Discovery BoxGenesis 41:29-31 
Context41:29 Seven years of great abundance are coming throughout the whole land of Egypt. 41:30 But seven years of famine will occur 1 after them, and all the abundance will be forgotten in the land of Egypt. The famine will devastate 2 the land. 41:31 The previous abundance of the land will not be remembered 3 because of the famine that follows, for the famine will be very severe. 4
Genesis 41:54
Context41:54 Then the seven years of famine began, 5 just as Joseph had predicted. There was famine in all the other lands, but throughout the land of Egypt there was food.
Genesis 41:56
Context41:56 While the famine was over all the earth, 6 Joseph opened the storehouses 7 and sold grain to the Egyptians. The famine was severe throughout the land of Egypt.
1 tn The perfect with the vav consecutive continues the time frame of the preceding participle, which has an imminent future nuance here.
2 tn The Hebrew verb כָּלָה (kalah) in the Piel stem means “to finish, to destroy, to bring an end to.” The severity of the famine will ruin the land of Egypt.
3 tn Heb “known.”
4 tn Or “heavy.”
5 tn Heb “began to arrive.”
6 tn Or “over the entire land”; Heb “over all the face of the earth.” The disjunctive clause is circumstantial-temporal to the next clause.
7 tc The MT reads “he opened all that was in [or “among”] them.” The translation follows the reading of the LXX and Syriac versions.
