If we had not delayed, we could have come and gone twice by now.”
11 Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: Put some of the best products of the land in your packs and carry them down as a gift for the man—a little balm and a little honey, spices and myrrh, pistachios and almonds. 12 Take double the silver with you so that you may return the silver that
