8. Then Judah urged his father Israel: “Let the boy go with me, that we may be off and on our way if you and we and our children are to keep from starving to death.
9. I myself will serve as a guarantee for him. You can hold me responsible for him. If I fail to bring him back and set him before you, I will bear the blame before you forever.
10. Had we not delayed, we could have been there and back twice by now!”
11. Israel their father then told them: “If it must be so, then do this: Put some of the land’s best products in your baggage and take them down to the man as gifts: some balm and honey, gum and resin, and pistachios and almonds.
12. Also take double the money along, for you must return the amount that was put back in the mouths of your bags; it may have been a mistake.
13. Take your brother, too, and be off on your way back to the man.
14. May God Almighty grant you mercy in the presence of the man, so that he may let your other brother go, as well as Benjamin. As for me, if I am to suffer bereavement, I shall suffer it.”
15. So the men took those gifts and double the money and Benjamin. They made their way down to Egypt and presented themselves before Joseph.
16. When Joseph saw them and Benjamin, he told his steward, “Take the men into the house, and have an animal slaughtered and prepared, for they are to dine with me at noon.”
17. Doing as Joseph had ordered, the steward conducted the men to Joseph’s house.
18. But they became apprehensive when they were led to his house. “It must be,” they thought, “on account of the money put back in our bags the first time, that we are taken inside—in order to attack us and take our donkeys and seize us as slaves.”
19. So they went up to Joseph’s steward and talked to him at the entrance of the house.
20. “If you please, sir,” they said, “we came down here once before to buy food.
21. But when we arrived at a night’s encampment and opened our bags, there was each man’s money in the mouth of his bag—our money in the full amount! We have now brought it back.