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.
10. And they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond [west of] the Jordan, and there they mourned with a great lamentation and extreme demonstrations of sorrow [according to Egyptian custom]; and [Joseph] made a mourning for his father seven days.
11. When the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning at the floor of Atad, they said, This is a grievous mourning for the Egyptians. Therefore the place was called Abel-mizraim [mourning of Egypt]; it is west of the Jordan.
12. Thus [Jacob's] sons did for him as he had commanded them.
13. For his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, east of Mamre, which Abraham bought, along with the field, for a possession as a burying place from Ephron the Hittite.
14. After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt, he and his brethren and all who had gone up with him.
15. When Joseph's brethren saw that their father was dead, they said, Perhaps now Joseph will hate us and will pay us back for all the evil we did to him.
16. And they sent a messenger to Joseph, saying, Your father commanded before he died, saying,
17. So shall you say to Joseph: Forgive (take up and away all resentment and all claim to requital concerning), I pray you now, the trespass of your brothers and their sin, for they did evil to you. Now, we pray you, forgive the trespass of the servants of your father's God. And Joseph wept when they spoke thus to him.
18. Then his brothers went and fell down before him, saying, See, we are your servants (your slaves)!
19. And Joseph said to them, Fear not; for am I in the place of God? [Vengeance is His, not mine.]