Esau said to his father, “Do you have only that one blessing, my father? Bless me too!” ¹  Then Esau wept loudly. ² 

Complete my older daughter’s bridal week. ¹  Then we will give you the younger one ²  too, in exchange for seven more years of work.” ³ 

She replied, “Here is my servant Bilhah! Have sexual relations with ¹  her so that she can bear ²  children ³  for me ⁴  and I can have a family through her.” ⁵ 

Then Rachel said, “God has vindicated me. He has responded to my prayer ¹  and given me a son.” That is why ²  she named him Dan. ³ 

Indeed, ¹  you had little before I arrived, ²  but now your possessions have increased many times over. ³  The Lord has blessed you wherever I worked. ⁴  But now, how long must it be before I do something for my own family too?” ⁵ 

The messengers returned to Jacob and said, “We went to your brother Esau. He is coming to meet you and has four hundred men with him.”

then you must say, ¹  ‘They belong ²  to your servant Jacob. ³  They have been sent as a gift to my lord Esau. ⁴  In fact Jacob himself is behind us.’” ⁵ 

When her labor was at its hardest, ¹  the midwife said to her, “Don’t be afraid, for you are having another son.” ² 

There we were, ¹  binding sheaves of grain in the middle of the field. Suddenly my sheaf rose up and stood upright and your sheaves surrounded my sheaf and bowed down ²  to it!”

So he returned to Judah and said, “I couldn’t find her. Moreover, the men of the place said, ‘There has been no cult prostitute here.’”

After three months Judah was told, ¹  “Your daughter-in-law Tamar has turned to prostitution, ²  and as a result she has become pregnant.” ³  Judah said, “Bring her out and let her be burned!”

for I really was kidnapped ¹  from the land of the Hebrews and I have done nothing wrong here for which they should put me in a dungeon.”

Reuben said to them, “Didn’t I say to you, ‘Don’t sin against the boy,’ but you wouldn’t listen? So now we must pay for shedding his blood!” ¹ 

He replied, “You have suggested your own punishment! ¹  The one who has it will become my slave, ²  but the rest of ³  you will go free.” ⁴ 

If you take ¹  this one from me too and an accident happens to him, then you will bring down my gray hair ²  in tragedy ³  to the grave.’ ⁴ 

I will go down with you to Egypt and I myself will certainly bring you back from there. ¹  Joseph will close your eyes.” ² 

Israel said to Joseph, “I never expected ¹  to see you ²  again, but now God has allowed me to see your children ³  too.”

Joseph saw the descendants of Ephraim to the third generation. ¹  He also saw the children of Makir the son of Manasseh; they were given special inheritance rights by Joseph. ² 

They said, “An Egyptian man rescued us ¹  from the shepherds, ²  and he actually ³  drew water for us and watered the flock!”

And now indeed ¹  the cry ²  of the Israelites has come to me, and I have also seen how severely the Egyptians oppress them. ³