1. THEN JOSEPH fell upon his father's face and wept over him and kissed him.
2. And Joseph ordered his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel.
3. Then forty days were devoted [to this purpose] for him, for that is the customary number of days required for those who are embalmed. And the Egyptians wept and bemoaned him [as they would for royalty] for seventy days.
4. And when the days of his weeping and deep grief were past, Joseph said to [the nobles of] the house of Pharaoh, If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, to Pharaoh [for Joseph was dressed in mourning and could not do so himself], saying,
5. My father made me swear, saying, I am about to die; in my tomb which I hewed out for myself in the land of Canaan, there you shall bury me. So now let me go up, I pray you, and bury my father, and I will come again.
6. And Pharaoh said, Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear.
7. And Joseph went up [to Canaan] to bury his father; and with him went all the officials of Pharaoh–the nobles of his court, and the elders of his house and all the nobles and elders of the land of Egypt–
8. And all the household of Joseph and his brethren and his father's household. Only their little ones and their flocks and herds they left in the land of Goshen.
9. And there went with [Joseph] both chariots and horsemen; and it was a very great company.