Discovery BoxGenesis 41:34-35 
Context41:34 Pharaoh should do 1 this – he should appoint 2 officials 3 throughout the land to collect one-fifth of the produce of the land of Egypt 4 during the seven years of abundance. 41:35 They should gather all the excess food 5 during these good years that are coming. By Pharaoh’s authority 6 they should store up grain so the cities will have food, 7 and they should preserve it. 8
Genesis 41:48
Context41:48 Joseph 9 collected all the excess food 10 in the land of Egypt during the seven years and stored it in the cities. 11 In every city he put the food gathered from the fields around it.
1 tn The imperfect verbal form has an obligatory nuance here. The Samaritan Pentateuch has a jussive form here, “and let [Pharaoh] do.”
2 tn Heb “and let him appoint.” The jussive form expresses Joseph’s advice to Pharaoh.
3 tn Heb “appointees.” The noun is a cognate accusative of the preceding verb. Since “appoint appointees” would be redundant in English, the term “officials” was used in the translation instead.
4 tn Heb “and he shall collect a fifth of the land of Egypt.” The language is figurative (metonymy); it means what the land produces, i.e., the harvest.
5 tn Heb “all the food.”
6 tn Heb “under the hand of Pharaoh.”
7 tn Heb “[for] food in the cities.” The noun translated “food” is an adverbial accusative in the sentence.
8 tn The perfect with vav (ו) consecutive carries the same force as the sequence of jussives before it.
9 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Joseph) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
10 tn Heb “all the food.”
11 tn Heb “of the seven years which were in the land of Egypt and placed food in the cities.”
